The Basic Mechanics of Christmas

I don't have a Christmas sermon to write this year. But over the past thirty years, I've written my fair share. Each year the details change and our context is different. But the core message is the same: God is with us. 

Seven years ago, my Christmas sermon turned out to be my last as rector of St. Francis Church in Holden. It was preached in the shadow of the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. Although I preached then on the appointed text from Luke's Gospel, I peaked ahead to Matthew 2:16-18, which is also an important part of the larger Christmas narrative.

One of my "go to" metaphors over the past three decades has been Simon and Garfunkel's "Silent Night/7 O'Clock News." That recording brilliantly juxtaposes the famous Christmas hymn with the actual news from August 3, 1966. It's still worth a listen.

This, for me, is what Christmas is all about. It's that place where heaven and earth meet, not generically but specifically. Here. Now. This is the good news of Emmanuel - God with us not "once upon a time" but right now, wherever the light shines in the darkness.

I find a similar theme in the poetry of Joseph Brodsky, U.S. Poet Laureate in 1991, who wrote a series of Nativity Poems, including December 24, 1971. One of the powerful lines in that poem goes like this:

Herod reigns but the stronger he is, the more sure, the more certain the wonder. In the constancy of this relation is the basic mechanics of Christmas.

Herod reigns. His name changes over time, but the basic mechanics of Christmas and the Incarnation refuses to allow us "spiritualize" the good news. For me this is the core and great heresy and it's alive and well today. In the name of the one who was born in Bethlehem and who died at Golgatha, people bifurcate their faith and their ethics. But that's bad faith. The economy, the environment, and politics have everything to do with Jesus of Nazareth. It matters when people are being held in cages at our southern border. It matters when Palestinians can't travel to Bethlehem to celebrate Christmas. Peace on earth and good will to all people requires of us that we strive for justice and respect the dignity of every human being. Always with God's help.

Herod reigns. And he seems invincible at times. Yet Herod never gets the last word. The more hopeless the world seems, the more clear our wondering of what not only might be, but will be. This is the great mystery of our faith: Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again. We live in the sure and certain hope of the resurrection and in the sure and certain hope that Herod's power has a term limit. So that even as we celebrate the first coming of Jesus, we live in hope for the culmination of human history when every tear is wiped away, and the nations study war no more.

The constancy of this relationship between what is and what will be is indeed the basic mechanics of Christmas. It leads us, in each new year, to the work of Christmas, as the great Howard Thurman once put it. His prayer continues to be my prayer for 2020.

When the song of the angels is stilled, When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry, To release the prisoner, To rebuild the nations, To bring peace among others, To make music in the heart.  

The Reign of Christ

I have a rare Sunday off and did not write a sermon for today, The Last Sunday of Pentecost, also known as "Christ the King" Sunday. These days I prefer to call it The Reign of Christ,. But I've left the sermon below, preached on November 22, 2004, at St. Francis Church in Holden, unedited. I think the themes are still relevant, even if there are no doubt some things I'd say differently today than I did fifteen years ago.  

Today we celebrate the feast of “Christ the King.” But what does it mean for us, as Christians, to say that we worship a king, a king who was executed as an enemy of the state? In a nutshell, that is the great paradox of our faith.

Most of the images and language we use in our worship today—including the hymns—point us toward the future. Our focus is on the culmination of human history, a focus that will continue next weekend on the First Sunday of Advent. That is, we look toward Christ’s victorious return, in glory, to set things right: to the time when every knee shall bend and proclaim Jesus as Lord, and he sets the captives free, and subdues the powers of this world once and for all. That is all about the power of God.

Yet even while we look toward that day, the gospel appointed for today is a Good Friday text, from Luke 23:33-43. It calls our attention not to the Second Coming, but the end of the first one. We are at the place of a skull, Calvary or Golgatha, where this “king of the Jews” is executed between two criminals, one to his right and another on his left. Here the cry, “hail, king of the Jews” is not a cry of the faithful, but an abusive taunt from an angry mob. The crown of thorns on his head has been put there to mock him, not worship him. And yet this plea, from one of the criminals: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Remember me.

So what is this “kingdom?” Too often as Christians we don’t pay enough attention to the ways that Jesus is such a different kind of king than we are used to. Too often we tend to hear these words as if we are talking about a completely different reality from this world, some heavenly realm high above us that is separate from this world where we live and move and have our being.

That can lead to two very different responses when we think about how that kingdom connects to the kingdoms of this world. Some (and they can be found both on the left and on the right) think it is their job to bring their version of Christian power to bear on the world. The thing is that has been tried in Christian history, as in the Holy Roman Empire. Unfortunately when Christians had all the power, they misused it as much as any other kings. The crusades and the inquisition bear witness to the fact that power can corrupt Christians as much as it corrupts anyone.

On the other end of the spectrum is an entirely different approach, one that keeps “heaven” and “earth” as far apart as possible. Faith becomes privatized and spiritualized, a matter only for an hour or so each week. A “wall of separation” develops within us that leads to a kind of spiritual schizophrenia. We can be pious in church, and “realists” in the workplace. Some people would call that hypocrisy

Is there a way beyond that impasse? I think the answer is found if we are willing to reflect on the true meaning of this day and in what it means to call Christ our “king” and our “lord,” as loaded as those words are. To make this claim is to put Jesus first in our lives. That begins as a personal faith claim: Jesus is my lord. But it is also about seeing how Christ is working in the world, how he is lord not only of our lives but "king" of all creation.

What I think needs to change is our understanding of power. We need to hear “king” and “lord” without thinking of medieval British monarchs, even legendary ones like King Arthur who use might for right. We need to let go of our modern version of that—the superhero—who always wins. Jesus lived in a time when he had his own version of that same archetype, the Roman Caesars who could control just about everything.

But when Jesus talks about the Kingdom of God, he doesn’t point to Rome or medieval England or to Superman. Instead, he talks about mustard seeds. Remember? How the tiniest of seeds, watered and nurtured and pruned can become something much larger than anyone could possibly imagine. He tells stories about finding something of great value—like a pearl—and knowing that it matters more than anything else in our lives—so you sell all you have to have it. He reveals the Kingdom of God every time he kisses a leper clean, or makes a blind man see, or speaks with a woman at a well and validates her as a human being. He reveals the Kingdom of God in our very midst whenever the hungry are fed.

Notice how all of the stories about the Kingdom of God are taken from the “real” world. They aren’t synagogue or church language. They are taken from people’s daily lives. They are stories about food, and health, and abundant life—stories about what God is doing in people’s lives. About how the world is sometimes turned upside down and the poor are blessed and the hungry are filled and the naked are clothed.

Those things continue to happen, if we only have eyes to see. If you want to see the Kingdom of God breaking in, then go to the Mustard Seed in Worcester or help out with food distribution at the Wachusett Food pantry. Or spend some time around a Habitat for Humanity work site, or explore mission work with our youth, or at Heifer Project International. That is the work of the Kingdom of God—the work where Christ is still alive and is king of kings and lord of lords. 

Jesus points us toward the world and says “bring good news there.” And then be amazed when amazing things begin to happen. Jesus holds a child before him and says, “do you get it yet?...can you see the world through the eyes of this child?...for until you do, you will not understand the Kingdom of God.” 

So I ask you, with all these kids around here in church school and youth group…are we paying attention to the good news they have to share with us here? Are we seeing ourselves, and our community, through their eyes?

This is Christ the King Sunday. But our “king” comes among us as one who serves. Our “king” dies on a cross. That reveals a very different way to think about power. It is as one preacher (William Sloan Coffin, Jr.) has put it, not about the “love of power, but the power of love.” It’s about God’s power to heal, God’s power to transform, God’s power to forgive and to redeem. Where those things are happening, there is Christ, our king and our God, making all creation new again. There the kingdom, like yeast is making the bread rise, and like salt is giving food its taste.

Christian communities like this one exist to keep that reality alive in a dog-eat-dog world. We are called to love one another, as Christ has loved us. That can sound too easy, until you actually try to love people who drive you crazy and act in some pretty unloveable ways. It’s only easy until someone hurts you. Then those primitive responses kick in: fight or flight. But Jesus, our king, points to a third way: to forgive. Because only forgiveness unlocks the capacity to love again.

So we gather again at the foot of the cross, where Jesus forgives the soldiers who mocked and killed him. Where Jesus forgives the religious authorities who betrayed him and turned him over to the Romans because he unsettled their doctrinal certitude. Where Jesus forgives criminals. Where Jesus forgives you and me. In so doing he opens up another way to live in this world, revealing a kingdom not of this world, but one that we do get glimpses of here and now. If only we have eyes to see.

Truly this is a different kind of king. Truly this is a king worthy of dominion and honor and praise, of our glad and joyful hearts, of our lives, until the kingdom really does come on earth as in heaven. 

Sermon for the 23rd Sunday after Pentecost

On this 23rd Sunday after Pentecost, I am at St. John's Episcopal Church in Ashfield.

There is a lot going on in today’s gospel reading. It feels like the world that Jesus is describing, a declining Roman empire, is coming apart at the seams. It’s coming unglued.

And maybe we can relate to that. We might use some different metaphors, but our own experience with hyper-partisan politics and a planet that is in crisis makes this gospel reading feel like it could be ripped from the day’s headlines. Impeachment hearings, yet another school shooting...the list is long. And it’s scary stuff. 

There is a line in a Bob Dylan song that goes like this: “it’s not dark yet, but it’s getting there.” It’s on an album called Time Out of Mind that was released twenty years ago. For me, that line speaks to our situation and the situation of today’s gospel reading: it’s not dark yet, but it’s getting there.

So there are lots of sermons, I suppose, to be preached on today’s gospel reading and perhaps many of them are about trying to articulate how Episcopalians might talk about apocalyptic theology in our own accent, different from southern Baptist ways of doing so. I’ve probably preached a dozen sermons like that myself over three decades of ordained ministry.

But what I noticed this time around as I prepared to come and be with you is that while most of what Jesus offers in today’s gospel reading is descriptive of that reality, hidden in plain sight are four prescriptive lines. To put it another way, Jesus describes what’s going on in a world that is coming apart, but he also offers four specific imperatives about how to respond to that reality. And for me, there is good news in that advice that is worth paying attention to.

What are we supposed to do when we notice that it’s dark out and getting darker still? Curse the darkness? No. We have been here before. By “we” I mean the people called to follow Jesus. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Throughout history, Christians have lit candles to remember that even one small candle can throw enough light, once our eyes adjust, to find our way in the dark.

Somebody around here will drag out the Advent wreath in a couple of weeks, and one at a time, we’ll light those candles, here and in congregations across this Commonwealth, as our ancestors have been doing from generation to generation. Why? Because we know/we trust/we believe/we affirm/we insist/we hope that the light still shines in the darkness, and that the darkness will not overcome it. This is our work – to let our little lights shine in and through us, in the neighborhood.

With all that in mind, I call your attention to those four imperatives in today’s gospel reading. Jesus is addressing his disciples – that includes us – about how to navigate through times like this. He says:

• Beware that you are not led astray;
• Do not be terrified;
• This will give you an opportunity to testify; 
• By your endurance you will gain your souls.

Do not be led astray. It’s so easy to get lost when the world is a mess. It’s so easy to lose sleep, and get distracted, and get sucked in, and forget who we are and where we are and what we are called to be about. In so many other places in Scripture, Jesus says that he is the Way. My favorite of those is when Jesus is telling the disciples about how to be faithful when he’s gone and that they know the way and Thomas says, “no we don’t, Lord, we are just not as smart as you sometimes think we are!” And Jesus says, stick with me, Thomas: I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life. Follow me. That is how we avoid being “led astray.” That is how we keep from getting lost. We keep our eyes on the prize. We stay close to Jesus.

Do not be terrified. Terror is paralyzing. When we are scared we often just spin our wheels. So repeat after me: do not be afraid. I am told on good authority that those words appear in scripture 365 times, once for every day of the year. Usually they are on the lips of some angel or another, but today they are spoken by Jesus himself. Those with ears to hear, need to hear. Because we do no good toward the glory of God when the terror moves from the world to take residence in our heads. Or in our guts. It will corrode from the inside out. We do no good toward the glory of God or toward mending the brokenness of this world if we are so terrorized that we unwittingly participate in the mess. So, do not be terrified. Jesus is Lord. We belong first, and foremost, to God. And She’s got the whole world in Her hands. God is not anxious. Brokenhearted? No doubt. Angry? Good Biblical evidence to say, highly likely. But not anxious. God knows how the story ends: with peace on earth and good will toward all. 

When the world is coming unglued, and we stop being afraid, this gives us an opportunity to testify. Now that’s a word that needs to be unpacked, but it’s a very Biblical idea in both old and new testaments. Walter Brueggemann’s big tome on the theology of the Old Testament is called: Testimony, Dispute, Advocacy. I don’t want to go down a rabbit hole too far on that – I’ll have to come back here again for that! But very briefly, Brueggemann compares testimony to sitting in a courtroom and trying to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing about the truth. We don’t need to stand on a street corner with a tract in our hands!

But what we do need to do is to rescue that word because the world needs us to tell the truth in a world of lies. We testify to what we have seen and heard and know of the love of Jesus, for all the little children of the world. That testimony means that we will not be silent when children are locked in cages. We testify to the truth that we are a people who respect the dignity of every human being, no matter what. Our testimony demands that we will not be divided by race or creed or sexual orientation – or stand by when others do that. That we will work for justice and peace until we take our very last breath. Testimony is like that sign I saw on your church, facing Main Street, that tells the world that you follow the way of love. 

Testimony is about not only words, but actions. When we stop being afraid, and anxious, it allows us to access our brains so we aren’t responding like reptiles to every crisis. And to soften our hearts so that we can be witnesses who testify to the truth. That truth still sets us free, and also offers hope for the world. When we fearlessly persist, with God’s help, the light shines in the darkness.

And then, that’s it, right? Add water and stir and we get peace on earth and good will to all! Only five weeks to the dear Savior’s birth, and Dylan can write the next verse: it’s getting lighter out! Gosh those Christians are good!

We know how the story ends. But it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Actually it’s like one of those super-marathons which I can barely even fathom. It’s forty years in the Sinai Desert. It’s longer than that in Babylon after the exile. It may feel like Narnia for a while, where it’s always winter and never Christmas. And so the fourth word from Jesus: endurance. By your endurance, you will gain your souls.

I suspect that this may be the hardest word of all in a society that not only loves technical fixes but loves quick instant technical fixes. And we are they. When I have to stand in a line for more than a minute and a half, I start looking ahead to see what could be fixed – who is not doing their job – or what customer is gumming up the works. Whether I’m in a bank or a restaurant or a grocery store or a big church where it’s taking too long to administer the sacrament, I know for sure how I could make it more efficient if given the chance.

The existential and cosmic challenges we are facing at this moment in history are not like that, however. They require deep, adaptive, fundamental changes that are not going to happen fast. And they require communities to change, not just charismatic leaders to fix things. As that (other) theologian from New Jersey puts it, it’s gonna be a long walk home.

So we have to figure out how to live in the meantime. How to endure. How to be resilient. How to support each other along the way. How to be courageous ourselves and to en-courage one another. How to make that long journey by putting one foot in front of the other. By endurance we discover and rediscover who we are, and whose we are.

I don’t need to have the last word here today. We get texts like this in the weeks ahead. Christ the King and the first week of Advent are about asking these same kinds of questions: what do we do in a world where it feels very dark right now? The truth is that we have to learn how to find our way in the dark. We can also light one candle. And then another. And then another. And then yet another.

We walk by faith and as we get our bearings, we commit to sticking with Jesus. We hold hands, so as not to be so terrified. We testify to the Light of the world and seek that light in our own lives. And then, slowly but with purpose and conviction and hope, we begin to move. One step at a time. Together. We know, and we believe, and we trust that these ordeals and sufferings produce endurance. And endurance produces character. And character produces hope. And hope does not disappoint us. Hope does not disappoint, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. (See Romans 5:3-4)

These days are an opportunity, and an invitation, to remember who we are and whose we are, and what we are called to be about. Do not lose heart!

For All The Saints!

This weekend as we celebrate The Feast of All Saints, I am at St. Stephen's in Pittsfield, one of our parishes at the beginning of a clergy transition.

All Saints is one of my very favorite days of the year. There are two main themes as I see it. First, it is a reiteration of our Easter faith: death never gets the last word. We are a people who make our song, even at the grave. Allelulia. Alleluia. Alleluia. And second, our alleluia song is sung by a great choir that includes those who have gone before us: saints like Francis of Assisi and Julian of Norwich. Stephen, of course, the first martyr. And countless others. But also those saints remembered by us today who left their mark on us – the ones you can meet at shops or at tea or over a cup of coffee. Those who taught us the faith and introduced us to Jesus. Take a moment to invite them in today, to join us as we gather in this thin place...

...my paternal grandmother, Esther Simpson, is one of the saints in my life. In addition to being my father’s mother, she is one of those people who helped to raise me into the full stature of Christ. She belonged to an independent Baptist congregation. She showed me how to love the Bible as a way to better know and follow Jesus. She read her Bible every day, using a resource called “Our Daily Bread” along with her King James Bible. When the message for the day struck her in a particular way she would clip it and send it to me with a note at college. She taught me to use the Bible and not to be afraid of it; the pages of hers were tattered and worn from use. She never heard (as far as I know) of a “lectionary” as a plan for reading the Bible in her congregation and her church didn’t use scripture inserts. I think she would have been suspicious. Everyone was expected to bring their Bible along to worship. Over the course of her life she must have read the Bible cover-to-cover many times over. The stories were real to her and through her they became real to me.

As far as I can trust my memory, I have to say that I don’t remember ever studying anything from the Book of Daniel in my Methodist Sunday School or for that matter even (sadly) in my Old Testament classes in seminary. Daniel was too often treated among mainline Protestants as an embarrassment—the Old Testament equivalent of the Book of Revelation—and the two of them together were viewed as something like inviting John the Baptist to a wine and cheese reception. But my grandmother loved Daniel: for her they were stories of resistance and hope.

So she would tell me about Daniel in the lion’s den. Do you know the story? About how all the king’s men established an ordinance and issued a decree about prayer and that anyone who didn’t pray to the king would be thrown into the lion’s den. But Daniel refused to follow such an unjust edict. He showed courage and defied the decree, trusting in the Lord. When he was thrown into the lion’s den as a punishment, the lions miraculously lost their appetites.

She would tell me that great story about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego (also in Daniel) who also refused to worship false gods and for their obedience to the true God they were thrown into a fiery furnace to be burned alive. The king was so filled with rage that he ordered the furnace turned up seven times more than was customary and they were thrown into the blazing fire. But guess what? They were protected!

As a kid I wanted to know whether or not these stories were true, by which I meant simply did it really happen like that? That question was, I think, disconcerting to my grandmother, who would assure me that they had happened just like that, something I found hard to believe then and now. But as a 56-year old adult who has been at this work of ordained ministry for more than three decades, I am way less concerned today about whether or not these stories are literally true anymore. It doesn’t matter to me if they “happened” because I am profoundly aware that stories like this are “true” in ways that go way beyond reporting current events.

The world of Daniel is a world of imperial power: a world of decrees and secret police and authorizations and having your “papers in order.” That language permeates the text. And the big question being raised in that context is this one: what does it mean to be a person of faith in such a world? How can you hold onto your faith in a hostile world that is not your true home? How does one resist the government when the government is wrong? Where does our true allegiance lie? 

All Saints Day is as good a time as any to remember that we are Christians together with people all around the world. When I was in Holden we developed a strong relationship with the Church in El Salvador through a group called Cristosal. This began when we did a capital campaign and raised some money - I think in the neighborhood of $350,000 or so. The vestry was committed to mission and said if we were going to spend that kind of money on ourselves we needed to give at least 10% of it away. It turns out that there are a lot of groups interested in receiving gifts of $35,000 or so. We settled on Cristosal but with a catch. They told us they didn't just want our money. They wanted us to walk with them, to accompany them, to get to know them as fellow pilgrims on this journey. To break down some walls. And so we began sending groups down there...

Among those who went were Tom and Dianne Wilson. Flash forward to the day that Tom and Dianne are sitting in my office, telling me they are going to quit their jobs and become missionaries to El Salvador. They are going to move down there, and take this whole "accompanying" thing quite seriously and literally. I was blown away and had so much respect for that faithful decision.  

I tell you this story because yesterday, Dianne was ordained a deacon in our diocese at Christ Church, Rochdale. I tell you this because the lives of the saints are woven together and through Dianne, and Tom, and through Noah Bullock who is the son of the priest in charge in Easthampton, we are barely one degree apart from people who have lived in a world where Daniel's context is the reality of their lives, as it is in so many parts of this world. They are our brothers and sisters in Christ. And the mess in their country is very much a product of decades of US foreign policy that has led to chaos and to people seeking a better life in this country even as we keep trying to build walls to keep them out.

The history of Central America is a world not so different from Daniel’s, a world that has known too often of corrupt and powerful governments intent on destroying the creatures of God. In the face of decrees and secret police and “authorizations,” and disappearances and torture, the faith of people like Oscar Romero and the Jesuit martyrs stands as a witness not very different from that of Daniel or of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego: of a faith that was willing, day after day, to stand up for what is right. To be courageous even in the face of violence and degradation. To choose hope over fear. And they are a part of us, and we are a part of them, among a great cloud of witnesses that worships the Lamb on this day and forever and forever and forever. 

Daniel is, as one scholar puts it, “about resisting the dominant imperial power structures.” It is a subversive text about non-violent resistance. It’s about being able to keep your identity by defining who you are as a child of God, over and against the ways that the empire tries to define you. Living your faith in such a world can literally make you feel crazy sometimes. I think that is what is going on in the seventh chapter of Daniel, in the reading we heard today. Daniel (like Joseph before him and Martin after him) is a dreamer. He lies down in bed and has these dreams about how one day righteousness will flow like an ever-flowing stream. He has this dream of a world where every human being is treated with dignity and respect and where people strive for justice. He has this dream of a world that I imagine is quite similar to what Jesus describes in the Sermon on the Mount: Blessed are the poor, and the hungry, and those who weep…

And yet Daniel also has this recurring nightmare. Imperial power can literally make you crazy. Threatening the dream of God are these visions in his head that terrify Daniel, and trouble his spirit, and keep him tossing and turning in his bed. The beasts (that is to say, kings who misuse their power and wreak havoc on God’s people) are an ever-present reality for Daniel; a part of his everyday life. So ultimately this text before us today is no different than the story of the lion’s den or the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. It asks the question of where your allegiance really lies. It dares to insist that we live by our dreams rather than our nightmares, because we belong to God. While acknowledging that the world can be a dangerous and even terrifying place, the encouragement in Daniel is that God’s people are called to stand tall and to not be afraid and to model an alternative way of life that is truly life giving. Ultimately the good news in this text is that the “holy ones of the Most High shall receive the kingdom and possess the kingdom for ever—for ever and ever!” (Daniel 7:18)

So I think that makes Daniel a great text for this holy day. We remember those who have gone before us, including our own dear ones who told us the “old, old stories” along the way. We remember Sunday school teachers and pastors who gave us the gift of faith, sometimes in ways they may not even been aware of. We have received all of that as a gift, or as St. Paul says in today’s epistle, as an inheritance. The saints in our lives (or at least in my life) were not perfect. But in the end we give thanks for the gifts given and shared with us that call us to join this great cloud of witnesses.

Saints like Archbishop Romero, assassinated while at the altar celebrating the Eucharist and resisting the forces of evil, are here with us, along with all those whose names are known to us alone. And all whose names have maybe been forgotten by us (but never forgotten by God)—that great cloud of white-robed martyrs who have gone the way of a great ordeal; they are here, too. They, too, are a part of us, part of the communion of saints. Part of this cloud of witnesses. We sing today for all of them and with all of them.

And that one holy, catholic and apostolic Church is about to include a new generation of saints as people are baptized this weekend across this diocese, since this is one of the days that the BCP prefers for baptisms to happen. They represent the next generation of Christian witnesses whose job it will be to let Christ show forth in their lives as the Church continues its work. We promise to uphold them in their faith, and to teach them the stories that we have been taught, and to show them how to love even those with whom they disagree; how even to love their enemies. In just a moment we will renew our own baptismal promises so that we can be clear on how it is we do that, which always begins by remembering who we are, and whose we are. 

Some days it is hard to know exactly where we are called to resist and how. We live in a world where there really are powers and principalities that corrupt and destroy the creatures of God. And those powers make it hard to be courageous and brave. Sometimes it’s hard for us let our better angels guide us, to let our dreams (rather than our night terrors) guide our decisions and our actions in the world. One thing I know for sure, though: we cannot do that alone. Every time we celebrate Holy Baptism, but especially in the context of All Saints, we remember that we are in this together by the grace of God. And that we have been claimed, and marked, and sealed. We are sent out with that in mind. 

The work we share is to keep articulating the dream of God and to hold up that vision as true and holy. Our work is to become those “holy ones” of God in this time and place who know that Jesus is truly lord of the universe. Not perfect, but holy in the sense of knowing where our allegiance lies. Our job is to become a people who live by faith rather than fear, so that the world might believe, until the kingdom comes on earth as it is in heaven. Forever and forever and forever.

The B*I*B*L*E

Today I am at St. Mark's in Leominster. The day's readings can be found here. My sermon is on the Epistle for the day, which is pretty rare for me. Rarer still is that this is a kind of "teaching sermon" about the Bible and a kind of theological reflection on how to read Scripture which I've had some fun with, and which I hope is helpful to both hearers at St. Mark's and readers here. 

What does it mean to say that “all scripture is inspired by God,” as we heard today in our reading from Second Timothy? (3:16) A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, I learned a song in Vacation Bible School that perhaps some of you learned as well. I won’t sing it for you. But the words go like this:

                   The B*I*B*L*E

                   Yes, that’s the book for me.

                   I stand alone on the Word of God,

                   The B*I*B*L*E

I stand alone on the Word of God.  It seems obvious to me (at least in hindsight) that this was intended as a double-entendre. Not only was the song claiming “Scripture alone” as the sole authority in matters of faith, but I think it also means to convey a sense that in a hostile world, where Biblical truth must be defended at every turn, the true believer stands alone in this world. Or at least is very lonely a lot of the time.

All scripture is inspired by God. Notice that it does it say that “scripture alone” settles every matter as the sole authority for Christians. It’s not like the bumper sticker that says: God said it. I believe it. That settles it. Nor does it say that all scripture is literally true. Rather, it says that all scripture is inspired. The Greek word used here is theo-pneustos; “God-breathed.” In the Gentile culture in which this text was written, that word could be used to describe what happened at the Delphic oracles, where messages were given by the gods. In other words, it is not an exclusively Christian or Jewish word. Nevertheless, for those early hearers of this verse (raised in the Jewish tradition) you couldn’t hear this word without thinking back to Genesis 2: about how God had made the mud-creature, the adam, from Mother Earth and then breathed life into that creature to make it live. I think that is how Scripture is inspired: even here, even now, as we gather together at the Table: God is breathing life into these ancient texts. So they become not just an interesting history lesson but a living, inspired, Word for us.

The Catechism found in The Book of Common Prayer (one of our least utilized treasures) says that we call scripture “the Word of God because God inspired their human authors and because God still speaks to us through the Bible.” It’s practically a mini-sermon on Second Timothy!

Then, notice those two big words in the rest of that sixteenth verse: so that. Why do we look to the inspired Word of God? So that “everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.” 

I continue to believe that Karl Barth got it right when he reminded us that the Word of God is not just the collection of texts in the Bible, however. The Word of God is Jesus Christ, the Word-made-flesh.  The Bible is always pointing beyond the words to that living Word, the person of Jesus. To say that another way, we worship Jesus Christ; not the Bible. We stand, together, with Jesus, traveling on the way of love. 

The Bible is most definitely authoritative for us as Episcopalians. Along with tradition and reason it points us to Jesus, our Savior—the One who calls us to be his disciples and to follow him. But it needs to be read and learned and marked and inwardly digested for that to happen, for it to show us the face of Jesus. And it needs to be read in community. I think that if I had to say one thing about the Bible it would be this: that along with the Sacraments it forms and shapes a people after God’s own heart, an Easter people who, as today’s gospel reading from Luke puts it, “are praying constantly and not losing heart.”

This fall we’ve been reading from both letters to Timothy: in September from 1 Timothy and in October from 2 Timothy. Taken together, these two epistles (along with Titus) are sometimes called “the Pastoral Epistles.” They are not written by Timothy but addressed to him, from an old, wise pastor named “Paul” who is nearing the end of his life. Scholars are pretty much in agreement that Paul himself didn’t actually write these epistles. Rather, they were penned by another inspired writer, probably one of Paul’s disciples trying to apply Pauline thought to a new context. The pastoral epistles are a depository for the traditions of the early decades of the church’s life; a “sound teaching” that can be handed on to the next generation of Christians. In the verses we heard today, the writer is encouraging Timothy to continue to grow in faith, “to continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it.”

It’s a little ambiguous when it comes to the word “whom” in that last sentence: “knowing from whom you learned it.” Some manuscripts have the masculine-singular pronoun in Greek, which seems to point to St. Paul as Timothy’s teacher. In other words, apostolic faith is being passed along from Paul to Timothy; that is how and why it can be trusted. But other early manuscripts are plural. What might that mean? You may recall the reading two weeks ago where we heard some lovely reminiscences about how Timothy’s faith first lived in his grandmother, Lois, and then in his mother, Eunice. (See 2 Timothy 1:5) Those who argue that these are the better manuscripts argue that this “whom” refers back and reminds Timothy that faith is learned in community—not just one-on-one—and that Lois and Eunice are as important to Timothy’s journey of faith as Paul was.

I want to linger on this point for a few minutes in the days leading up to All Saints Day, because I think it illustrates how it is that Scripture may be “inspired.” I think of my own grandmother, Esther, who loved the Bible. And Katharine, my Sunday School teacher in what was essentially a one-room school house at the Hawley United Methodist Church when I was growing up. And many, many others along the way from whom I learned to love the Bible and get hooked by it in ways that have been life changing and life giving. Our work is both to receive and learn the faith from others and to give thanks for their witness. But also to pass it on and to teach it to the next generation. For me, at least, it was not agreeing with their interpretation that mattered most but falling in love with the Bible.

There is a tendency in our time to want to have Scripture settle big questions. God said it. I believe it. That settles it. There are versions of this on both the right and on the left, by the way. One puts all its faith in a literalistic interpretation of the text while the other side believes that higher criticism will lead us to discover “what really happened.”  But both are forms of idolatry. In a complex world, what if the best response to a good question is a better question, not a simplistic answer? And what it the Bible isn’t intended to “settle” arguments at all, but to invite us into holy conversations? You might even say, to inspire us into holy arguments.  

The authority issue is not settled just because we say that God speaks through scripture, tradition, and reason. We still have to sift through all of that. We still need to pray and discern. And since my life-experiences and your life-experiences are not identical we will always hear and see texts differently. As we engage it, as we mark it and learn it, we are changed for good. That process is in-spiring. God breathes through it all!

Just as we could all go to see a film or a play together and see it differently, so also with Scripture. One example: it makes a difference when you hear the story of the Prodigal Son how you find your way into the story. Maybe you see yourself as more like the older brother, feeling over-burdened with responsibilities and maybe a tad self-righteous. Or maybe you feel lost like the younger brother, trying to muster up the courage to get up and go home again. Or maybe, like the father in that story, you are trying to faithfully love two kids who are so very different. The goal isn’t to flatten it all down into one moralistic single meaning. Rather, that powerful story is ever-new and has many layers of meaning. As God breathes meaning into it and into us, it has the power to change our lives. What happens when we learn to celebrate the fact that Biblical interpretation is more like reading poetry than going on an archeological dig?

We don’t get the “definitive biography of Jesus” or one doctrine of the atonement from Scripture. We get four gospels, four witnesses, four portraits of the One we call “the Christ” seen in slightly different ways, from different angles. Why is that? Which of those four portraits is true? Is it Mark’s “rebel” or John’s “mystic” who is one with the Father?” Well if all Scripture is inspired—if God breathes through all four gospels—then a faithful reading of the Scriptures needs to deal with that pluralism and diversity of perspectives. We don’t put it all into a blender and homogenize in search of the historical Jesus. Rather, we allow each to speak the truth that they bring to the table.

God-breathed words are endlessly new. God is in the mix, and especially in the conversation that ensues when two or three gather around a text and Christ is present, and community is formed. Over the years, in countless Bible studies, I have found people turning to me with their questions, in search of the “right” answer. I am constantly trying, with God’s help, to give that work back to the group and to discover what others see that I may not see. Of course I have some skills developed by theological training and some knowledge of Biblical languages. But that doesn’t lead to a monopoly on the truth of what any text is saying. Each of us has both insights and blind spots.  

I think the great challenge for the Church is to let Scripture form a community that can not only live with, but one that celebrates ambiguity and paradox. Scripture invites us into the holy mess of the real world, where Jesus is still present. Scripture invites us into a community of faith that is meant to be a little contentious. But in all of that we are called, by name, into a loving relationship with God and with one another. We are called to follow Jesus on the way of love.

I want to teach the next generation of kids a new song about the Bible, but I’ll need your help. I’ve only got a first draft and I know it isn’t catchy yet. It needs music and a poetic editor. But the theology of it goes something like this:

                  

The B*I*B*L*E…yes, that is the book for us.

We stand together, servants of Jesus, the Word-made-flesh.

We are seekers of truth, committed to reading, marking, learning and inwardly digesting Holy Scripture until, by the grace of God we become the people of God. Until we become witnesses of the Stories that reflect our own stories – mirrors that tell us who we are. And whose we are.

Instruments of God's Peace

I am here today, Holy Spirit, Sutton - to talk with you about St. Francis of Assisi, parking lots, and signs. In that order.

From 1998-2013 I served as the rector of the only parish in our diocese that bears the name of St. Francis. When I went to Holden, I knew that statue in the garden and I knew he kind-of-sort-of-but-not-really wrote a prayer about being an instrument of God’s peace. But during my fifteen years at St. Francis, we became close friends. I read at least four biographies on him and blessed a lot of animals, including donkeys and snakes. Over the years, as I got to know him better. I started calling him Frank.

There are two “snapshots” in Frank’s life that you may or may not know about. I think they take us deeper into the witness of this guy before he was talking with the birds and I want to tell you about those today.

Francis lived in the latter days of the twelfth century, in the Umbrian town of Assisi, half-way between Rome and Florence. Assisi sits on a hill and it’s obvious that the narrow streets were built long before the automobile. In 1182, an infant boy was baptized in the cathedral font of Assisi. His mother was a religious person who decided to name her son after John the Baptist, the one who “prepared the way” for Jesus. He was therefore christened “Giovanni,” the Italian version of John.

Francesco was the nickname given to him by his father. Francesco means “little Frenchman.” Assisi was moving from a feudal society to a mercantile society. Giovanni’s father was a cloth trader who traveled regularly on business to France. Presumably it was because of his dad’s love for all things French that he picked up the nickname, which stuck.  Francis may have even traveled with his dad on a business trip in his teenage years. If he did, then he would have seen a new cathedral being built in Paris that would be named for the mother of our Lord: Notre Dame.

By all accounts, little Giovanni/Francesco was a spoiled rich kid. It can happen when parents are upwardly mobile. They sometimes indulge their children so that they will have the “opportunities” they never had. His father expected him to follow in his path in the family business. Something happened, though—it’s not clear what—that led to a change in his worldview. Some say he came down with an illness that left him bedridden for a long period of time. In any case, he ended up in the military, wanting to become a knight. It left a mark on him as military service usually does. Two “core values” for knights were a commitment to largesse, i.e. to give freely, and to always be courteous. Yes, sir. No thank you ma’am. I mention that because as profoundly shaped as Francesco would be by the gospel, these military values also played a role in shaping who he was becoming, and in fact dove-tailed with his reading of the gospel.

Then Francis has this powerful religious awakening in the church in San Damiano. While praying, he hears Christ calling to him “Francesco, repave the parking lot! Make a new sign!” (Just kidding; I’m wanting to make sure you are still awake!) What he heard was, “rebuild my church.” He takes that literally at first and starts to do some much needed repairs.

The moment of ultimate conflict in Francesco’s life comes soon after, as he starts to take his faith more and more seriously and he realizes that “rebuilding the church” is about something more than repairs to the building. His father calls the bishop, a personal friend, to talk some sense into the boy who was beginning to spend a little too much time at church. Part of what was happening is that he was being very generous with his father’s hard-earned money. All of this brings us to that first “snapshot” – a defining moment in his life.

In the upper church in Assisi there is a fresco that I stood in front of when I was there, trying to imagine the turmoil and the sense of shame and betrayal that both father and son must have felt that day in the public square as Francesco went, shall we say, “al fresco.” He takes off all his clothes and he gives them back to his father and tells him he wants nothing to do with him anymore, that he has only one father, his father in heaven. There is such humanity and pathos in that scene. And even if he is a much-beloved saint, I think we make a mistake if we turn Francis into the hero of this moment and his father into the devil. I imagine his dad, especially within his context of a changing world where there were increasing opportunities for those willing to work hard as honestly wanting the very best for his “little Frenchman.” He must have been devastated. The problem is that father and son don’t see eye-to-eye on what is best. Their core values clash and Francis has to live the life he believes God is calling him to, not his father’s dreams. I have often wondered if this isn’t a kind of inverted story of the prodigal son: instead of the father running out to embrace the son, Francesco’s father seems almost to be recoiling. Who is this kid and what has happened to him?

As a parent I can’t help but to feel some empathy for the father. That isn’t the same as saying he was right: we raise our kids in order to let them become adults who will find their own path to God and their own way in the world. When we baptize them we are giving them back to God and trusting that they won’t do that alone. But they are never meant to be our clones. Moments like this one are so hard, not just for father and son (not to mention the bishop) but for all the rest of us who are eavesdropping on a family matter being played out in the town square. It’s a sad and heart-wrenching moment. At least to me it is. Yet I think it surely must also have been a defining moment in Francis’ spiritual journey. For Francis, at the heart of the gospel was a call to embrace poverty as a way to share in Christ’s suffering. His father simply couldn’t understand that after all the sacrifices he had made to make life better for his son. And so father and son go their separate ways. There is no evidence that they ever reconciled.

Snapshot 2: in 1219, Francis heads off to the Middle East during the time of the Crusades. War is always hell, but the Crusades were particularly brutal, as perhaps only religious conflicts are. Yet Francis goes down to Egypt to the sultan’s palace to meet with a caliph who is roughly the same age as he is—late thirties. The Muslim leader (most likely a Sufi mystic) is fond of religious poetry, intellectually curious, and on good terms with the merchants of Venice. The two men meet and Francis tries to convert him to Christianity. That doesn’t happen, but they depart in peace and on good terms. In the heart of the Islamic world, in the middle of the Crusades, Francis bears witness to the love of God he knew in Jesus. But he also listens and treats the other with dignity and respect.

The word crusader literally means “he who bears the cross.” In the twelfth century and to this very day, however, that word sends chills down the spines of people who remember the atrocities done in the name of Christ and in the name of the cross, especially in the Muslim world. Our language is so easily manipulated in times of war, isn’t it?  Yet Francis bore witness in the midst of all of that to another way. He was the true crusader: for him the “way of the cross” meant the way of mutual respect and conversation, being an instrument of peace in a world gone mad, living with hope for the dawn of a new day. Never lording it over someone else. Following the path of love.

So there you have it: a public rift with his father and a private encounter with a Muslim in the Middle East, trying to bring peace on earth and good will to all. We are all complicated, aren’t we? Francis was no exception. So many of us come here today knowing how Francis loves all creatures great and small, and that his life was a kind of prayer (even if he did not actually write those words) about being an instrument of God’s peace. “Where there is hatred, let us sow love” and all that.

But in these two snapshots I see humanity and risk and the reality of how hard that can sometimes be. The snapshots could have been otherwise: his father could have “embraced him in a reenactment of the story of the prodigal son. The sultan could have told Francis to go to hell, or worse. But each stands as a witness, I think, of what it means to “rebuild the Church” once we get the physical plant in order. It’s about vulnerability. It’s about relationships. It’s about risk. It’s about the way of the cross, which is the way of love. The word “crusader” may beyond reclaiming. But we should at least notice that it doesn’t mean what the culture said it meant, even in Francis’ time.  The way of the cross is not about lording it over others, or invading their country or telling them what god they must believe in. It’s about bearing the sign of the cross as a sign of our own weakness and vulnerability. And yet also as a sign of hope. As we heard today from St. Paul, “may we never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Galatians 6:14)

We have an opportunity to be cross-bearers whenever we stand with the poor and the vulnerable. Like Francis, we may sometimes travel to distant places in order to be instruments of peace and agents of reconciliation. But like Francis, we do well to remember that sometimes the much harder work is in reaching across the kitchen table or in the public square. Sometimes the work of reconciliation that is needed most is the work of healing the rifts that emerge between father and son, or mother and daughter, or brother and sister. Sometimes the work of reconciliation is hardest of all in a parish church, which falls somewhere between family and international conflicts. We expect that congregations will be places where love is made manifest. But the truth is that wherever two or three gather together in Christ’s name there is sure to be conflict.

Yet that’s never the last word. As instruments of Christ’s peace we are called to be people who seek more to understand than to be understood. Like Francis and Andrew and John and all the rest, in every generation, we are called to rebuild the Church. I love what you have done in this worship space. I have no doubt there are still some who miss the pews, but walking in here are outward and visible signs that this is no longer two parishes but one, guided by the Holy Spirit. I give God thanks for that. As for the parking lot! Let me be clear – I don’t usually go around telling parishes to focus on parking lots. But yours was pretty sad and what always bothered me was that there was good ministry happening here, but the neighbors would have a hard time imagining that. And also it was dangerous to drive my car up here!

Sometimes the work of rebuilding the Church, as in San Damiano and so also here, is literal. New signs and new parking lots are outward and visible signs of the inward and spiritual grace that is happening here. 

I give thanks for it all today: for Francis, the new parking lot and your sign – in that order. For Laura and your wardens and the vestry here and for the work that Lisa also did to help birth this new parish. 

Above all, I give thanks for all of you, doing the work that God has given you to do, that work of healing and reconciliation in a world so desperately in need. I am grateful for your witness to this part of God’s kingdom as people walking the way of the cross.

Lord, you searched me, and you know

I am not preaching anywhere this weekend. I think this Sunday (sometimes called "Homecoming" or "Welcome Back" in places where people tend to be away during much of the summer) is one that diocesan clergy tend to keep for themselves, kind of like Christmas and Easter. So I didn't have any invitations to be anywhere, which is actually kind of nice (especially after a busier than usual summer of commitments.)

Even without a sermon to write, I find myself reflecting this morning on Psalm 139, which will be prayed in congregations using Track 1 for the Old Testament today. (See the Revised Common Lectionary readings here.)

Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17 Domine, probasti

1 Lord, you have searched me out and known me; *
you know my sitting down and my rising up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.

2 You trace my journeys and my resting-places *
and are acquainted with all my ways.

3 Indeed, there is not a word on my lips, *
but you, O Lord, know it altogether.

4 You press upon me behind and before *
and lay your hand upon me.

5 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; *
it is so high that I cannot attain to it.

12 For you yourself created my inmost parts; *
you knit me together in my mother's womb.

13 I will thank you because I am marvelously made; *
your works are wonderful, and I know it well.

14 My body was not hidden from you, *
while I was being made in secret
and woven in the depths of the earth.

15 Your eyes beheld my limbs, yet unfinished in the womb;
all of them were written in your book; *
they were fashioned day by day,
when as yet there was none of them.

16 How deep I find your thoughts, O God! *
how great is the sum of them!

17 If I were to count them, they would be more in number than the sand; *
to count them all, my life span would need to be like yours.

Robert Alter calls this "one of the most remarkably introspective psalms in the canonical collection." He translates the opening words even more directly than the version above: "Lord, you searched me, and You know." 

I imagine that there are times in our lives, times perhaps when we feel ashamed of some choice or another, that the God-from-whom-no-secrets-are-hid scares us. But that is not where this poet is going. To be known, truly known, is to be loved. And to be loved is to be able to live more fully, and more gracefully.

In the decade or so that I served as an EfM mentor, I came across something called the The Johari Window, an image that has continued to intrigue me these many years later. It looks like this:

I think it's fairly self explanatory, but it's very been very helpful to me over the years. There are parts of us that we know and others know: who we are in the public arena.The kind of stuff that may make it into our obituaries or be shared at our funerals. It's important, yet maybe not the most interesting part of our personalities.

There is also the stuff we don't know about ourselves even though pretty much everyone else does: our blind spots. In my work I encounter this frequently with clergy and congregations,and it can cut in both directions. People can love us in spite of something we don't know about ourselves or because of something we don't know about ourselves. It can be sweet, like we don't have any idea how gifted we really are in some area. Or it can be maddening, like we have no idea how obnoxious we sound. Either way, there are things we don't know about ourselves that, if we asked, a friend would be more than happy to tell us!

Then there is that stuff that we know about ourselves, but keep hidden from others. Again, this can be good stuff - talents we don't want to share openly, perhaps. So we sing in the shower and we do it well, but only there. Or it can be things that we are afraid might make people think less of us; we tell ourselves that if they ever found out, then we'd be all alone. As Billy Joel once hauntingly asked, "did you ever let your lover see the stranger in yourself?" This part of the window is fittingly called facade, the stuff we know only too well about ourselves but either intentionally or unintentionally hide from others.

But to me the most interesting box is what is unknown. Unknown to us, no matter how well we think we know ourselves. Unknown to others, no matter how much of an open book we may be. Only God knows. Lord, you have searched me. And you know.

I fully realize the psalmist does not know about Johari's window. But I think the deep level of introspection of this psalm leads to that place. This pray-er fully understands that God knows us better than even those who love us deeply know us. And God knows us better than we know ourselves. That, I think, is what the poet is reflecting on in this prayer. God knows. And God loves. The One who knit us together in our mother's wombs did so with love. It is an amazing thing to be truly known even when we do not understand ourselves some days, or why we act as we do.

God knows us in ways that are too high for us to attain. We will never fully know ourselves, let alone another person. But we can strive to love others as we are already loved. I believe to my core, even now as a budding curmudgeon troubled by the state of the church, and our nation and the planet that when we take the time to get to know someone, it is easier to love them. Much of what we hate or fear (or judge) in another are really just projections of what we may hate or fear or judge in ourselves.

I read this week that the founder of so-called gay "conversion therapy" (that is, an attempt to make gay people straight) changed his mind. He admitted, at 51 years old, that he is himself gay and that he was wrong. If you haven't heard about this, you can read it here.

This story may be a longer conversation, but for this reflection I want to simply say this: for nearly five decades, this man literally did not know who he was. Perhaps it was in the blind spot area and if he'd asked, others would have told him. Or perhaps even they did not know. But the God who knit him in his mother's womb knew. Either way, his own not knowing was extremely harmful to many, many people. I don't know how he can ever fully repent for the pain he has caused. But I do recognize, when I see it, how that turning begins. It begins by accepting who he is, as known by God. It begins by admitting he was wrong.

God has searched us. And God knows. May that truth make us more and more aware that we are loved - not because God does not see, but because God knows us better than we know ourselves. And may that knowledge that we are loved, deeply loved, help us to respond in turn, by loving God, and by loving neighbor.