Gratitude

The Gospel Reading for Thanksgiving Day is Luke 17:11-19. 

When asked to describe the nature of true worship, Martin Luther responded succinctly: “the tenth leper turning back.”

Luke has organized his gospel in such a way that Jesus and his disciples are "on the way" to Jerusalem from Galilee, and along the way they have various encounters that  reveal something about the Kingdom of God that Jesus came to proclaim and establish.

In the seventeenth chapter, however, we seem to have taken a detour. Luke reminds us that we are still “on the way” to Jerusalem, but then adds that now Jesus “is going through that region between Samaria and Galilee.” We should pay attention. It’s a bit like saying that on the way from Worcester to Boston, they stopped in Providence. It’s out of the way! There are three possibilities for such a detour. One is that Jesus has gotten lost, which is possible but unlikely. In fact, since faithful Jews aren’t supposed to be anywhere near Samaritan soil, it seems Jesus is making a point here. 

A second possibility is that Luke doesn’t have a very good sense of first-century Palestinian geography. Since all of the gospels, including Luke, were written decades after the events being recounted, it is in fact possible that Luke has gotten his geography wrong. 

But most scholars think there is a far more likely third possibility, and I agree with them: that both Jesus and Luke know exactly what they are doing and a serious theological point is being made here. Jesus is stepping into a boundary where ethnic and religious tensions are palpable. Think about a detour to beyond the wall in Israel to the West Bank, or to Belfast when tensions were highest between Catholic and Protestant Christians there or to Charlottesville, Virginia after the murder of George Floyd. Or maybe to those cages on the US- Mexican border.  Luke is putting us on notice: while we are still “on the way” to Jerusalem, something important that reveals something about the Kingdom of God is going to happen in this little village…

Only Luke gives us that other famous Samaritan story, the one about the so-called Good Samaritan. For any self-respecting first-century Jew, of course, that phrase, Good Samaritan, would have been considered an oxymoron. Everybody knew that Samaritans represented that which was never good: that which was to be feared as unholy and polluted. Jesus has crossed the tracks to the part of town where when you hit a red light you don’t stop. He’s traveling through that region between Samaria and Galilee when they come to a village.

Now in case anyone reading Luke’s Gospel has missed the point, we get hit over the head a second time by a 2 x 4 when Jesus encounters a group of lepers there. Not only is he in a place considered unclean, but now there are lepers everywhere. People with leprosy were considered to be ritually unclean and not allowed to come into contact with healthy people. Hence the leper colonies where they lived away from the community. They keep their distance because coming into contact with someone who had this ailment would make you ritually unclean. In fact, as you approached a leper, they were required to shout out: “unclean, unclean” as a kind of warning, just to be sure that you don’t walk up to them accidentally to ask for directions. Imagine such a life: suffering not only from a terrible disease but being socially ostracized as well. And then notice that while they do approach Jesus, Luke makes it clear that they “kept their distance from him.”

Keeping their distance, they shout out to Jesus for mercy. And then Jesus sends them along to the priests, because the Torah says that before they can re-enter the community the priest must pronounce them ritually clean. As they turn to leave they find their skin disease is healed. But they still need that “OK” from the Temple authorities before they can re-enter society. They know that, and everyone with Jesus knows that; and besides Jesus has just told them to do that. So off they go.

But one of them turned back. Now it may be fair enough as you hear this to say, “Hey, cut the nine some slack because they are just doing what Jesus said to do.” But that really isn’t the point of the story. The point here is something that every parent I know tries to teach their children from a very young age. And even when you don’t know much about Middle Eastern geography or the ritual laws about leprosy, this part of the story translates pretty easily from first-century culture to our own day: it doesn’t cost you anything to say “thank you.” They can get on their way soon enough. But their lives have just been radically changed. This is huge! 

And yet they seem to have tunnel vision: must get to priests! Only one of them takes the time to turn back and say, “thank you!” That is what Luther meant when he said that true worship is to be like this one. Or as Meister Eckhart put it: “if the only prayer you ever say is ‘thank you’ it would be enough.”

We all know this. But it takes practice. It's been a long and difficult year during this pandemic. Yet even now, we are surrounded by miracles and you would have to be blind to live in New England in autumn to not notice. We experience, even on the most difficult of days, blessing upon blessing. The one who turned back, takes us to the very heart of the gospel. Ten were healed of their leprosy: their skin got better and they were all presumably soon pronounced ritually clean and allowed to re-enter society. But only one of them got well. He isn’t just “not sick” anymore; he’s been made whole. He’s alive.

Can I say it this way: he’s been saved? That word makes Episcopalians squirm a little bit and I get why: it’s a little like the word “evangelism” or “stewardship.” Often when someone asks us whether or not we are “saved,” we may be tempted to run the other way. But that is in fact the Greek word used here: the root sozo literally means “to be saved” or “to be made well.” In the old King James Version it says, “Your faith has made you whole," which of course is what salvation is really all about. Being saved isn’t about something that happens to us after we die. The abundant life that Christ promises begins here and now and this story suggests that we take hold of that new life. We really are made whole when we cultivate gratitude in our lives. That part, at least, of this reading is really very simple. 

Miracles abound. That doesn’t mean life isn’t sometimes hard, although it’s hard to imagine a life any more difficult than being a leper in a small Samaritan village. But too often we’re too busy moving on to the next thing; the miracles are all around us but we must get to work or get to class or get to the doctor or even get to church. We need to get supper ready or do the laundry. All these things matter but if we aren't careful we begin to live our lives focused on the next thing rather than the thing we are doing right now. And too often we forget to stop and say: “thank you, God.” 

So I think Luther had it just right: true worship is the one who returned. Discipleship is about cultivating gratitude, until we learn to become givers ourselves. Anne Lamotte says that she has two favorite prayers that she tries to pray every day: one in the morning and one at night. When she gets out of bed, she simply prays: “Help me. Help me. Help me.” And at the end of the day, before her head hits the pillow, she prays: “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

Those are both really good prayers. And they can take us a long way down the path of being made whole, if that is what you seek. They can take us a long way toward embracing the saving love that is in fact already ours as beloved of God. Happy Thanksgiving.

Advent Hope

This Sunday will mark the beginning of a new liturgical year as we celebrate the First Sunday of Advent. The readings appointed for this Sunday can be found here.

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The first words of this Advent season and a new liturgical year come from the prophet Isaiah, a desperate cry for help addressed to God: O that you would tear open the heavens and come down…

Have you ever prayed such a prayer or stood with someone who has? Perhaps it was at the grave of a loved one who died before their time. Or maybe you have gone through a rough divorce or lost your job right before the holidays. Perhaps you have just been watching the news. 

When I served as as Associate Rector at Christ and Holy Trinity Church in Westport, Connecticut, I developed my own confirmation curriculum. My work focused on youth and formation work and at the time I found the materials that were available to be dismal. I ended up keeping and annually revising those materials which paired confirmands with adult mentors throughout my tenure as Rector of St. Francis Church. (Ask any kid who was confirmed at St. Francis between 1998-2013 and they will tell you about the red binders!)

In those materials, there was an assignment intended to expand the confirmands' repertoire of Biblical metaphors for God. The Bible has far more metaphors than our liturgies tend to avail themselves of, and I wanted them to explore that a bit. It was also a chance to channel my inner Baptist grandmother by having them find their way around an actual Bible rather than those fancy little Scripture inserts we Episcopalians are so fond of. (And this was in the days before Google!)

One of the texts that I had them look up comes from the tenth chapter of the Book of Job, where Job suggests that God is a lion. (Job 10:16) But Job isn’t using that image in the flattering way that C.S. Lewis does with his great Christ-figure, Aslan. You will remember that Job is suffering from incredible loss and is in incredible emotional turmoil. But worse than all of his spiritual pain is that he has come to see God as the cause of all of his suffering. When he says that God is a lion, it’s because he feels like a wildebeest that God has hunted down and chewed up and spit out. He is asking a haunting question: why are you doing this to me, God?

It’s hard enough when your life is coming unglued. But you can pretty much get through anything if you feel that God is with you, if you feel that God is your rock or the good shepherd who walks with you through the valley of the shadow of death. Even if we know it will be another six months or a year that we have to face chemotherapy or until we find new employment or love again, or until this pandemic ends, we can make it if we have hope. We can make it if we feel that God is on our side and working through it all to bring about something good. 

Our deepest fear comes when we are no longer certain that God is with us. But if you believe God has abandoned you, or worse still that God is the source of your pain (a lion who has hunted you down) it is too much to bear. Like Isaiah, Job prays for God to tear open the heavens and come down. He is a desperate man who wants his day in court; he wants to be heard. (Actually, what he wants is to make his case against God.) If only God would tear open the heavens and show His face…

For Isaiah, it isn’t personal suffering like Job’s, but a national tragedy that gives us these first words of Advent. He speaks on behalf of an entire nation, out of the pain of the Babylonian exile and a feeling of having been betrayed by God. Isaiah poses a profound theological question, perhaps the most serious theological question any of us will ever ask. Given God’s past marvelous deeds, where is God now? If God could do all those wonderful things “back in the day” (like bring the slaves out of Egypt and defeat Pharaoh) then why isn’t God doing something about the Babylonians and King Nebuchadnezzar now? It is in line with Isaiah’s words that we ask why God didn’t intervene to stop six million Jews from being killed in the middle part of the twentieth century. 

O that you would tear open the heavens and come down…

It may seem like an odd way to begin Advent, but maybe less odd in 2020 than in previous years, as we sort through the many messes we are in on this fragile earth, our island home. It is so tempting to replace authentic hope with cheap grace and wishful thinking. People want easy answers to hard questions, at least some days. 

Yet, if you are in a place where you can identify with where Isaiah or Job are and find yourself yelling at the heavens, and your friend says, “there, there” or "there is some reason for this" they are not much of a friend. This prayer expresses extraordinary grief and loss and a sense of betrayal that grow out of Isaiah’s first-hand experience and he needs to take that to God, whom he feels has been M.I.A. He needs to be heard and acknowledged before he can get to hope. 

So the question before us as we light that first candle of hope this Sunday is simply this: what do we do with that? One commentator on this Isaiah text says that “God hides in order to deconstruct a distorted faith.” Now that sounds like the kind of thing a theologian would say, doesn’t it? But I want to suggest that leads to very good theology. God hides in order to deconstruct a distorted faith.

God is beyond all of our language, beyond all of our images. I don’t mean only the false idols. Of course God is not a golden calf or a little statue or a 401-K. But I also mean that God is beyond even the most helpful of icons: beyond “father” and “rock” and “light” and “lion.” At the burning bush when Moses wants to know God’s name, God insists, “I am who I am.” At best all of our words and images for God—even our very favorites—can only point us toward the Inscrutable One who is beyond our understanding and comprehension, the One Tillich called “the God beyond God.” We need human words. But we must always be careful about confusing our words for God with God; they are not the same. God is always bigger. This is where I wanted the conversation to go each year after confirmands and mentors had found all those Biblical images and we gathered together, to recognize that God is and is not any and all of those things.  

So when someone tells me that they don’t believe in God (which tends to happen for the first but not last time for almost all kids right around confirmation age) I never panic. I just ask them to tell me about this god they no longer believe in. And usually if they are willing to humor me and talk about it, what I discover is that they are actually beginning to deconstruct a distorted faith. Or to say it another way, I don’t believe in the god they don’t believe in either! They need to let go of an old image that is keeping them from encountering the more mysterious but living and real God. Their crisis of faith is real, to be sure. But every crisis represents not only danger but an opportunity and in this kind of experience there is a very real opportunity to discover God anew. And I think that is why these words of Isaiah may be a very good place to start our Advent journey.

Let me be specific. We talk of “father God” so much we may actually begin to think that God is an old man with a gray beard sitting up in space. We go along, often unquestioning, because as long as life is good it’s just fine for God to be “the big guy up there,” not all that different from Santa Clause or a kindly old grandfather. Until one day chaos breaks in and we find ourselves really hurting. Sometimes it takes an exile, or a crisis in faith, or a pandemic to bring us to our knees: we find ourselves vulnerable and frightened and we cry out for God to make it all better by putting a band-aid on our boo-boos or to fix the ozone layer or clean up the oceans or to zap away weapons of mass destruction or to bring about peace on earth or to end this pandemic. “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down…”

And when nothing happens, we start to convince ourselves that we are atheists, since God clearly hasn’t done what we asked. We stand with Isaiah and Job at a crossroads in that moment however, and what in fact needs to go is not our faith but those old images we’ve been carrying around that are now keeping us from encountering the true and living God. That can be very hard work. And most of us don’t like that place of unknowing, that place of painful uncertainty and anxiety. We just want God to fix it. 

If we are willing to work though all of that, however, we may find that out of a deconstructed distorted faith, something new is born. Here is the thing though: the process of giving birth is always painful, isn’t it? (Or so I am told anyway!) If it is about nothing else this season is about birth. Certainly the child whose birth we are preparing to celebrate but also the new birth that each of us must go through to discover authentic faith. We prepare ourselves for a king of kings and a lord of lords, a messiah who would rule the world. And what we get is a tiny little baby who needs his diaper changed. We find ourselves kneeling before a manger and a child who needs to be fed and cared for and loved.

What if, as my scholarly friend says, such moments represent an opportunity rather than an obstacle to faith: an invitation to deconstruct a distorted faith in order to become free to reconstruct a more Incarnational faith? So that Immanuel can meet us where we are. Or more accurately, what if Christmas invites us to stop looking up to the heavens for a magical God who fixes things and to open our eyes to see God-with-us redeeming and healing things? A God who says, “I’m right here, now …wherever and whenever two or three gather together.”  

The irony of this prayer is that it has been answered: the heavens have been torn asunder and God has come down to dwell among us, very God of very God, begotten not made. The Word that was with God and was God has become flesh to dwell among us and we have beheld his glory, full of grace and truth. But not as we expected.  The God we get comes to us as a little child who grows up and dies on a cross. Easter life emerges only out of risk and loss and death. Christ’s initial appearance will lead to new and more profound questions before it offers us easy answers, questions like the ones Brian Wren raises in one of his provocative hymns: 

Can this newborn mystery, an infant learning to feed, defeat the grim and chilling powers of domination, death and sin?

Well, can he? Is this little baby the best God can do? This One with the tiny little hands and fingers—He is going to defeat the powers of domination, death, and sin? Wren’s poem is (as the Church has come to expect of him) very good theology. But let me give away the ending: yes. The mystery of this newborn child, this infant learning to feed, is that he is the Way and the Truth and the Life, and that he is victorious over the chilling powers of domination, death, and sin. No matter how bad this week was for any of us, that is good news. Christ before us, Christ behind us, Christ beside us, Christ beneath us, Christ above us. Christ here and now, among us. Don’t look for the skies to be opened up. Just look around you.

The Reign of Christ

It has been twenty-five weeks since we celebrated the Feast of Pentecost on the last day of May. Six months of what the Church sometimes calls "Ordinary Time." 

But these past six months have been anything but ordinary! This time of pandemic goes back to the beginning of Lent. So we have celebrated the Paschal Mystery: moved through Holy Week and the Fifty Days of Easter to Pentecost, followed by this long stretch of so-called ordinary time. This Sunday is the last Sunday of the liturgical year, traditionally called “Christ the King Sunday" and sometimes called “The Reign of Christ.” 

The icon shown on the left is of Christ the Pantocrator, Greek for "Almighty." It comes to us from the Byzantines. Talk about Jesus as king of kings and lord or lords can be confusing; we remember, after all, the crown of thorns and the way he was mocked in a purple robe. We remember that he comes among us as one who serves. And yet, lately my prayer has been drawing me to this part of the tradition, which also has roots in the Bible- especially John's Revelation. Lately, I've been trying, one day at a time, to put my trust in Jesus, the Almighty, the Victorious, who shall reign forever...

If you can read a newspaper or if you watch the news on television or if you have feeds on your various devices, you don't need me to tell you that it feels like we are a long way from the Reign of Christ. It seems that there is only one thing the right and left agree on: that the system is utterly broken. The world's oldest democracy remains under siege weeks after the most recent presidential election. Ordinary times? Not even close...

38.1 million Americans live in poverty in the United States of America, defined as an income of less than $33.26 a day. (That's about $12,000/year.) As I write these words, over 250,000 people have died of COVID in the United States alone. In the midst of this public health pandemic, 27.5 million people are without health insurance. There are currently 2.2 people incarcerated in this country, a five-hundred percent increase from forty years ago. A disproportionate number of those are people of color. 

It is a violent world we live in, and the evils perpetrated can give us nightmares. In the midst of this time of unrest, a record seventeen million guns have been purchased in this country.  Every time we seem to make some progress in the Middle East, it seems that there is a setback. We pray at Holy Baptism that every child of God will know the gift of joy and wonder in all God’s works. Yet a few broken and sick adults can do so much serious damage to that joy and wonder. 

But no one reading these words needs me to tell you about the violence and degradation of the world we live in. Ordinary time? Heaven help us. 

And yet, we dare to proclaim that Jesus is Lord. And that is a political statement. We are called to remember that, so that by God's grace we are empowered and equipped and encouraged to act as instruments of God’s peace: to do justice, and love mercy, and walk humbly with God. We remember who we are in order to be awakened to the reality of what it means to be the Church in the face of so much pain, and to dream of a world where the Almighty reigns.

This year, the gospel reading appointed for this coming Sunday comes from Matthew 25:31-46. (You can read it here.)

In this particular text, on this particular day, the words from Matthew’s gospel are addressed to the nations, not just to Jesus’ disciples. And the criteria by which the nations are judged as either “sheep” or “goat” is not about a theological claim, but about ethics. And quite specifically: about how the poor and vulnerable are treated in any given society.

So it isn’t about whether a nation is, or claims to be, a Christian nation. (Many will say, “Lord, Lord.”) In fact, Jesus’ parable seems to presume a good bit of confusion among the sheep and goats about which group they belong in. Some say “Lord, Lord…we love you Jesus” but they are in truth goats masquerading as sheep. Why? Because they ignored the poor. And some may say, “Praise be to Allah” or “Namaste”—but if they do justice and love mercy and care for the hungry and the sick and those in prison, they discover in the end that they were really sheep. Karl Rahner called these folks "anonymous Christians" and while I'm not sure I agree with that way of saying it, his intent is rooted in an honest reading of this chapter in Matthew, especially. There are people out there who, even if they don't do these things in the name of Jesus, they are doing it to Christ himself. That is what the text says, after all. It is what Jesus says, or at least what Matthew records Jesus as having said.

In any event, our work is not to be the King or the Judge. That job is taken. We don’t get to decide who is a sheep or who is a goat: the Almighty does. But for people who do claim Jesus as Lord, we have an even greater obligation to listen to his words and to act according to his command. We have an obligation to behave like sheep in the meantime. 

For that is where we live…in the meantime. We are called to respect the dignity of every human being. in the meantime We are called to work for justice, in the meantime. We are called to feed the hungry and clothe the naked and visit those in prison, in the meantime. This work can feel discouraging when we see how great the needs are. Visiting those in prison is now 500 times harder than it was in 1970, The work can lead us to burnout if we think we are the only ones, the only hands and feet and hearts to do this work. There will never be enough... 

But the truth is, we do not do this work alone. It is among the many, many reasons, why we need each other: why we need community. We need ecumenical and interfaith partnerships and the "nones" who are willing to do justice and love mercy. This text reminds us that it is the work that matters, and that work (along with our confession of Jesus as Lord) defines who we are, and invites us to get clearer about being sheep who know the Good Shepherd rather than goats who simply mouth the words.

Today’s gospel reading can leave us feeling paralyzed and guilty. But by God’s grace, it can also awaken us to our true vocation as followers of Jesus, just in time for Advent, when sleepers are called to awake. 

Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food, or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you, or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?' And the king will answer them, `Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.

Bridesmaids

Today is The 23rd Sunday after Pentecost. (Two weeks to go in this long season of ordinary time and then we begin again, with Advent.) The gospel reading for today comes from the 25th chapter of Matthew's Gospel, and can be found here. I am live-streaming today from St. Paul's in Holyoke, a congregation that recently was added to the list of congregations in transition. They will welcome a wonderful interim priest next weekend. 

Christian discipleship is about learning to live our lives in gratitude, as a response to God’s love made known to us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. This is true regardless of what century we live in, or what country we live in. Or who is president. Or who is the priest of our congregation. Last Sunday, on All Saints Day, we remembered that we are part of the communion of saints that extends through time and is not limited by national borders. Here, we proclaim that Jesus is Lord. Here, now, we remember that Jesus Christ is the Church’s one foundation.

At the core of Jesus’ teaching ministry was what he called “the Kingdom of God.” He taught his disciples to pray for that kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven. He said that those with eyes to see and ears to hear would be able to discern signs of God’s reign if we had enough imagination to know how and where to look for it. He said at one point that it is like a mustard seed that starts small and then grows into something much larger. Or like the yeast that a woman kneads into the bread to make the whole loaf rise. Or like a father who welcomes his lost son back home and serves up veal piccata for everyone.

Similarly…

There were ten bridesmaids: five of them were “wicked smart” and five of them “not so much.” They were all waiting for the groom to arrive for the wedding. This is code language in early Christian-speak to refer to the return of Christ.  But he was delayed, and they were all getting exhausted and they all fell asleep (because it doesn’t matter much whether you are smart or not, we all need to sleep sometimes.) But then in the middle of the night there is a shout: it’s time! The bridegroom has returned! But only five of them are ready when that shout goes out to go out to light their lanterns and meet him. (This is in the days before Duracell batteries so you had to make sure you had enough oil to light your lantern; but the dumb ones forgot to bring oil.) They want to borrow some from the others, but the smart ones said, “no way! We came prepared and you didn’t. Go get your own oil!” So the five wise bridesmaids go into the wedding banquet (early Christian code-language for the ultimate banquet and celebration at the end of days) while the others go out to Walmart to get their oil. But by the time they get back it’s too late: the door is shut and locked. There is no room for them. The end!

“So keep awake,” Jesus says to his disciples.

It’s an interesting ending since they were all asleep when the shout went out. We may expect Jesus to offer up the Boy Scout’s motto of “be prepared” but maybe that’s part of what being awake is all about. In any case, the crux of this allegory revolves around that oil. In all other ways, by outward appearances, the ten bridesmaids are the same. They are all dressed up for the party, all part of the community of the Church. All proclaim the mystery of faith: Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again. In fact, this parable is a lot like the story of the wheat and the tares. It’s not about Christians over and against the world: it’s about how within the Christian community there are those who are wise followers of Christ and others who simply claim to be followers of Jesus but are really just along for the ride.

Now I’ll be honest: I’m not too crazy about this kind of parable. I get it and I believe it: we will all be judged. I take great comfort, however, in knowing our judge is full of compassion and mercy. So I think that the Church (and especially clergy) needs to be clear that the final judgment is in God’s hands, not ours. Moreover, my experience of people is almost never that they are either wise or foolish. The wisest among us sometimes do dumb things. And even a broken clock is right twice a day!

The thing is, for an allegory to work it has to paint the extremes: foolish and wise. It’s like that old Highlights Magazine duo some of you may remember, Goofus and Gallant. But most of us, I would submit to you, fall somewhere in between those two poles: we are far from wise but smarter than fools. We have good days and bad days.

Perhaps an allegory is intended to give us all a bit of a swift kick, a “wake up call”—and if that is correct then Jesus’ last words make perfect sense. Wake up! In any event, I think that the work of the Church is to invite everyone to the banquet and to proclaim boldly that “all are welcome.” I am pretty sure that Matthew’s community would have agreed with that as well, and quite confident that Jesus himself would do so. All are welcome here.

Even so, it doesn’t take long when you are part of a community to begin to learn that some really are along for the ride. Some like the bridesmaids’ dresses or the liturgical garb or the dignity of the liturgy or a certain style of music. But they have very little interest in actually taking up their crosses to follow Jesus. They want the outward signs without any inward transformation. They want discipleship without the costs. They want Easter Sunday without Good Friday.

So I’ll say it once more: judgment belongs to God—not the Church. But elsewhere in Matthew’s gospel it is clear what the criteria are that God will use: it’s not about who says, “Lord, Lord” (that phrase comes up here as it does in the parable of the sheep and the goats.)  It’s not about confessional statements or creeds. It’s about action and deeds. It’s about how we walk the talk. It’s particularly about how we care for “the least of these” among us: the hungry, the naked, the homeless, those in prison.

In the Old Testament, the rabbis saw oil as a reference to deeds of love and mercy, as a metaphor for obedience to Torah and specifically the two great commandments to love God and neighbor. So that’s probably important to Jesus, the rabbi.

We are so used to thinking about oil as a commodity: as that which we need to put in the tank to heat our homes this winter. And with commodities there is always a limited supply: if I have more that means you have less. The price can go up, or down.

But notice that this story is not about there being, let’s say, one gallon of lamp oil and the five wise ones keeping it all for themselves and not letting the foolish ones have any. The truth is that there is plenty of oil in this story. It’s just that the wise ones are ready and have it with them. The foolish ones left theirs at home or forgot to buy it.

Maybe one way into this story is to think about batteries, especially if you find yourself wondering why the wise ones don’t just share. Many of us have flashlights with batteries for when the power goes out. But they don’t do you any good if you are foolish enough to have dead batteries in your flashlights!

And if you’ve got two batteries in your flashlight that work, but the person next to you does not, then it does no good to try to take one battery out to share it with somebody else. You will both end up in the dark.

Whether or not that works for you, let me say again: the rabbis saw “oil” as a metaphor for being obedient to Torah which comes down to two things: loving God and loving neighbor. That oil is really about how you choose to live your one, wild and precious life and that is one thing that can’t be done for someone else. Not even those we love the most. The foolish bridesmaids have forgotten who they are: they’ve forgotten their calling to illumine the darkness. That is what it means to be awake and wait for Christ: not to sit around but to do justice and love mercy. They miss the ultimate opportunity and purpose of their lives. It is futile to go out and try to “get your oil” after the bridegroom’s arrival simply because it is simply too late then. You don’t get a do-over on life.

Each of us must decide what we will do with that which God has entrusted to us because God has given all of us “oil” that is meant to be used for the sake of God’s kingdom. That oil is intended as a gift that we are meant to use to lighten up the world around us. Some days we get that and are wise enough to let our light shine, and other days we are pretty foolish and forget what the point of discipleship is. But when we do let our light shine, then the world knows that we are Christians by our love.

So these words are addressed to you, St. Paul’s, at a particular moment in your life together. You’ve said goodbye to a priest-in-charge who was here for just three years. That may kick up a lot of emotional energy and some regrets, and some hurt. You now embark on a season of transition, an interim time for learning and reflecting and spiritual growth before the work of calling a new rector begins again. The temptation is to check out – to fall asleep – to wait and see. To “sit back.” But it is in moments like this where we are again invited to wake up, to light our lamps, to step up to the plate. Pick your preferred metaphor! You are blessed to have a fine, trained, intentional interim who will walk this next chapter with you. You are blessed to have a strong, capable leadership team. Together, with God’s help, it’s time to light up the lamps and enlighten this neighborhood. This city and this commonwealth and this nation needs for you and for all of us to be the Church, as light that shines in the darkness. And the darkness has not and will not overcome it.

The “oil” given to each of you and to this parish not as an end in itself. It is a means to an end. Our “oil”—which is simply to say all that we are and all that we have—is not for hoarding or leaving at home or saving for a rainy day. It is meant to be used in ways that make the Reign of God manifest in our world. That time is NOW. If you keep that in mind over the course of this time of transition, all will be well. So keep awake! Stay alert! And pray that this might be a congregation filled with lots of wise bridesmaids, with God’s help.