A Prayer in remembrance of Saint Nicholas

Almighty God, who in your love gave to your servant Nicholas of Myra a perpetual name for deeds of kindness on land and sea: Grant, we pray, that your Church may never cease to work for the happiness of children, the safety of sailors, the relief of the poor, and the help of those tossed by tempests of doubt or grief; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

A Collect For the Victims of Addiction

Blessed Lord, you ministered to all who came to you: Look with compassion upon all who through addiction have lost their health and freedom. Restore to them the assurance of your unfailing mercy; remove from them the fears that beset them; strengthen them in the work of their recovery; and to those who care for them, give patient understanding and persevering love. Amen.

BCP

Worthwhile Investments; a sermon for the Twenty-Fourth Sunday after Pentecost

Mark 12:38-44

³⁸ As he was teaching, he said, “ Watch out for the legal experts. They like to walk around in long robes. They want to be greeted with honor in the markets. ³⁹ They long for places of honor in the synagogues and at banquets. ⁴⁰ They are the ones who cheat widows out of their homes, and to show off they say long prayers. They will be judged most harshly. ”

⁴¹ Jesus sat across from the collection box for the temple treasury and observed how the crowd gave their money. Many rich people were throwing in lots of money. ⁴² One poor widow came forward and put in two small copper coins worth a penny.i⁴³ Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “ I assure you that this poor widow has put in more than everyone who’s been putting money in the treasury. ⁴⁴ All of them are giving out of their spare change. But she from her hopeless poverty has given everything she had, even what she needed to live on. ”

Let the words of my mouth

and the meditations of my heart

be pleasing to you,

LORD , my rock and my redeemer.

We’re at church. This is the place where, week after week, you have somebody asking you for money. We take up regular offerings every week, most of which, admittedly, support my salary. Awkward to stand in front of y’all making that request. Six out of fifty-two weeks every year, we take up special offerings for something with the global United Methodist Church. We take up special offerings immediately after major disasters. We could probably fill up every other Sunday with special offerings for Wesley Foundations and camps and ministries with minorities and food banks and thrift stores and South Sudan and whatever else comes up that needs the support of local churches.

At the same time, we don’t talk about the way we are called to invest responsibly here, locally, in our own households.

In fact, you know what? We don’t talk about personal responsibility much at all. And I suppose that’s my fault.

I talk about our calling. I talk about what it means to follow. You know, discipleship and stuff.

But I’m not sure I often go in the direction of defining worthwhile investments.

Folks generally know better than to have these arguments around me, but once upon a time in Cullowhee, North Carolina, Karoline got involved in a conversation about giving in the church. Another student who attended the Wesley Foundation with us was arguing that wealthy people who made comparatively enormous investments were giving sacrificially. For example, if Jay Leno chose do make a $100,000 donation to a local non-profit, approximately what it might cost him to purchase and repair one of his fleet of luxury or one-off cars, that would be a sacrificial gift comparable to what we call the widow’s mite.

That infuriated Karoline, because the math simply doesn’t work. And in no way, shape, or form is it appropriate to talk about the sacrifice of a luxury as if it’s the same as the sacrifice of a meal.

If you have more, more is expected of you. It’s really that simple.

But we are a society that has embraced and uplifted greed to the point that accumulating wealth is considered the highest of all attainments.

All of them are giving out of their spare change. But she from her hopeless poverty has given everything she had, even what she needed to live on.

Now, in the interest of full disclosure, giving is a thing that our family struggles with. And it’s not just because we have diapers and constantly changing wardrobes to deal with investing in. We are also dealing with serious debt, the largest part of which is in student loans. We have more academic debt than all our other debt combined.

So when Bishop Swanson asked me, on the stage at Annual Conference, with all the other ordinands a year and a half ago, if I was in debt so as to embarrass myself, I had a serious problem answering.

Was a Master of Divinity at Candler School of Theology in Atlanta a debt I collected that is embarrassing? Was it a worthwhile investment?

I believe in education. I believe in the power of wisdom and knowledge. I believe it is a gift God gives us.

But the amount I am paying for that education is embarrassing enough that I haven’t announced to you this morning what the actual number is.

What is a worthwhile investment?

Is it land? That’s something our founding fathers valued enough to protect it as a fundamental human right. Ownership of property, which is absolutely not a biblical value. The Bible teaches us that we don’t own anything. We take care of certain things. We invest them in worthwhile ways.

What is a worthwhile investment?

Stocks? Sports? Entertainment? Books? Technology?

Our reading from Ruth and from the Psalms this morning point to children as a worthwhile investment.

Well, they are an investment. That’s for sure. And they are worthwhile, without a doubt. Our lives are richer by far because of Noah and Sarah and Rebekah. Everything means more. Everything is redefined by the gift of children.

But in no way is the way that God gives more clear than in our children, who are ours for only a fleeting time before they are their own people, making their own decisions and mistakes and investments.

But the situation of Ruth and Naomi is not the same as ours today. Naomi is without any hope of dignity or even sustenance without a male heir. The book of Ruth, really, is her story far more than it is Ruth’s. It is the story of how she secures her own future through Ruth, directing her toward Boaz in rather graphic detail that I will not unpack for you this morning by pointing out the meaning of the euphemism, “uncover his feet.” You can do that yourself.

We are people who are far more propertied and comfortable than they. Our children do not secure our future in the same way that Ruth’s son did.

Nor are our children “like arrows in the hand of a warrior” in the way that the Psalmist speaks today. We don’t collect them to be used as weapons or as bargaining tools. They are not property. They are people.

When Karoline and I invest in our children, we are investing in the future of our community, the future of our world. We are developing disciples for the inbreaking of Christ’s Kingdom. We are readying them to make their own choices and invest in what they value. Sure, we hope they believe in what we believe in, but we can’t ultimately define that for them.

So if we invest wisely, in the future of our communities and in the Kingdom, then our children are a wise and worthwhile investment.

And maybe that’s where the rubber meets the road. We shouldn’t be asking what organizations have the right name, what kinds of groups or things we should be investing in. We should be asking if what we are investing in will help break God’s Kingdom into this reality, whether how we are investing will actually help that happen.

When I invest my finances into something, am I ensuring that my finances will promote something God wants, or am I just pouring money into a pit to be eaten by monsters of greed and corruption?

A few years ago, a friend had an opportunity to lead his ministry in participating in the shoebox ministry. You know, Samaritan’s Purse/Operation Christmas Child thing. He had the presence of mind to make a phone call to their office and ask exactly where the donation was used that is included in every single gift box.

They refused to answer his question.

I have a hard time investing in a ministry like that.

When I invest my finances in something, I want to make sure they are being used for ministry.

When I invest my time in something, I want to make sure my time is cared for and that it makes a difference. When I covenanted that I wasn’t in debt so as to embarrass myself, I also covenanted not to spend my time frivolously. Sometimes I’m good at that, and sometimes I’m not. But I’m making a point of improving.

When I invest my energy into something, I want to make sure that my energy is being used to do good, not to do harm, and to help people realize how close God is to them.

I am striving to make all my investments worthwhile. And there are loads of ways to do that. There are as many ways to do that as there are gifts that God is giving me.

If a poor widow can bless God by giving the very thing she needed to live on, then shouldn’t I, whom God has so richly blessed, give everything I have to bring God’s Kingdom today?

Forget the tithe. The tithe is a cheap excuse. Here, let me write a check and feel like I’ve done my part for the church.

God doesn’t want your tithe. God wants your life.

Is your life a worthwhile investment?

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

On That Day; a sermon for the Feast of All Saints

Isaiah 25:6-9

⁶ On this mountain,

the LORD of heavenly forces will prepare for all peoples

a rich feast, a feast of choice wines,

of select foods rich in flavor,

of choice wines well refined.

⁷ He will swallow up on this mountain the veil that is veiling all peoples,

the shroud enshrouding all nations.

⁸ He will swallow up deathr forever.

The LORD God will wipe tears from every face;

he will remove his people’s disgrace from off the whole earth,

for the LORD has spoken.

⁹ They will say on that day,

“ Look! This is our God,

for whom we have waited—

and he has saved us!

This is the LORD , for whom we have waited;

let’s be glad and rejoice in his salvation! ”

Revelation 21:1-6

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. ² I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. ³ I heard a loud voice from the throne say, “ Look! God’s dwelling is here with humankind. He will dwell with them, and they will be his peoples. God himself will be with them as their God. ⁴ He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more. There will be no mourning, crying, or pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. ” ⁵ Then the one seated on the throne said, “ Look! I’m making all things new. ” He also said, “ Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true. ” ⁶ Then he said to me, “ All is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will freely give water from the life-giving spring.

John 11:32-44

³² When Mary arrived where Jesus was and saw him, she fell at his feet and said, “ Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. ”

³³ When Jesus saw her crying and the Jews who had come with her crying also, he was deeply disturbed and troubled. ³⁴ He asked, “ Where have you laid him? ”

They replied, “ Lord, come and see. ”

³⁵ Jesus began to cry. ³⁶ The Jews said, “ See how much he loved him! ” ³⁷ But some of them said, “ He healed the eyes of the man born blind. Couldn’t he have kept Lazarus from dying? ”

³⁸ Jesus was deeply disturbed again when he came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone covered the entrance. ³⁹ Jesus said, “ Remove the stone. ”

Martha, the sister of the dead man, said, “ Lord, the smell will be awful! He’s been dead four days. ”

⁴⁰ Jesus replied, “ Didn’t I tell you that if you believe, you will see God’s glory? ” ⁴¹ So they removed the stone. Jesus looked up and said, “ Father, thank you for hearing me. ⁴² I know you always hear me. I say this for the benefit of the crowd standing here so that they will believe that you sent me. ” ⁴³ Having said this, Jesus shouted with a loud voice, “ Lazarus, come out! ” ⁴⁴ The dead man came out, his feet bound and his hands tied, and his face covered with a cloth. Jesus said to them, “ Untie him and let him go. ”

Let the words of my mouth

and the meditations of my heart

be pleasing to you,

LORD , my rock and my redeemer.

The raising of Lazarus is perhaps the most awe-inspiring miracle that Jesus performs. It’s a moment of the Divine hand reaching into humanity and radically changing the order of life and death. It is a moment that is particularly holy, particularly righteous.

But it is a moment that is bathed in distinct humanity. And I mean, several different flavors of mundane, real humanity.

Do you hear the grief in Mary’s voice?

“ Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died. ”

Do you see the tears in Jesus’ eyes?

“ See how much he loved him! ”

Do you hear the skeptical voices?

“ He healed the eyes of the man born blind. Couldn’t he have kept Lazarus from dying? ”

Do you hear pragmatic Martha, reminding Jesus:

“ Lord, the smell will be awful! He’s been dead four days. ”

Do you see yourself in the family gathered there? Would your reaction be different?

What about the times you’ve been in the shoes of some member of Lazarus’ family? I know we’ve been through a lot in the past year, and we’ve screamed Mary’s complaint at God, and we’ve wondered if Jesus is really all he’s cracked up to be, and every so often we’ve seen the face of Christ crying with us.

That is the promise of Emmanuel, of course. God is with us. And that is the promise that we can tend to forget when we focus too much on texts like Isaiah and the Revelation.

We read those and think, Yeah, God is preparing a house, a banquet, a new everything!

And that’s a valid point.

Thanks be to God that on That Day,

He will swallow up death forever.

The LORD God will wipe tears from every face

Thanks be to God that

There will be no mourning, crying, or pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.

Thanks be to God for That Day.

But That Day doesn’t mean God is neglecting what we’re experiencing right now, in this moment, in this grief, in this trouble, in this joy and celebration, too.

In fact, That Day doesn’t mean that it’s not happening right now.

Christ has already defeated death. Christ has already destroyed the power of hell.

The promise to us is that we get to participate in the end of death and hell. We get to be agents of freedom and salvation. We get to be bringers of the kingdom today!

And on this Festival Day, we get to celebrate that fact, and celebrate all those who have made us able to feast today.

Today we celebrate the Feast of All Saints. I want to invite us to the table this morning and offer us a chance to participate in salvation with those saints who have preceded us and with those who will come after. That is the joy of this table. It is a place and time when space and time converge, a means of grace, a moment when eternity narrows down into this place and time, and this moment joins with all other moments at the table, including that great feast that Jesus is preparing for us on That Day.

This day, we saints feast with all the saints, and this day we recognize and name them and celebrate them and each other.

So as you come to the table this morning, I invite you to take a candle from our basket and light it in memory of your own saints. You can name them aloud, or you can name them in your heart. And you won’t remember everyone. Nobody expects you to. You know, if you get back to your seat and you think of them, name them from there.

And as our lights collect and brighten this space, know that in their flame is the prayer for and our prayer with the saints, who still pray with us today, near to the heart of God where prayer never ceases.

Today, in the face of death and hell, let us celebrate the defeat of death and hell, and prepare a table in the midst of our greatest enemies.

Be Salty: a sermon for the Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

Mark 9:38-50

³⁸ John said to Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone throwing demons out in your name, and we tried to stop him because he wasn’t following us.”

³⁹ Jesus replied, “ Don’t stop him. No one who does powerful acts in my name can quickly turn around and curse me. ⁴⁰ Whoever isn’t against us is for us. ⁴¹ I assure you that whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ will certainly be rewarded.

⁴² “ As for whoever causes these little ones who believe in me to trip and fall into sin, it would be better for them to have a huge stone hung around their necks and to be thrown into the lake. ⁴³ If your hand causes you to fall into sin, chop it off. It’s better for you to enter into life crippled than to go away with two hands into the fire of hell, which can’t be put out. q⁴⁵ If your foot causes you to fall into sin, chop it off. It’s better for you to enter life lame than to be thrown into hell with two feet. r⁴⁷ If your eye causes you to fall into sin, tear it out. It’s better for you to enter God’s kingdom with one eye than to be thrown into hell with two. ⁴⁸ That’s a place where worms don’t die and the fire never goes out .s⁴⁹ Everyone will be salted with fire. ⁵⁰ Salt is good; but if salt loses its saltiness, how will it become salty again? Maintain salt among yourselves and keep peace with each other. ”

Let the words of my mouth

and the meditations of my heart

be pleasing to you,

LORD , my rock and my redeemer.

I thank God every day that Nickelsville isn’t a town in which we have to compete with other churches. Yeah, I know that the Baptist church is the biggest in town, and by a considerable ratio, but I almost never get the impression that we feel like we’re competing with them, or trying to be like them.

The most vital ministries in Nickelsville happen when people are working across denominational lines. I’m sure you’ve seen that, because it’s something I noticed right away.

And I think that’s fantastic! It’s a gift that a lot of communities don’t have. More often than not, churches and different local groups may come up with all the same ideas (because to some degree, people who live in one defined area tend to think alike), but while they have all these similar and compatible ideas, they want to promote only their church, their group, their sub-community.

That’s a problem.

First, it’s a practical problem because when you have a bunch of smaller communities or groups trying to do exactly the same thing (VBS, food pantry, handymen ministries, etc.), their project is only going to get so far. Everybody will be competing for the same resources and the same population. And what you’ll end up with is a bunch of minimally successful or completely unsuccessful ministries spread out over the area.

Second, it’s an image problem. Every community has a lot of people outside of the church. People who are too busy, too disinterested, too badly burned by churchy people to ever darken the door of a church again. And they are extremely critical of and cynical about the institutional Church. When what they observe is that a bunch of churches in an area can’t get along well enough to do something together, in a culture where even outsiders in the church are fundamentally aware of Paul’s theology of one Body with many members, they realize that what we’re doing isn’t Church. What we’re doing is trying to maintain our own local club.

We are being competitive about ministry.

For a couple years at Buffalo Mountain Camp, there were some songs that groups would sing as they hiked up and down the road. One of them got pretty fierce:

We love Jesus, yes we do!

We love Jesus. How about you?

And a group would always sing it at another group. And the other group would respond. And the kids wouldn’t just get excited; they’d get riled up to the degree that you only see at UT football games.

But Brandon, that’s good! Our kids are fired up for Jesus!

No. No, they’re not. They’re fired up about being louder and fiercer than someone else, which is not the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Ministry should never be competitive.

Ministry should never be about I’m-right-and-you’re-wrong. Ministry should never be about we’re-allowed-but-you’re-not.

That’s what the disciples don’t get.

Teacher, we saw someone throwing demons out in your name, and we tried to stop him because he wasn’t following us.

We tried to stop him.

Oh, we read this today and we think, How could they dare? And that’s too bad, because we should read this today and think, Oh, I just said that.

I’d like to blame behavior like that on election season, but really, that us-against-them mentality has been prevalent for a long time. I couldn’t point to a time when our churches weren’t that way. If I were to hazard a guess, which I suppose I’m doing right now, I’d say that the followers of Christ have never not been that way.

We get fired up about being right all the time, about our ministries being the most important, the most vital, the most relevant, the most scriptural, the most Jesus-like, the most welcoming, whatever. But what does the Holy Spirit have to say about that?

I think the Holy Spirit shakes her dreamy head and smiles and reminds us of what Mark remembers:

No one who does powerful acts in my name can quickly turn around and curse me. Whoever isn’t against us is for us.

Funny. Matthew and Luke say exactly the opposite.

Whoever isn’t with me is against me, and whoever doesn’t gather with me scatters.

Tricky.

The context is a little different. In Matthew and Luke, Jesus is telling the authorities that he isn’t doing the Devil’s work, essentially. But in Mark, Jesus is advising the disciples to let people who are doing Kingdom work keep doing Kingdom work.

Oddly, the bottom line is the same. If you’re doing the work of Christ, you’re in good standing with Christ. If you’re showing fruit, you’re growing on the vine.

(Just to mix our metaphors a bit.)

So I am glad that the Nickelsville community has some really good models of ecumenical ministry, but I’m not sure we’re really good at welcoming others into our little ministry circles, even when they are fundamentally cooperative.

And I’m also not sure that the spirit of cooperation plays out more broadly than a couple group of friends who’d be hanging out together anyway.

As an example, I want you to observe what kind of a group we have gathered here in worship this morning. We have, today, all three churches of the Nickelsville Circuit gathered in this one beautiful space to worship together.

Now, look around at who’s not here.

I know that there are some folk with valid, real reasons not to be with us this morning. I get that. But I also know, because people have voiced this concern directly to me, that there are those of our friends who will never attend a cooperative service like this because that’s not my church.

Let’s set aside the fundamental theological problems of claiming any local manifestation of God’s church as our own, and of neglecting the reality of the Church as one, holy, apostolic, and universal, and never, ever just a local phenomenon.

Let’s just juxtapose that complaint with the plethora of other criticisms I hear that boil down to, “We don’t want to do church like that because we’ve never done it that way before.” Every criticism I hear like that is only a poorly veiled request to make our worship and our way of doing things exactly like every other ministry around.

Bland. The same. Unseasoned. Saltless.

Forget that, y’all! Let’s do something else! Let’s do something different! Let’s be salty!

Let’s shut up our fears and our discomfort and our preconceived notions and let the Holy Spirit guide us for a change!

Listen, we’re about to dismiss and find our way around tables to dine with each other as one community. Isn’t that a great venue for conversation?

Here’s what I want you to do. We’ll sing a song, we’ll have a benediction and a blessing, and we’ll feast and share. I want you to be brave like Esther and sit with someone you know less well, and I want you to ask them:

What dreams do you have for ministry in Nickelsville?

What people does God put in your line of sight who need the mercy of Jesus?

What gifts do you have that God wants to put to work in our community?

And let me tell you, not everything that the Church does is purely about evangelism. James reminds us to be in ministry with the suffering, the cheerful, and the sick. Jesus reminds us that whenever we have offered mercy to those who are hungry, thirsty, stranger, naked, sick, and imprisoned, we have offered mercy to Christ. The prophets time and again remind us that God is deeply concerned with the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the alien in our land.

Do you have a dream or a gift you can share with them?

Let’s sing together, as one body with all the Church around the world this morning, and let the Holy Spirit guide us from here.

One Who Fears the Lord; a sermon for the seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

Mark 9:30-37

³⁰ From there Jesus and his followers went through Galilee, but he didn’t want anyone to know it. ³¹ This was because he was teaching his disciples, “ The Human One p will be delivered into human hands. They will kill him. Three days after he is killed he will rise up. ” ³² But they didn’t understand this kind of talk, and they were afraid to ask him.

³³ They entered Capernaum. When they had come into a house, he asked them, “ What were you arguing about during the journey? ” ³⁴ They didn’t respond, since on the way they had been debating with each other about who was the greatest. ³⁵ He sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them, “ Whoever wants to be first must be least of all and the servant of all. ” ³⁶ Jesus reached for a little child, placed him among the Twelve, and embraced him. Then he said, ³⁷ “ Whoever welcomes one of these children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me isn’t actually welcoming me but rather the one who sent me. ”

Let the words of my mouth

and the meditations of my heart

be pleasing to you,

LORD , my rock and my redeemer.

Are children special?

Once upon a time, and still in some cultures, when there is a meal given, children are the last served. Some of you remember that. But not now. When there’s a pot luck dinner, like we’ll have next week at New Hope, we send our children through first. We do that to make sure they’re fed well, to minimize whining, even though some of our adults are a lot whinier than our kids, and sometimes to just corral kids who would otherwise be underfoot and into everything. On a regular weekday morning, I get Karoline out the door and to school, and I sit the kids down to breakfast, supplying yogurt, oatmeal, cereal, juice or milk, toast or bread with butter or jam, and/or fruit per request. Then, if they’re not finishing up by the time I get all that provided to each of them, I sit down and shove into my mouth whatever I have time for before the first kid says, “I’m done!” and we have to start into the routine of getting dressed and ready for school.

Are children special? We sure treat them like they are. And to us, they certainly are.

But I ask that because we often take today’s gospel reading to understand that children are elevated to a special place in Jesus’ eyes.

But I don’t think that’s what’s happening here. And I say that as a parent of three beloved, beautiful children myself.

The disciples are arguing about who’s better, who’s more important among them.

Jesus says, y’all don’t get it. This isn’t about being served. It’s about serving.

See this kid? She’s beloved in God’s eyes.

And what Jesus doesn’t say is what’s unspoken in that culture.

See this kid? She’s powerless. She has no vote, no say, no opinion that you value. In fact, she has no value, and the likelihood of her making it to adulthood isn’t all that great. She is, essentially, worthless.

But not to God.

To God, everyone is worthy. Everyone has value, inherent value, because God has created every one and God loves every one.

It’s not ultimately about this child. It’s about every child. Everyone who ever was a child. Everyone who ever will be a child.

God loves them all.

God values them all.

It’s not about children, specifically. Just like, in the long view, Proverbs 31 isn’t just about a worthy or capable woman. Those are characteristics of a godly person, regardless of gender.

But what needs to be said, in the context of the audience of the Proverbs, is that a woman can be of worth, that a woman can own property, that a woman can be strong, that a woman can be an entrepreneur, that a woman can speak and preach wisdom, that a woman can be happy.

Come to think of it, that needs to be said today, too.

Because God loves and empowers not just men, but women, too.

And God loves and empowers not just adults, but children, too.

God loves and empowers not just Americans, but people from all over the world, too.

God loves and empowers not just Christians, but also those who have been wounded by the Church, and those who will never darken the door of a church again, and those who have never heard the name of Christ, and those who will never be able to hear the name of Christ and not associate it with hatred and violence.

God loves and empowers all people. Everywhere.

We don’t have a monopoly on the work of God. We don’t even have a monopoly on the Holy Spirit.

That’s what we Wesleyans understand that a lot of people don’t get about grace.

We sing, “Amazing grace… that saved a wretch like me,” but what we really think is “Amazing me who saw God’s grace and accepted it. Way to go, me!”

That’s not grace.

Grace is that whisper in your heart, in your head, that’s always saying to you, “I love you. I know you. I know you and I still love you. I want you to know me. I have great things planned for you.”

Grace is that nudge that God puts in our gut from the moment we are imagined that reminds us that we are never alone, but calls us out of our comfort to follow.

Grace is also that voice that is always telling us, be kind, be considerate, be compassionate, be forgiving, be welcoming, be real, be understanding, be serving.

Because that is how God is calling us to be. Because that is how Jesus shows us to be. Because that is the life the Holy Spirit is breathing into us.

Whoever wants to be first must be least of all and the servant of all.

Whoever wants to follow must follow all the way.

Whoever claims Christ must live as Jesus.

The Human One will be delivered into human hands. They will kill him. Three days after he is killed he will rise up.

Whoever claims Christ must give of himself completely.

Grace is the evidence that God desires to be in relationship with us, that God desires us to be in healthy relationship with each other, that God desires us to follow.

But grace is also the evidence that God’s love for us never quits. That God sees the deepest, most fundamental part of us, and God sees all the junk we pile on top of that created potential, that hides the blessing we truly are. Grace is evidence that through all that, God loves us.

Over and over, scripture testifies to us that God loves us. That God’s love isn’t just for the powerful and the strong. That just because a person is prosperous, a person isn’t necessarily blessed. Prosperity is absolutely not the sign of God’s favor.

Grace is the sign of God’s favor.

And that grace is poured out upon old and young, rich and poor, male and female, dark and light, slave and free, straight and gay, clergy and lay, methodist, baptist, catholic, mormon, muslim, hindi, atheist, and agnostic. Grace is bestowed upon everyone.

Because God loves us all.

And the question is, How do we respond? Do we respond in our own interests, or do we follow the call of Christ and welcome - seriously welcome, without judgment or bias, making physical and emotional and spiritual space for - all of God’s children?

Some of us are good at welcoming people. Some of us just can’t get over ourselves and see people unlike us, people we disagree with, people we just can’t stomach; we can’t see them the way God sees them.

All of us have room to grow. Will we show God today, tomorrow, next week, each day we wake, that each of us, you are and I are, one who fears the Lord?

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Bride of Christ

I'm going to weigh in on this because I can do it briefly, which is unlike most other commenting I can offer.

An ancient fragment of papyrus has very recently come into the public eye that quotes, in coptic, “Jesus said to them, ‘My wife...’ ”

1. The fragment is a fragment. Have you ever gotten a pre-approved credit card in the mail and promptly ripped up the envelope and its contents so that no one could piece together any sensitive information in it? The point of shredding the document is to make it unreadable, to turn it into nonsense, because that's what happens when we take a piece of something out of context. We turn it into nonsense. That's what's happened with this fragment. It has no surrounding pieces. It has been thoroughly decontextualized. It has been rendered essentially into nonsense.

2. The piece is dated about four centuries later than the life of Jesus of Nazareth. It's not exactly an eyewitness account. That's not to say that only eyewitness accounts of Jesus are authoritative; that argument would throw Paul into considerable scrutiny, and we don't have any first-century texts anymore, anyway. Every piece of biblical literature we have is copy that is assuredly much farther than seven degrees away from Jesus. But that this fragment appears so much later, in a language Jesus probably didn't speak, doesn't help gain it any authoritative traction.

3. Who cares? What does our theology - our God-talk - gain by putting faith in Jesus' abstinence and/or celibacy? The theological effect of holding Jesus above the rest of humanity because he never got married and/or had sex is the damnation of sex regardless of its relational context. If we say Jesus is more holy because he never had sex, whether in or out of marriage, then we claim that sex itself is a problem, a sin regardless of whether or not we are in a committed, God-blessed relationship. That is ridiculous! Sex is nothing to be ashamed of. It is a sign of health and intimacy in a relationship, a sign of trust and adoration between people committed to each other. It is a gift from God, not a sin.

Maybe Jesus was married. Maybe not. There's a lot about Jesus we don't know because nobody bothered to write it down. One of these days, maybe I'll ask Jesus about his wife, but in the meantime, I'll just do my best to live like he showed me.

On the Word God Is Speaking; a sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost

^{John 6:56-69}

⁵⁶ Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in them. ⁵⁷ As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me lives because of me. ⁵⁸ This is the bread that came down from heaven. It isn’t like the bread your ancestors ate, and then they died. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. ” ⁵⁹ Jesus said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum.

⁶⁰ Many of his disciples who heard this said, “ This message is harsh. Who can hear it? ”

⁶¹ Jesus knew that the disciples were grumbling about this and he said to them, “ Does this offend you? ⁶² What if you were to see the Human One u going up where he was before? ⁶³ The Spirit is the one who gives life and the flesh doesn’t help at all. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and life. ⁶⁴ Yet some of you don’t believe. ” Jesus knew from the beginning who wouldn’t believe and the one who would betray him. ⁶⁵ He said, “ For this reason I said to you that none can come to me unless the Father enables them to do so. ” ⁶⁶ At this, many of his disciples turned away and no longer accompanied him.

⁶⁷ Jesus asked the Twelve, “ Do you also want to leave? ”

⁶⁸ Simon Peter answered, “ Lord, where would we go? You have the words of eternal life. ⁶⁹ We believe and know that you are God’s holy one. ”

Let the words of my mouth

and the meditations of my heart

be pleasing to you,

LORD , my rock and my redeemer.

Are y’all tired of hearing about bread?

The last time I went through this series of texts in John, I preached the entire five weeks on Holy Communion, and we broke bread every week.

Some of you are glad I didn’t do that. Some of you wish we had.

Yeah, me too.

On the other hand, some of you probably haven’t realized that’s been happening.

<sigh>

Well, this week is the last, and John is finally shifting out of this obsessive conversation and talking about spirit and life instead of bread, and when they’re not hearing what they want to hear any more, the crowd disperses.

Good thing that doesn’t happen in our churches today. We would never come to church to feel comfortable and good about ourselves.

That Jesus’ words are spirit and life doesn’t mean, after all, that they are always - or even often - a pat on the back or a nice warm hug. If that’s your impression, I encourage you to read the gospels again. Take Jesus’ message seriously, and see just how comfortable and warm and fuzzy it makes you feel.

The funny thing is that the crowds are reacting to something we generally take for granted today: that body-and-blood argument, that life comes only from Christ. We may not take the time to think about it much today, but we take it for granted. We generally get that what Jesus is saying here reflects the modern phrase, “You are what you eat.” How much we take Jesus in - how much of his teaching and his model and his very life we ingest - is directly proportional to the degree we become like him and become remade into the image of God.

And I’m going to differentiate again here. We are talking about the living word of Christ, and I don’t just say out of redundancy. It’s not just because Jesus says, “The words I have spoken to you are spirit and life.” I’m saying that because the word Jesus says here isn’t the word John uses to describe Jesus when he opens his narrative. This isn’t the λογος of creation. Jesus is referring to the words he is breathing, the present, Spirit-inspired ρημα that is proclamation, announcement, immediate and vital right here and right now.

And that is the same word that Paul is using. Truth as your belt; righteousness, more well-known as justice, to protect your soft, gushy bits; “shoes on your feet so that you are ready to spread the good news of peace”; faith or trust as your shield; God’s saving power to protect your brain; and the sword of the Spirit, God’s word.

The sword of the Spirit. The sword that is the very breath of God. That πνευμα that inspires us, fills our lungs with good news. That Spirit is the still-speaking word of God.

Next time you read this bit - and I know it’s a popular paragraph - remember that. The word of God Paul is talking about, that Jesus is talking about, isn’t that handy reference text that some of you bring to worship. The word of God is more alive, more vibrant, more present than that. The word of God is…

Noah told me the other day that God didn’t talk to him.

I told him, basically, that he needed to learn to listen.

The question caught me off guard. I tried to offer him the hope that everyone can hear God, that we just have to learn how. But when all the stories he hears are of people who seem to be physically receiving the sound of God’s voice vibrating the air around them, how do I tell him that God almost never does that? That hearing God’s voice sometimes means listening carefully for the words of hope and grace from our neighbor? That hearing God’s voice sometimes means observing or receiving a gesture of mercy, even if no word is spoken? That hearing God’s voice sometimes means sitting on the bank of a creek and watching the wonder of nature changing and reshaping herself?

How do I tell him that God is everywhere, if we only learn to look?

We have to experience that. We have to still ourselves, to calm the plethora of other voices in our heads and around us, to focus in on where blessing and redemption are.

The word of God is being spoken all around us. No book can contain it. No church or idea can restrain God’s ability to speak Spirit everywhere we turn.

Solomon, in his wisdom, began to understand that the temple he built would never really be a resting place for God. It was only ever an homage, a gift to recognize how good God had been to him.

But how could God possibly live on earth? If heaven, even the highest heaven, can’t contain you, how can this temple that I’ve built contain you?

Oh, I say this to you all the time. We try so hard to fit God in a box, to conform the Holy Spirit to our own ideology, our own ethical system. And we’re in plentiful company to do so. Our own scriptures are full, chock full of people who tried very hard to fit God into a box. And occasionally we have a wonderfully redemptive story of someone whose conception of God got stretched when the epiphany came that God was much, much bigger than what they thought.

Solomon understands that.

The crowds following Jesus began to understand that. But instead of bowing in wonder and awe, they thought it was too much for them right then, and they left.

The word God proclaims threatens to change us. It threatens to transform us at a fundamental level, and it is just as threatening to those who have never tried to be in relationship with Christ as it is to those who were baptized decades ago and have spent all our lives trying to live into that relationship. Because the righteousness of God is so incredibly distant from our human experience! It is an ideal we can never reach; it is infinitely far away.

The spoken, still-spoken word of God is dangerous and uncomfortable. God is guiding the Church, which is not a building or a structure or a denomination, but rather is everyone who would be in relationship with Christ; God is guiding that Church into strange and new places, into ideas that don’t jive with what we are often willing to accept in our fervent religiosity.

And God is guiding us there not to wage battle with people, but to nurture them, to love them into relationship with Jesus.

Because the word of God isn’t a weapon of war; it’s a proclamation of peace.

We spend a lot of our conversation thinking that Paul is telling us to wage war with people who don’t represent what we expect of God’s will. But that’s an impoverished interpretation of Paul’s words.

Paul is being far more straightforward than that, I think. He specifically, concretely says:

We aren’t fighting against human enemies

but against rulers, authorities, forces of cosmic darkness, and spiritual powers of evil in the heavens. 

So let’s set aside our bitter, belligerent words that we reserve for our “enemies” and try speaking the word, the ρημα of God instead. A word that is peace, that is hope, that is love for each other. A word that is spirit and truth. A word that is praise of God, thankfulness and blessing. A word that is only threatening because of how powerful it is and how different it is from the human word.

Let us surrender our human words. Let us let God speak a word through us, and all our words shall be like the psalmist:

How lovely is your dwelling place,

LORD of heavenly forces!

Better is a single day in your courtyards

than a thousand days anywhere else!

My heart and my body

will rejoice out loud to the living God!

LORD of heavenly forces,

those who trust in you are truly happy!

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.