You Also Are to Testify: a sermon for Pentecost

John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15

²⁶ “When the Companion comes, whom I will send from the Father—the Spirit of Truth who proceeds from the Father—he will testify about me. ²⁷ You will testify too, because you have been with me from the beginning.

“I didn’t say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. ⁵ But now I go away to the one who sent me. None of you ask me, ‘Where are you going?’ ⁶ Yet because I have said these things to you, you are filled with sorrow. ⁷ I assure you that it is better for you that I go away. If I don’t go away, the Companion won’t come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. ⁸ When he comes, he will show the world it was wrong about sin, righteousness, and judgment. ⁹ He will show the world it was wrong about sin because they don’t believe in me. ¹⁰ He will show the world it was wrong about righteousness because I’m going to the Father and you won’t see me anymore. ¹¹ He will show the world it was wrong about judgment because this world’s ruler stands condemned.

¹² “ I have much more to say to you, but you can’t handle it now. ¹³ However, when the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you in all truth. He won’t speak on his own, but will say whatever he hears and will proclaim to you what is to come. ¹⁴ He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and proclaim it to you. ¹⁵ Everything that the Father has is mine. That’s why I said that the Spirit takes what is mine and will proclaim it to you. ¹⁶ Soon you won’t be able to see me; soon after that, you will see me. ”

Common English Bible

Let the words of my mouth

and the meditations of my heart

be pleasing to you,

LORD, my rock and my redeemer.

Photo by Amy Mann

I watched Facebook with considerable jealousy a couple weeks ago as some friends of mine attended the Festival of Homiletics in Atlanta. Homiletics, by the way, is the study and subsequent practice of preaching and all the mess that goes into it.

The Festival of Homiletics gathered some of the most well-known preachers in the world under one roof. If you’ve ever been inspired by a good sermon or in awe of a really outstanding preacher (and I know that happens to you every week here), then you can imagine the atmosphere.

One of my friends caught this quote from a hero of the craft:

"Like that first Pentecost, God crashes our parties and invites in the people we're trying to avoid." - Nadia Bolz-Weber

Why were the disciples gathered in their cloistered room? Because they were afraid; they were trying to avoid the crowds who had so recently demanded Jesus’ crucifixion.

But you might notice that when Jesus appears to the disciples after the Resurrection, he does so unannounced and often breaking the fundamental laws of physics, appearing on their fishing trips and in locked rooms.

And the Spirit, the Breath of God, does exactly the same thing.

a sound like the rush of a violent wind…

⁴All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit…

God breaks into their everyday lives, into their safely locked rooms, and begins the work that the disciples were ill-equipped to do on their own.

Not only were they not confident enough to preach; not only were they completely unprepared to share in the language and cultural context of that diverse crowd in Jerusalem; but they lacked the broader vision that God had, even after Jesus shared it with them:

go and make disciples of all nations

The disciples didn’t need a Long Range Planning Committee. The disciples needed a Right Now Organizing Committee.

We just grew from 120 to 3000. Dude, what do we do???

How many of us has even seen a crowd of 3000 people?

Can you just imagine what that must have been like for the disciples? Can you imagine what that would look like here? This circuit doesn’t typically gather 100 people on a Sunday. To have an explosion of that magnitude would be like everyone in the Nickelsville zip code hearing and being set on fire by the Gospel of Christ.

Why doesn’t that happen?

Maybe it’s because we’re very happy to leave here and go about our lives as usual. And there is good evidence that most of the disciples’ lives were business as usual. But the difference is that under the thin skin of normalcy, something abnormal and exciting was quivering to burst forth from each of them.

And what I am NOT going to do right now is bemoan the fact that our churches in America seem to be lacking that quivering excitement. What good is whining and moaning?

What I am going to do is to encourage you to remember that moment that Jesus got you excited. And I’m not just talking about some big conversion experience. If I’m being perfectly honest with you, I don’t personally have one to point to. My entire life has been a conversion experience, and praise God that Jesus ain’t done with me yet!

On Thursday of last week, we celebrated Aldersgate Day. That’s the day we remember John Wesley, the founder of the methodist movement, stopping in to visit a study on a particularly boring piece of commentary on Romans. He went in rather down in the dumps, but he left feeling his heart strangely warmed, with a new confidence that Jesus loved him.

We celebrate it as Wesley’s conversion experience.

But two weeks later, his journal records his questioning and his despair renewed.

All his life was progress toward perfection, too.

But he had one moment he could point to in which he had a glimpse of the overwhelming, unfailing love of God.

I bet you’ve had that.

And I know it’s hard to grab on to a moment and sustain that remembering to keep being inspired by it. I doubt, as finite human beings, that we are capable of sustaining it, of always realizing the infinite love of God. It’s so much bigger than us that trying to sustain that understanding might just blow our little minds.

But maybe that’s the point.

Take that moment, and hear in it the voice of the Comforter that Jesus has sent us. Jesus doesn’t say that the Spirit of truth will suddenly reveal to us all truth. Jesus says the Spirit will guide us into all truth.

So don’t sweat it if you don’t have all the answers, or if you’re not completely confident in God’s saving power. You don’t have to be!

Just take what you have, take what you know, and hear Jesus’ command:

²⁶ “When the Companion comes, whom I will send from the Father—the Spirit of Truth who proceeds from the Father—he will testify about me. ²⁷ You will testify too, because you have been with me from the beginning.

And here’s the fun part.

[Go outside with everyone’s balloons]

When we are willing to share that testimony - not a testimony of condemnation, because that’s God’s, not ours to decide - but a testimony of love that overwhelms and overcomes all, then the Spirit will take the power of our testimony and spread it through all creation.

When we release these, the wind is going to take them wherever the wind wants. When we release our witness to the people and to the world around us, the wind of God’s Spirit will blow our testimony way out of our control and into the wilderness of God’s creation.

Ready? Go!

[Release balloons]

That’s how amazing God’s love is.

That’s a love worth celebrating.

Let’s sing together because we can trust God’s Spirit…

A sermon for the Sixth Sunday of Easter

John 15:9-17

⁹As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. ¹⁰If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. ¹¹I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

12 ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. ¹⁶You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. ¹⁷I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
   be acceptable to you,
   O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Luke’s record of the Acts of the Apostles is a narrative comprised of snapshots with not a lot of record of time. It might be that we can trust Luke to give us a chronological record, but he doesn’t exactly promise that. He promises an “ordered account” at the beginning of his first volume.

So we’re not at all sure when Peter climbed up on his roof to pray, but the vision he receives there is dramatic and clear and really ought to still stir us to question our own presumptions today.

Do you remember? All we share in our reading today is the culmination of the story, but I think that what builds up to it is what really speaks to us.

If you don’t remember this story, check it out. It’s one of the best!

An officer in Rome’s army named Cornelius is one of those rare converts to Judaism. At tea-time one day, God decides that it’s time for Cornelius to take the next step, and an angel appears to him.

“Cornelius!”

<gaping>

“…What is it, Lord?”

“Cornelius, you are one devoted dude. God’s got a task for you…”

Meanwhile, in Jerusalem, Peter is getting away sunning himself on his roof when all of a sudden he has a hunger-inspired vision.

Have you ever been so hungry you start seeing visions of food?

Peter does just that. But it’s a bunch of stuff he isn’t allowed to eat.

God lowers a tablecloth down to Peter and it’s got, oh, I don’t know, barbeque and lobster and cheeseburgers. Stuff you can’t have if you’re a devoted Jew.

And God tells Peter, “I know you’re hungry. Take your pick.”

“Yeah, right, God. I know temptation when I see it. I know enough not to sin that obviously.”

“No, Peter, seriously. If I tell you it’s okay, then it’s okay.”

And that exchange is multiplied by three. Just to hammer the point home. And it blows. Peter’s. Mind. It’s an abstraction he can’t figure how to put into practice. Or maybe not. Maybe it’s just about food. Maybe God is just telling Peter, and just Peter, that bacon is on the menu now.

Mmmm bacon.

While Peter is trying to work this out, there’s a knock at his door. And Peter hears the Breath of God whisper in his ear:

“You’ve got visitors. I sent them your way. Go with them.”

And so Cornelius and his household are brought into the household of faith. It isn’t just about bacon, after all. And we get this marvelous proclamation that Peter makes in today’s reading:

“These people have received the Holy Spirit just as we have. Surely no one can stop them from being baptized with water, can they?”

John reminds us that the speaking-in-tongues bit that Peter witnesses is just icing on the cake, though. The fruits of the Spirit that Cornelius and his household are demonstrating are far simpler:

²By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.

[Cornelius] gave generously to those in need among the Jewish people and prayed to God constantly.

Sounds simple, doesn’t it?

Remember: the followers of Christ who wrote our New Testament are recalling Jesus’ words and reflecting on them all the time. It’s when Peter has this rooftop experience and has to interpret it on the ground that we see Christianity really start to take a new shape.

If I call it clean, you’ve got no business calling it unclean.

If I call it blessed, you’ve got no business calling it cursed.

If I call it righteous, you’ve got no business calling it sin.

We so often think, in the Church, that we have a monopoly on praise and salvation and theology. But our own scriptures speak a contrary word. Did you hear the words of the Psalmist today?

⁴ Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth…
  
⁷ Let the sea roar, and all that fills it;
   the world and those who live in it.
⁸ Let the floods clap their hands;
   let the hills sing together for joy
⁹ at the presence of the Lord

I’ve heard the sea roar. The sea doesn’t tire. The crashing waves will keep crashing as long as tectonic plates move and the moon revolves around the earth.

I’ve heard the applause of the floods, sometimes in a whisper and sometimes in a forte so deafening that I can’t even yell a conversation with someone standing right beside me.

I’ve heard the hills singing together in wind and birdsong and livestock.

And if God can call forth praise out of the inanimate features of the earth, how can we possibly say that God only calls the faithful of the Church?

The earth doesn’t need a thousand laws and regulations to tell it how to praise. All the earth needs…

Well, let’s unpack that one, shall we?

In order to get the applause of the floods, we need water. That’s a good place to start, right? But water, by itself, will just stand still. It won’t move. Still water is stagnant. It’ll grow things, but it won’t applaud. It’ll gradually become a pool of death.

For water to applaud, it needs to move. For water to move, we need slope. Gradient. Running water will applaud.

But only if it’s got obstructions. If I run water on a completely smooth surface, it won’t make a sound. I need shape and form.

The floods clap their hands because they’re slamming against rocks and trees, because they’re filling in holes with great sucking sounds (and if you’ve never heard a hole suck, you probably aren’t in rivers the way that I am).

Water, gradient, shape. They’re ingredients that occur naturally, that are always cycling and transforming. They don’t require thought or regulation. They’re just there.

And it’s funny. Our lives would be like that, too. God has created us to live lives that are constant praise, constant joy. God isn’t calling us to put forth tremendous effort to fake praise for an hour, or for ten minutes on a Sunday morning.

We don’t need rules and regulations. We just need to get over ourselves and recognize that we are created for praise!

And that’s how love ought to be, too.

“This is my commandment: love each other just as I have loved you.”

That means just love the people I like, right? No, it means just love the people in my church, right? No, it means just loving Christians, right?

As if we even do that.

No, Jesus’ words are for everybody. Love one another.

The only reason we don’t love is because we let our sin get in the way. We close ourselves off to other people. We don’t believe in what they do, in what they say, in what they profess, in what they live. We don’t agree with them and so we must be right and so we refuse to love them.

Let. Go.

Love one another.

We are created in God’s image, and God is love.

Take off the shades that discolor the people you see, the bigotry and judgment and pride, and let us all see one another with the eyes God has created.

And I know, I know it’s not as easy as taking off a pair of sunglasses. Letting go of sin, especially something as deeply rooted as prejudice and pride, takes re-learning of our lives.

But it’s okay. Peter didn’t get it right right away. He and Paul argue for a long time about the direction that the Way of Christ is heading. Peter, the simple fisherman who you’d think would have an easier time making the shift, doesn’t get it as quickly as Paul, who is rooted in law and the judgment and strictness of the Temple. Somehow, Paul shrugs off a lifetime of learning and sees Christ leading the Church out into the Greek world, and simple, stubborn Peter just can’t do it.

It’s weird. I don’t understand that.

But I do understand that I have a lot of learned behavior, learned expectations that I have got to shrug off so I can see God doing a new thing, so I can open my God’s eyes and see my neighbor for the blessing God sees.

God’s commandments are not difficult, not burdensome.

Because when we step out of our own way, we become God’s children.

Let go, friends. Let go with me, and let’s just see into what terrifying and new places God’s Spirit will guide us.

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

See and Know; a sermon for the Third Sunday of Easter

Luke 24:36b-48

36 While they were talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’ ³⁷They were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost. ³⁸He said to them, ‘Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? ³⁹Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.’ ⁴⁰And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. ⁴¹While in their joy they were disbelieving and still wondering, he said to them, ‘Have you anything here to eat?’ ⁴²They gave him a piece of broiled fish, ⁴³and he took it and ate in their presence.

44 Then he said to them, ‘These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.’ ⁴⁵Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures, ⁴⁶and he said to them, ‘Thus it is written, that the Messiah is to suffer and to rise from the dead on the third day, ⁴⁷and that repentance and forgiveness of sins is to be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. ⁴⁸You are witnesses of these things.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
   be acceptable to you,
   O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Revelation.

It’s more than a book.

(A book whose title, by the way, is not “Revelations”. It’s “Revelation”, specifically, The Revelation to John.)

Revelation.

The revealing of something, like an unveiling, a “Behold!” that gives us a glance at something we’d not have seen otherwise.

We’ve talked before about how God’s grace dwells in our hearts so that we can be inspired to follow, how without that grace we would be lost, utterly unable to make any single right or good choice because we are fundamentally bereft and fallen creatures.

I submit to you that God’s grace is also the means by which we receive any revelation of God. Without God’s inspiration, we wouldn’t be able to make any guess about the nature of God.

That’s probably why we so often shape our image of God after our own image. It’s really hard to let go of our self-centeredness and let God show us something different. It’s a lot easier to assume that the things we treasure most about ourselves are also characteristics of God.

Example: I like to spend time in nature. I like music. I assume that God creates the world to make a great and varied symphony of birdsong, clapping leaves of trees, popping and whispering and sometimes roaring streams… That is all so beautiful, and I enjoy it so much, and it brings me such peace, that I assume that God loves it and creates it specifically for that purpose.

And I also assume that the hammering and banging and ripping and growling of human development and technology is a blight upon that natural symphony. I don’t care for it. It makes me tense and stressed, so I assume that God does not intend that in creation.

But God creates us with imagination and productivity, and blesses us in the exact way that we are created. Who am I to say that God doesn’t intend us to have smog-producing automobiles and deforesting houses and landscape-stripping mining? I don’t like them, but that doesn’t mean God doesn’t bless them. I have a hard time - a really hard time - imagining how God could have intended us to use our gifts and imagination in that way, but that doesn’t mean I’m right.

Maybe the ongoing development of humankind is the perfection of creation, and the natural world around us God intends to be stripped in the name of progress.

What do I know?

The Psalmist reminds us:

There are many who say, ‘O that we might see some good!
   Let the light of your face shine on us, O Lord!’

That doesn’t mean that there are many who are ready to see some good. I can easily say, “Man, I wish I could see some blessing in this day!” and still focus on the stress and weight and busy-ness out of which that cry comes.

In fact, I think that the cry to see blessing always comes from us when we’re least prepared to see it. I say that because I know that in every moment of every day, we are surrounded by blessing! All we have to do is look up from our navel-gazing and realize just how good God is.

God doesn’t call us to navel-gazing. God calls us to creation-gazing. God calls us to look up and see what’s going on around us.

God calls us to see the world the way God does.

When Jesus appeared to the disciples (and scared them half to death), he said, “look… see… witness…” because he didn’t want the disciples to live in fear, locked into their cloistered little safehouse.

And, by the way, this moment in Luke’s gospel is one of those I really enjoy.

It’s nearly evening, and the day is almost over,

 the disciples have completely forgotten their manners, and Jesus is coming in after a busy day of defeating death and hell, and he says to them:

Have you guys got any grub around here?

Oh, well, yeah, J.C., we’ve got some leftover fish.

Welcome back to normalcy. Welcome back from navel-gazing.

Sometimes, we get busy focusing on everyday problems, and we need to be reminded of the big picture. Sometimes, we’re so focused on the big questions that we need to be reminded of the everyday stuff.

The bottom line, I suppose, is this: God will show us what we need to see when we need to see it.

The question is, will we open our eyes?

Peter is addressing a Jerusalem audience full of the people who had condemned Jesus to death, and his accusation clings to a word that rankles us today. How would you like Peter to say to you:

friends, I know that you acted in ignorance.

How does that make you feel?

Ignorance is a four-letter word today. Ignorant is an insult. But only because we have confused ignorance and stupidity. Ignorance is when we don’t know better; stupidity is when we know better and we still make a poor choice.

Ignorance is being blind to God’s revelation. But Peter is seeking to open the eyes of the Jerusalemites and turn them around to act in the truth of Christ.

We spend a lot of our time in ignorance. But we don’t have to.

¹See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God.

God loves you more than you love your children; more than you are loved by your parents. You’re stuck with your family, and sometimes that’s easy and sometimes it’s really hard. But God chooses you, and you know that’s not always an easy relationship.

Yeah, you know what you’re like.

But look! See how much God loves you.

You are God’s child.

Look at how God sees you! Look at how beautiful and amazing you are! Look at how completely, how full of blessing God has created you!

God loves you because God sees what you are created to be.

Now look at your neighbor. See how perfectly God has created each of you.

Now I want you to go from here today and see every single person you encounter with God’s eyes. Let go of your bitterness and your prejudice, your history with your neighbor and that nasty thing she said about you twenty years ago. See how wonderfully and marvelously God has created them.

And then God will start to do miracles through you.

The revelation is being offered to you. Just open your eyes.

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

The Big Joke; a sermon for Palm Sunday

Mark 11:1-11

When they were approaching Jerusalem, at Bethphage and Bethany, near the Mount of Olives, he sent two of his disciples ²and said to them, ‘Go into the village ahead of you, and immediately as you enter it, you will find tied there a colt that has never been ridden; untie it and bring it. ³If anyone says to you, “Why are you doing this?” just say this, “The Lord needs it and will send it back here immediately.” ’ ⁴They went away and found a colt tied near a door, outside in the street. As they were untying it, ⁵some of the bystanders said to them, ‘What are you doing, untying the colt?’ ⁶They told them what Jesus had said; and they allowed them to take it. ⁷Then they brought the colt to Jesus and threw their cloaks on it; and he sat on it. ⁸Many people spread their cloaks on the road, and others spread leafy branches that they had cut in the fields. ⁹Then those who went ahead and those who followed were shouting,

‘Hosanna!
   Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!
¹⁰   Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!
Hosanna in the highest heaven!’

11 Then he entered Jerusalem and went into the temple; and when he had looked around at everything, as it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the twelve.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
   be acceptable to you,
   O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Oh, that we were on fire like that crowd outside of Jerusalem!

How many of us would find ourselves in that crowd as Jesus entered the Holy City? Be honest with yourself. What excites you more, what gets more response out of you: a revival or a political rally?

Because if you look at our world today, it’s pretty obvious where the enthusiasm is. And it’s not just the secular world that’s getting more excited about politics than faith. The folk who are leading the charge are the folk who most wholeheartedly connect their faith to their politic.

But I think that most people, in their political excitement, look a lot like that crowd on the road to Jerusalem. They don’t really know what they’re excited about; they just know something really nifty is going on and they want to be a part of it.

For the most part, that’s how we react to our politics. We don’t really look deeply at the leaders of our political movements, and we don’t think all the way through the consequences of our political enthusiasm; we just make knee-jerk reactions out of frustration or a sense of righteous indignation. We get excited when somebody looks hopeful and we hurry to bandwagon and throw our coats and donations and support before the next big thing to come down the road.

And months later we find out what a goon that politician actually is. And years later we start to realize just how many people those ideas hurt. And decades later we wonder what fools actually supported those idiotic ideas.

Because our political memory is fabulously short-sighted.

The crowds who gathered to celebrate the Prophet from Nazareth didn’t have any real sense who he was. They were just getting excited because of all the hype surrounding him. They had a hope that he would fix their problems right then, right there.

‘Hosanna!
   Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!
¹⁰   Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!
Hosanna in the highest heaven!’

The kingdom of our ancestor David…

The coming kingdom of our ancestor David…

Do you see what’s weird about that?

The crowds gathered were looking backward at something long past, hoping that the king they were seeing through rose-colored glasses would reappear and right the wrongs they were experiencing in the present.

And in rides Jesus on a donkey.

It doesn’t give the crowds pause. They just keep singing. Most of them probably don’t even see what he’s on. A baby donkey.

Well, that’s not a military mount. That’s not worthy of the savior.

What’s going on?

This isn’t a parade. It’s a parody. It’s like sitting in the audience of the Colbert Report and taking the monologue seriously.

Since when did God start making fun of us? Since when did God start pointing out the flaws in our plans? Since when did our best intentions become the butt of a divine joke?

It’s not fair! It’s not fair that God has gotten our hopes up and is suddenly making a mockery of them.

What kind of God does that?

There had better be some good reason for this parody. There had better be some good explanation this week for the way God is turning everything upside down.

This had better make more sense as Passover nears, because Jesus is about to ruin a perfectly good Festival Day.

There had better be some sense, now we watch Jesus’ back heading into the city on that donkey, there had better be some sense that this is…

To Be Continued…

<exit>

Covenant: Being Fruity; a sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent

John 12:20-33

20 Now among those who went up to worship at the festival were some Greeks. ²¹They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and said to him, ‘Sir, we wish to see Jesus.’ ²²Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. ²³Jesus answered them, ‘The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. ²⁴Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. ²⁵Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. ²⁶Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honour.

27 ‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say—“Father, save me from this hour”? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour. ²⁸Father, glorify your name.’ Then a voice came from heaven, ‘I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.’ ²⁹The crowd standing there heard it and said that it was thunder. Others said, ‘An angel has spoken to him.’ ³⁰Jesus answered, ‘This voice has come for your sake, not for mine. ³¹Now is the judgement of this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. ³²And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ ³³He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart

be acceptable to you,

O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.

Karoline and I are currently planting our first garden ever. We are busy asking friends what to plant when, and how. On Tuesday, Noah and I spent a very brief part of the afternoon planting a row of red onions. He was really excited. He has decided that he likes gardening. We’ll see how true that is when harvest comes around.

Our hope is that our harvest will be productive. It’s our first shot at this, so I have my doubts about our rate of success, but I’m hopeful.

I hope our garden will be fruitful.

We are doing the best we know how, and checking in with friends, trying to learn how best to do this and keeping ourselves accountable. We are trying to keep our end of the bargain and trust the earth to do her part as well.

Do you see where I’m going here?

There is a reason that the prevailing context of parables and stories in the Bible is agriculture. It’s something the people around Jesus knew about. It’s something the patriarchs knew about. Like music to Stevie Wonder, agriculture is

a world within itself;

It’s a language we all understand.

…[it] always will be

One of the things that life just won’t quit.

It is a practice that people around the world have recognized from before antiquity through today, however much the practice of farming and gardening may change with the advent of ever-improving technologies: irrigation, plows, tractors, hydroponic gardening, even organic harvests from the rooftops of our most densely concreted cities. Growing things for beauty and for nourishment happens everywhere, and the observations Jesus makes about that seems to carry from one location to another, however different they may seem.

Even observations like today’s that we would rather overlook:

unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

God’s covenant is always beneficial to us. We’ve seen that through these texts during Lent. God is always working toward our well-being, our gifting, our salvation; but there is often considerable sacrifice that we must make on our end of the covenant.

We have to look hard at ourselves; to recognize that, unlike what so many of the people to whom we look for guidance have to say, we cannot be a self-made person. We cannot pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. We cannot improve ourselves. We cannot make ourselves worthy. We cannot make ourselves holy. We cannot save ourselves. And we cannot expect that the change God desires to make in us will allow us to hold on to the stuff we treasure most dearly.

For I know my transgressions,
   and my sin is ever before me.

I know I’m not good enough for the work to which I’m called, for the following I’m called to do.

Indeed, I was born guilty,
   a sinner when my mother conceived me. 

And that is why the psalmist, seeking holiness, makes such a wrenching request:

Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
   wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
⁸ Let me hear joy and gladness;
   let the bones that you have crushed rejoice.
⁹ Hide your face from my sins,
   and blot out all my iniquities. 

Purge me… the bones that you have crushed… hide your face…

Really?

How many of us have had a stomach virus this year? Do we really want to be purged?

How many of us have had bones not only broken, but crushed?

How many of us remember when someone beloved to us has been so upset, so hurt that the very sight of us is painful? What does it feel like when your beloved cannot even bear to look at you?

Purge me… crush my bones… hide your face…

Being made worthy is not a fun process. Being made holy is painful, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. To be sanctified means giving up a lot that we hold dear.

All that stuff we hold on to so tightly, all that stuff we hoard; all the times we turn back into a three-year old screaming “MINE!” have to turn into opened arms, uplifted hands, a humbled countenance before God, saying, “Yours”.

All my time is yours.

All my gifts are yours.

All my attention is yours.

All my work is yours.

All my stuff is yours.

All my emotion is yours.

Every thought is yours.

Every word is yours.

Everything, Lord, is yours.

Put to death all that is unholy. Dry it up, crack it open so that the germ of faith still living inside me can soak up all the goodness in the soil you plant me in; so that that faith, potent as a mustard seed, can grow into the fruit you desire me to be.

Put me to death, Lord. Make me holy. Make me fruity, so I can show you that I’m worth your time, your attention, your love.

Because you tell me you love me, Lord, but it’s so hard to believe when I keep messing up. It’s so hard to have faith in your love when there is so much of me that’s hate. It’s so hard to believe in you when I just can’t believe in myself.

God, purge my impure thoughts. Break the fragile frame I’ve made for myself. Hide your face from my shamefulness until you clothe me in righteousness.

And make every thought yours. Make me strong with your hand. Put on me new habits, holy habits that remake me in every action and interaction with my neighbors.

Make me worthy of the promise you’ve made with me. Write your word on my heart so that every word that comes out of me is blessing. Forgive me, remake me, and let me know only you, all the time, everywhere I am.

Make me yours, Lord.

Make me only, always, ever yours.

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