easter-5-homily.md

Homily: 5th Sunday of Easter

April 29, 2018

lectionary

Homily

The 8th chapter of the Acts of the Apostles opens right in the middle of amazing things happening as the witnessing and preaching of the Risen Lord began to spread. It’s sort of like how we find ourselves today, listening to texts that are chosen because we are well into the season of Easter, not yet at the end, and it’s been going on for weeks. But it’s not the end yet. In the midst of life.

I’m not sure when I first became enamored of this little vignette involving Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. I really think it began in my youth. On his way home an Ethiopian eunuch – that is to say an VIP, an important person – you know you can tell those kind of folks by the clothes they wear and the way the carry themselves. And you can tell by the car they drive. He drove a really classy chariot. In today’s world, I guess, it would be a classy private jet.

Well, he was driving his chariot and reading Isaiah at the same time. I wondered about how he did that? Did he have a book stand on his chariot. Oh, wait, it might have been a scroll. That would be an even more elaborate contraption on his chariot. Looking out for traffic and potholes while doing a bible study. Amazing, I thought.

Philip was walking along, ready to share the good news he had with anyone who would listen – or maybe anyone the Spirit told him to pay attention to. And lo – the Spirit said – there, that one! Climb into his chariot.

Now this VIP is minding his own business, doing his daily chariot bible study, and Philip decides that he needs to ride with him a while. Amazing.

“What you reading?” he asks. The VIP says, “Oh some stuff about a lamb led to slaughter – a lamb who acted like some kind of weird holy man. I really don’t understand. What do you know about this?”

“I know his name. It is ‘God saves.’ Jesus.” We have seen and we have heard. It’s true.

I don’t really know what special words Philip had that day. What insight into human emotional psychology. How did he know that day, under those circumstances how to speak the incisive words of life to a man caught up in his own self-importance. The Spirit gave him what he needed. And that VIP stopped his whole life. He got off his chariot and went down into the water to be reborn.

Philip disappeared in a quick God-delivered scene-change, and the Ethiopian eunuch went on his way, a changed man. He took with him the basic message about Jesus. That may well be the man who started the Christian church in Ethiopia. As a young man I was amazed to learn that one of the oldest Christian communities there is is found in Ethiopia.

That was one of my important discoveries – that not only is the world made up of people who don’t look, act, or think the way I do. The church, also, is made up such people. And I knew I loved it for that great wide diversity.

Mary Pat and I got to celebrate a little bit of the Ethiopian connection when we were leaving Honolulu to move to Rock Hill, SC.

I used to do a mid-week Eucharist at the St. Andrew’s Cathedral. Those services, as is usually the case, were attended by a group of regulars. Among them was a young man, an architect by trade. We got to know him through the weeks and months – learning that he was the son of an Ethiopian priest. His father had been jailed for many years for his anti-government agitation. And here his son was in Hawai’i – a devout Christian, quietly going about his faith with a deep and quiet resolve. Maaza Mekuria is his name.

We had dinner at his house, one of our last nights. He served us traditional Ethiopian food. It was delicious. It was amazing. It was like nothing else I had ever had. And I was aware that night of the breadth and depth of the Body of Christ, spanning the globe, and connecting generations upon generations.

the one who is sent

It couldn’t have happened without the one who was sent saying, “Yes.” And it wouldn’t have happened if the one who heard had not opened his or her ears to the message that could quicken the heart and give life. Maaza was the messenger of the good news to us that evening in Honolulu. We allowed ourselves to be touched.

It was a little thing for us. But it has happened over and over again, in big and little ways, through the ages, down to the present day.

What does it mean to be sent? It means listening for directions. That’s obvious enough when you’re a student in the classroom, waiting for the teacher to give directions. It’s less obvious when you’re a grown up adult, intent on making your own decisions, responsible every bigger and bigger slices of life.

So for most of us, it entails recognizing that we’re not the ones in charge. That I am not the captain of my life. Those stripes belong to someone else. Luke in today’s reading calls it the Spirit.

As we navigate the difficult passages of our life, we try to manage them by taking control. In the end it is only be letting go that we are able to truly sail through the rapids and shoals, the whirlpools and eddies as well as the rapid descents and falls of our life.

Sometimes the words that bring life can be as simple as, “I love you.” or sometimes it is “I forgive you.” or “I accept your forgiveness.”

On occasion when a person has served me in some way I will say to them, e.g., “You have a pretty smile.” If the person is especially busy they might not really hear. They might say, “What did you say?” thinking I’m asking them for something. When I repeat myself it breaks in and they smile and say, “Thank you.”

I experienced it on that day, waiting in the drive-up line at the Chick-fil-a. When I came up to pay, the cashier said, “Your order has already been paid.” In my instinctive hard hearted way, my first thought was, “I hope the car behind us isn’t a van filled with people.” But happily my second thought was, “Yeah. I get to pay it forward.” That particular day I was able to get past the hard heart, I took it in, and smiled at the grace.

To Receive News / words that give life

If at times we are the ones who are sent to bring the incisive word of life, there are also times that we have to receive those words from another. It was an important discovery for me, many years ago, that it is often harder to receive than it is to give. When one gives, that person is in charge. To receive is to be vulnerable.

The Ethiopian that day had to get off his chariot and receive what Philip had to give. He made himself vulnerable. He humbled himself. Then he could receive the piercing words of life.

Many are the times in my life that I was challenged to acknowledge that I needed help. Oh, and I resist it when I do. When I let down my guard, however, and the one who is sent is there, I have let someone into my life who has the precious pearl of great price.

It is worth it.

The world of diversity

Maaza fit wonderfully in the vibrant community of Hawai’i. It’s a place with all kinds of people. It’s a place where no one ethnicity is in the majority. It’s like the world we live in – the wider world.

One of the themes of the Book of Acts, is that the Good News of Jesus was taken to the whole wide world. “I’ve got the whole world, in my hands.” My mother used to play Tenessee Ernie Ford singing that song.

It’s a sign of a healthy community when you look out and see all kinds of people: young and old, rich and poor, educated and uneducated, reflecting many cultures, nations, and languages. I would challenge any community that if that’s not what you see, then ask yourself what barriers have you erected to prevent it from happening.

in the midst of life – God breaks in

The Ethiopian that day wasn’t planning on having a baptism. He hadn’t sent out invitations. He hadn’t figured out when his aunts and uncles could be there. He was just living his life, VIP that he was.

Then along came this God thing. It broke into his life. He let it happen and he knew he had been changed. He looked out and found the most ordinary thing – water. In that part of the world it was also one of the basic ingredients for life. It was the desert, the wilderness, and one died without water. Ordinary water. The stuff of life. He said, “I want that.”

Not so Episcopalian

What happened that day wasn’t a particularly Episcopalian sort of thing. I became aware of some of those dynamics after ordination and I was charged with baptizing folks – usually, but not always, infants and children.

This narrative about Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch stood out for me in that context as a challenge to the way my church had always done things.

It helped to persuade me then – and I am persuaded now – that the church must slough off the way we’ve always done things if it is to receive the true words of life that we are offered through the God-event of Easter. We must be ready like the Ethiopian eunuch to get off our chariot of focus on our interests and our ways of doing things. We must be able to let Philip into our lives – whatever he looks like and however he talks – so that the Spirit can speak life-giving words to us.

In that sort of place we will find what John describes for us today – “those who abide in love abide in God and God abides in them.” We will find a place love casts out fear so that those who are sent have the courage to go and those who are called to receive the incisive words of life have the humility to open their ears and hearts. Above all, we will find a place where “those who love God must love their brothers and sisters also.”

For such a place, a gift from above, we give thanks this day.

Homily: St. Paul’s Easter 3

Lectionary

I’m not sure when the passage I have just read became embedded in my senses and memory. It had to be after the period when my siblings and I would spend several weeks in the summer with some friends of ours. They had rented a cabin on a lake / reservoir just outside Rock Mountain National Park. They had a boat and fished. My father was not an outdoors man but he had enough sense that he wanted his children to be exposed. I learned to waterski there. I learned to fish there. And I had my first – and really my only experience of frying a rainbow trout over a campfire as the sun rose over the majestic Rocky Mountains.

All of that combined made for a very full sensory symphony. I can smell and taste that fish to this day.

At some point I associated that memory with this passage from Luke and the similar one from the last chapter of John. At some level, Whenever I eat fish I think of Jesus revealing himself to his disciples in the meal he shared on the shore of the lake that day, after his resurrection and before his ascension – as recorded by Luke.

It’s not just the smell and the taste at that point. I tend to want to sing – or at least hear some music. The collect prompts me to listen to: [1]

Open the eyes of my heart, Lord
Open the eyes of my heart
I want to see You
I want to see You
To see You high and lifted up
Shinin’ in the light of Your glory
Pour out Your power and love
As we sing holy, holy, holy

The song has a beat and background that reminds me of U2 but was written by Michael W. Smith. [That’s a positive association for me – maybe not for you.]

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There’s a sequence of actions that takes place in this reading from Luke’s gospel, just prior to the ending. His gospel ends with what we might call an abbreviated version of the Ascension & the sending of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost – each of them recorded more fully in Luke’s follow-up volume, the Acts of the Apostles. Here, just before he closes, he gives us this pattern:

• Peace be with you
• Look at my hands and my feet
• sharing a piece of broiled fish
• interpreting scriptures – “needing to be fulfilled”
• that the Messiah is to suffer
• that repentance and forgiveness needs to be proclaimed
• and finally, the direction to his disciples, soon to be apostles, you are witnesses

The last time I was here, 2 weeks ago, I said to you that I understood the Easter message to be directed at us. So here. The word I hear is that just as those friends of Jesus on the beach so long ago must be witnesses, so too, we must be witnesses.

There’s a song I used to play over and over on the piano, building up my spirit. It was a kind of a prayer. It was a way of transforming what had been the drudgery of piano practice – my mother continuously harping on it – turning it into something that fed my spirit.

You Are My Witnesses by Betty Carr Pulkingham [2]

Chorus You are My witnesses To the ends of the earth You are My witnesses To the ends of the earth

Verse 1: You are My people I love Gentle as dove Wise and harmless ones

Verse 2: You are My saints of new birth Living on earth But born from on high

Verse 3: You are My prophets and priests Proclaiming My feasts Telling the wonders of God

Verse 4: You are My shepherds of sheep Over them keeping watch by night

Verse 5: You are beloved of God Living His Word Dying His death till He comes

The verses seem to describe what a witness of the Resurrection looks like.

• saints of new birth, born from on high
• prophets and priests, telling the wonders of God
• shepherds keeping watch over the people
• beloved of God, living his word, dying his death

That’s a tall order. You would be forgiven for thinking it’s too hard. But there it is.

• If you follow in my footsteps
• You shall be my witness
• If you take up your cross and follow me
• And do not be afraid
• If you abide in me
• bear fruit in plenty
• love one another

Wow.

I think that what happened in the wake of the historical event that we call Easter, with Jesus’s appearances to men and women who lived thousands of years ago, … what happened then was the deliverance to all future generations of a challenge, a task, a responsibility, … to be witnesses.

Easter, by my reckoning, is not about something that happened long ago. It is about how we are linked with what happened long ago.

It’s a responsibility and a challenge that I think we often would rather avoid or at least put off.

That doesn’t take us off the hook, however, as witnesses to the resurrection. There are lots of us. But we have invested a lot in avoiding the kind all or nothing commitment that being a Resurrection witness involves.

We should have known, way back when the 1928 Prayer Book began every Eucharist with the words: “You shall love the Lord your God all your heart, your soul, your mind, your strength, and your neighbor as yourself”, we should have known that much was being asked of us.

How many are the ways to witness?

• “abide in the Lord” – spend your waking and your sleeping days so aligned with the will of the Lord
• Figure out what it means to pick up your cross – most of us not called to be crucified.
• make a little peace in a world that is intent on making war, from the board room to the grocery store aisle
• hold and love a dying baby – and be able to go home and love your own healthy child
• Love the unlovable – forgive the unforgivable

In short, there are as many ways to witness to the Resurrection as there are people here to witness. We each may have our own path, but it will take all of who we are to pull it off. The witnessing takes all of us, mind, body, spirit.

It’s a funny thing about songs. I’ve quoted from several of them here. Often when I’m preparing to preach, I hear music or pieces of songs. Someone once told me that most church-goers care more about music than they do about the Prayer Book.

What I think is true about music and song is that it involves all of us: body, mind, spirit – sort of like the gospel that we’re here to witness.

I think again of another song that sometimes I can’t shake loose from my head. It’s from Leonard Bernstein’s Mass.

Word of the Lord

For the Word was at the birth of the beginning,
it made the heavens and the earth and set them spinning,
and for several million years
it’s endured all our forums and fine ideas.
It’s been rough but it appears to be winning!
There are people who doubt it and shout it out loud,
oh they bellow and they bluster ’til they muster up a crowd.
They can fashion a rebuttal that’s as subtle as a sword,
but they’re never gonna scuttle the Word of the Lord

The Word of the Lord comes to us down through the generations and we cannot shake loose from it. My peace I give to you. Repent of all your short-comings – they are many. But my love is even greater. Then, forgiven, inspired, go and be my witnesses.

I leave you then with a question and a charge.

The question is to direct to yourself. How can you be a witness to the Resurrection? Serving fried fish by the side lake is a fine example. Just make sure you are serving someone who needs the love of God. Sing a song. But sing it with love and a transformed heart. Those who hear you sing will recognize the Lord’s presence for themselves.

The charge is this: go forth from here with the assurance that the Lord goes with you, beside you when necessary, ahead when it’s called for, and just behind you when you need to be caught.

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1. *open the eyes of my heart*: Michael W. Smith. cp. the collect which builds on Emmaus story, “Open the eyes of our heart in the breaking of the bread”  ↩

2. CCLI Song # 339914 © 1975 Celebration  ↩

Easter 2 Our Savior 1

Easter 2: Our Savior

April 8, 2018

Homily

Today’s a day that when I was first ordained many years ago was called a low Sunday because the rush of people who came to church on Easter didn’t come back for Easter 2.

That’s not so true in my experience 30 years later because it seems to me there are a lot fewer “Christmas and Easter” Christians these days. Generally I think that’s a good thing. There is nowhere near the social pressure on people in today’s culture to appear in church. It’s more acceptable just not to go to church.

You all are in church because you want to be. And I think that’s increasingly true around the Episcopal Church. Maybe other denominations as well. I’m glad to see you here.

For many years now I have approached the pulpit on the Sunday after Easter with the shadow of Thomas following close behind me. “Doubting Thomas” stalks me on this day. I have composed and given so many sermons on the close relationship between doubt and faith that I can not count them.

I encountered Thomas as the founder of an ancient Christian community while I was living in Hawai’i. There was a student from India at UH. He met someone and fell in love. They wanted to be married. Not such an unusual event.

Then it got more complicated. They were involved in a local faith community – not St. Mary’s Episcopal Church. But his parents were lifelong members of an ancient Christian community in India called the Mar Toma Church. No one really knows how old that church is, or when it first arrived in India, but the legend that it was founded by Thomas himself is given a certain amount of weight by historians. It’s been around a long time. And the Mar Toma Church is in communion with the Anglican Communion – and in Hawai’i that Anglican Communion is represented by the Episcopal Church. St. Mary’s was one of the closest Episcopal churches to the main campus of UH.

The couple wanted to use my church for their wedding so that the parents would feel satisfied that there was a connection with their ancient church in India. I gave permission.

The Thomas I encountered there was not one who struggled with faith, looked for evidence, “doubted.” That was a Thomas who was so empowered, so motivated, so excited, so inspired by the Gospel of Jesus Christ that he traveled as far away as India, founding Christian communities along the way.

I mention this because, while it is true that Thomas is right behind me, having just read the narrative about Jesus appearing to him a week after Easter, I am far more aware today of a different kind of person somehow just behind me and whispering my name, “Dale”.

1 John 1:1–2:2 We declare to you what was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life– this life was revealed, and we have seen it and testify to it, and declare to you the eternal life that was with the Father and was revealed to us– we declare to you what we have seen and heard so that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. We are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.

Today I am stalked by a different voice. It’s a different tone from the one before. “Doubting Thomas” is highly rational, looking for evidence, like a scientist.

The voice I hear today is softer. More understanding of the differences among people. It wants to empower communities of peace and service to the poor and the outcast.

I’m thinking of the people who taught me, spoke to me, witnessed to me, in such a way that I am more sure of Christ’s presence than I was when I was young.

I stand before you because of … counteless others who have gone before me to make sure that I could stand here before you this day. The 20^th chapter of John’s gospel ends:

… Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.

That might well be the way the gospel ended in its earliest edition. In any case, the next chapter which is the last in John’s gospel ends with almost the same words.

In way or another, my friends, we give witness here today, so that all those coming after will know the truth that can set them free.

Sermons I have known

“Sir we would see Jesus” (John 12:20)

Pasted on the inside of a high and ornate pulpit in Germany. The story related by a Lutheran turned Episcopal priest.

Some Greeks Seek Jesus 20 Now among those who went up to worship at the feast were some Greeks. 21 So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.” 22 Philip went and told Andrew; Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. 23 ~~And Jesus answered them, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. 24 Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. 25 Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. 26 If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.~~

The message from the priest was straightforward. When you preach, do it in such a way that the people who are thirsty to “see Jesus” can actually do so.

I’ve never forgotten those words in 30+ years of preaching. It’s a daunting goal. One that I alone cannot meet. But sometimes it happens.

• Shane Claiborne:: Calcutta children where he learned what we meant and that we means we all share.

Tony Campolo:: Go through those doors and sponsor a child

Every year he preaches and teaches at HIM in Honolulu. He is now retired, but the power of his preaching is as strong as ever. I have never been influenced so forcefully and immediately by a sermon. He preached about the need to serve others, to feed the hungry, clothe the naked – that sort of thing. It culminated with the command/suggestion to go out the back doors and sign up to support a child in need through Compassion International that had tables set up ready to serve us. I’ve been helping to support Evelyn ever since.

That’s the kind of power and effectiveness John is talking about. And the effect of that kind of preaching is a community like that described in the Acts of the Apostles.

Radical Community

Our first reading from the Acts of the Apostles gives an idealized picture of the kind of community that is possible when built on the foundation of Jesus, crucified and risen.

Acts 4:32–35 Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common. With great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. There was not a needy person among them, for as many as owned lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold. They laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.

These texts are not put down to be scripture – something to be read in churches – they were written down to support and encourage, to empower and guide, to care for fledgling “families” of Christians. They were written so that we would do the same. That we would support & encourage … our own communities and those who come after us.

How are you doing? I urge you to through those doors when you leave today and preach and teach and bear witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ: He is Risen!

Sunday Easter morning 1

Sunday / Easter morning

Wearing new clothes

There is a tradition that Easter is the day show up at church in new clothes. I haven’t really been with you long enough to be sure – but I’m guessing not a few of you are wearing new clothes. Some of you might even be wearing white clothes – white clothes for the white of baptism. Baptism as it was practiced for many centuries entailed being stripped of your own clothes before entering the baptismal font and as you emerged being clothed in new white robes. New clothes for the new life given in the Risen Lord.

This morning

I am drawn with power, tenderness, attraction, interest, awe, wonder, not a little bit of trepidation to the figure of Mary (in John’s gospel) – in Mark’s gospel it’s Mary & Mary & Salome. I am drawn to Mary who heard the Lord call her by name. And with that was ready to run to pass on the news that she had seen the Lord.

I am in awe of the power of one person’s testimony, be it a story or just the look in their eye, that the world has just changed. That God has spoken. That in the empty tomb & Resurrection, life was transformed.

The scripture readings today are primarily about those who, having been touched variously by the sacred encounter with Jesus, were able to pass on their account in such a way that one person after another, stretching now into the billions, believed and followed him to become his students and friends.

That is powerful story-telling.

Paul said: The Lord has appeared last of all to me.

For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred

Tell it for healing

How one tells the story. To tell it with power. It has moved men and women, young and old, for thousands of years.

… reading Gates of the Forest, for Wiesel, an almost hopeful and, therefore, unrepresentative novel in his mournful body of work. In the preface he tells the story of the revered Hasidic Rabbi Baal Shem Tov.

The story goes, “When the great Rabbi Israel Baal Shem-Tov saw misfortune threatening the Jews, it was his custom to go into a certain part of the forest to meditate. There he would light a fire, say a special prayer, and the miracle would be accomplished and the misfortune averted.”

In succeeding generations, when their people were threatened, rabbis would return to the forest seeking salvation for them. But in the next generation, a rabbi had forgotten how to light the fire. In another, the rabbi forgot the prayer. In the third generation, the rabbi does not even know the place.

This last rabbi prays to God, ‘‘I am unable to light the fire and I do not know the prayer; I cannot even find the place in the forest. All I can do is ask You to redeem us, and this must be sufficient.’’

The narrator reports, “And it was sufficient.” citation

Acts 10:34–43

In the reading from Acts (2nd service) we hear Peter, in effect, preaching one of the first Easter sermons.

Peter began to speak to Cornelius and the other Gentiles: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ–he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

The whole point of the book of Acts is that as the followers of Jesus began to tell the story, their lives and the world around them began to change. As they tell us again and again, “The reason we do this is for all those who come after.”

Tell it for power: the monk

There is a story that speaks to the power that disciples tapped into, the power of Resurrection, the power of God in a world intent on wielding power – in the world of politics and national intrigue, in the boardroom where hiring and firing people is the epitome of becoming the king of the mountain. The story we are a part of is a completely different kind of story. It flows from a tomb – an empty one. citation

… It was during one of these invasions, [the story goes] as the samurai returned with the captured holy men, that the army’s General was informed of a monk, one of the highest ranking, who refused capture.

“He would not come? Even under threat to his brethren?” the General asked.

The lead samurai shook his head. “We murdered numerous lower ranks in front of him, from the Samanera to the Majjhima. All his contemporaries surrendered, yet he remains. We did not harm him, however, as we knew you would want such a dissident fully intact.”

The General thought on this for a while. In all his years as an enforcer he had never encountered such a situation. The audacity! He decided to meet this monk face to face. Rounding up a select group of samurai, they rode off to the monastery.

Passing through the gates, he saw him there, a man of no special stature, standing stalwart in front of his holy house, face to the sun, arms clasped behind his back. The General dismounted and started towards him, the samurai remaining behind on horseback.

As he drew closer, the military man unsheathed his sword, walking directly into the monk’s midst and pushing the tip into his navel. For the first time, the monk made eye contact, looking down from the sky and into the face of his attacker.

“Don’t you know who I am, monk?” the General hissed. “I could take this sword and run it through your belly without blinking an eye.”

The monk remained stolid, his expression unchanged. “And don’t you know who I am?” he replied. “I could have your sword run through my belly without blinking an eye.”

Recognizing that he was in the presence of a power far greater than his own, at that moment he took off his sword and became the monk’s student.

Those who heard the disciples knew they were in the presence of a power far greater than the Roman Empire that stood so proudly around them. And so it is to this day.

A whoop throughout the city: the Brewers

The sensation in Wauwatosa as the Brewers won the pennant 1982, going outside to hear a whoop going up across the whole city.

I once experienced the delight of a community coming together and hearing powerful good news in one sudden moment. I was the associate at a parish in a suburb of Wauwatosa, WI. The baseball team – the Milwaukee Brewers was having a tremendous season. They made it to the series that would determine the winner of the American League. For that series I rented a television. We had not had one in our home for many years.

Well, shortened story, the Brewers won that series. “The 1982 ALCS was marked by a dramatic comeback by the Brewers, who lost the first two games of the series and were trailing late in the final game.” (Wikipedia) As the final out came with ground out to the short stop Robin Yount, my son Owen – age 5 at the time – and I jumped up and gave yell. We ran outside to the street in front of our house, Wisconsin Avenue, one of the main roads leading into downtown Milwaukee Ave. There was not a car on it. And then we heard it. A whoop began to grow out of the asphalt of Wisconsin Avenue until it was like a mighty storm. The city of Milwaukee was celebrating their first pennant.

The Easter good news that went up that day in Jerusalem, has grown and grown up to the present day. God has won a great victory.

From fear to confidence: riding a bicycle

The Easter message has the ability to bring hope and confidence to the weakest and most fearful. I have watched my own children learn to ride bicycles. At first there is great fear. Shaking. Caution. Then finally they’re up. My youngest, Emma, was so excited the moment she got up on her own she completely forgot that she had no idea how to stop the bicycle. She rode around the circle in front of our house until she finally crashed the bike into a large bush.

I had my own slow starts, but eventually rode century rides around the mountains of Colorado and took my brother to college in Santa Fe, 300 + miles away, by bicycle. That’s like the craziness of the Resurrection message.

Open to Serendipity: The women at the tomb

Breathless from running – from Jerusalem to Galilee? (synoptics) or across the city (John) these women knew that they had a brand new story to tell and it needed to be known now. Spreading the good news with power.

They were open to a new way of living, a new way of seeing, they were prepared to change. Serendipity is the way I think of it. They were open to the wow of God doing the totally unexpected.

From Jesus .. superstar: “I don’t know what to do …”

I have to tell you that I often feel real fear and trepidation at the task of finding the right words on Easter morning. I feel a little like Mary Magdalene in her song from *Jesus Christ Superstar*:

I don’t know how to love him
What to do, how to move him
I’ve been changed, yes really changed
In these past few days
When I’ve seen myself
I seem like someone else …

In order to express her own sense of inadequacy and falling short, but all she can do is begin to tell the story of what’s happened. In the end I know that my task is simply to get out of the way and let the story speak. In the end I don’t know how to do it. How to say how I’ve been moved, how I’ve been changed, by this one who is no longer found in the tomb. It is empty. And he is risen. Alleluia.

St Paul's Easter Vigil 2018 2

St. Paul’s : Easter Vigil 2018

April 1, 2018

lectionary readings

Abundance, extravagance, –

My entrance (conversion) to the Episcopal Church came about because I associated it with extravagance, abundance, genuineness, sharing, – even though the caricature of Episcopalians is that we like things ordered and not with too much enthusiasm – you know, like “not too much salt.”

For me there were really 4 things: - Candles: real fire - Chalice: real wine - Dress up in holy clothes - Stand, kneel, a willingness to put our bodies into a sacred space.

What I experienced was that this was a place where people were not afraid to say that God is in this place. A church that is not afraid to show extravagance and abundance in its worship – because God is himself extravagant and abundant.

Later I was exposed to clergy who seemed to speak my language and also the language of God – at the same time! The Episcopal Church has been a place for me where God and the human are able to meet. Where an extravagant and abundant God was able and willing to cross paths with the likes of me.

It is a little as if I have been living into that reality ever since – well, it’s been a couple of years since I was a teenager.

Tonight, more than any other time in the church year, we have the opportunity to experience the extravagant and abundant God reflected in an extravagant and abundant liturgy.

New Creation

It has seemed amazing to me that the primary narrative of Christian faith is told on only 1 Sunday in the church year. We did it last Sunday. The narrative of the suffering of Christ.

It turns out that the primary narrative (the Passion) is not why we’re here. If Jesus had died on the cross and that were the end of it – we would not be here. We’re only here because the cross is not the end of the story. God is extravagant and abundant.

It takes a liturgy that lasts 3 days to tell the whole story. Today is the 3rd day. The liturgies on Holy Thursday and Good Friday do not have an actually end – they don’t have dismissals. That is because they are a part of a liturgy that lasts 3 days – culminating in tonight worship.

Tonight we show how big the story is with the range of the readings from Scripture. It is so big that we have to go back to the beginning – –In the beginning** – to tell it.

The story has to include the main extravagant and abundant action of God – deliverance. From the Passover and Exodus in Egypt, to the redemption from Sin on the cross, to the slaves of the present, God’s basic activity in the world is to set us free. Free from all that enslaves us. That’s what the extravagant and abundant God is up to in this world.

We forget that at our own peril. Ezekiel and his vision of the dry bones that God blows into life reminds us that where the people lack a vision, where we fail to recognize God’s awesome work around us, we are in danger of perishing. –When a people lacks a dream they will perish– (Prov. 29:18.)

Baptism

The place where this story comes into burning focus is in baptism. This liturgy tonight has its original purpose in being the time that new Christians were initiated into the faith. This was the culmination of a long process of learning about the abundance and extravagance of God’s grace. On this night the newcomers to the faith were baptized, confirmed, and received their first communion. It was done with extravagance and abundance. The font was a pool. The oil of confirmation was poured out of a jar. The bread and wine was clearly the stuff of life.

I have known glimpses of that kind of Easter Vigil. My baptisms in:

• My seminary, Nashotah House, was not my first vigil but it was the first time I realized that if God is who we say he is our liturgy ought to reflect that. We began with a fire being kindled near midnight, the doors opened with a bang, the proclamation was made as a curtain came down revealing a 100 lilies behind the altar, and the seminary bell tower began to ring. And volunteers continued to ring it until dawn.

• Trinity Church, Wauwatosa In my first parish I had to begin designing for myself some kind of worship that could reflect the awesome God in our midst. I remember scouring the countryside for a font big enough that my infant daughter Miriam could be immersed in it. It was something of a new experience for many there..

• St. Andrew’s by the Lake, Michigan City. I had the most extraordinary opportunity to baptize a 50 plus year old adult in a pool where he could be immersed. I was describing one day the previous year’s Easter vigil baptism. This man began to cry. I didn’t know why. He said, ‘Would you baptize me’? I said, –Of course.– He went on to explain that he while he had been a pastor for 30 years he only the past year had learned that his parents had not actually had him baptized.

• Honolulu, esp. Isaiah. One Easter vigil in Honolulu, in a pool that we could wade in, I baptized a young boy named Isaiah. I had the picture for a long time as my Facebook page. We were outside, standing together in the pool, and the rain was pouring down on us. We were soaked. It was joyous. And it seemed to me that God’s grace surrounded us with amazing extravagance and abundance.

photo

Expect the awesome

Often we don’t measure up to God’s call to show extravagance and abundance. God knows that and loves us anyway. Annie Dillard wrote once:

There is one church here, so I go to it. – The members are of mixed denominations; the minister is a Congregationalist, and wears a white shirt. The man knows God. Once, in the middle of the long pastoral prayer of intercession for the whole world–for the gift of wisdom to its leaders, for hope and mercy to the grieving and pained, succor to the oppressed, and God’s grace to all–in the middle of this he stopped, and burst out, –Lord, we bring you these same petitions every week.– After a shocked pause, he continued reading the prayer. Because of this, I like him very much. ‘Good morning!’ he says after the first hymn and invocation, startling me witless every time, and we all shout back, ‘Good morning!’ …

The higher Christian churches - where, if anywhere, I belong - come at Godas though they knew what they were doing, I often think of the set pieces of liturgy as certain words which people have successfully addressed to God without their getting killed. If God were to blast such a service to bits, the congregation would be, I believe, genuinely shocked. But in the low churches you expect it any minute. This is the beginning of wisdom. [1]

Acclamation

This is one night when I let down my guard and I really begin to believe – like the ‘low churches’ – that God is going to blow the service to bits. Or perhaps blow it into shape.

Let us tonight let down our guard and expect God to break into your lives with power and great glory. As we proclaim “The Lord is Risen!” let us say it as if we mean it. As we repeat it over and over again, we will grow into the likeness and truth that we proclaim.

He is Risen. Alleluia.

---

1. Annie Dillard, Holy the Firm  ↩

Good Friday

Opening

By some measures today is the most solemn day of the year for a Christian. I didn’t really know that growing up. I didn’t learn it until seminary. The way it comes up there is that it illustrates a basic principle of the development of worship and prayer patterns. Namely that the most ancient practices are preserved in the highest holy days.

2 examples from this day’s liturgy are the abrupt opening without special introductions or music. The other which I choose to do is the style of kneeling that you saw me do. Prostration. On this most penitential day the most ancient style of kneeling has been preserved. The other place that it is observed is at the ordination of a priest.

We have just heard the account of Jesus’ Passion as it appears in the 4th gospel, John. There are important differences between it and the 1st 3 gospels, known as the “synoptic gospels”. Among the differences is that in the synoptic gospels Jesus speaks from the cross the opening words of Psalm 22.

“Eloi eloi lama sabachthani?”

i.e. psalm 22 “why have you forsaken me?” As a part of bringing last night’s liturgy to a close we read together Psalm 22. As a way of linking last night with today, “Good Friday,” my modest homily is structured around the NIV Readers version of Psalm 22.

Daddy, Why do they call this day Good when it’s the day that Jesus died?

Sweetheart, It’s the day that Jesus died – and that’s the bad part but that was a good day because it is God’s work on that day that saved us all. Good Friday brings salvation to all the people.

It’s good. But it’s bad, too. It’s a basic part of the Good News that we call Gospel. But it’s a time when all the pain that we can muster up is gathered together in one place so that the Son of God can mop it up. It’s a paradoxical day.

It’s a day filled with the voice of despair and pain. It’s a day when all the unfuilfilled hopes of humanity are gathered and concentrated and focused on one thing. The suffering and death of Jesus. But the story’s not over.

It’s Friday. But Sunday’s coming.

There is terror about, danger and much to be anxious over

Psalm 22

For the director of music. A psalm of David to the tune of ‘The Doe of the Morning.’

1 My God, my God, why have you deserted me?

Why do you seem so far away when I need you to save me? Why do you seem so far away that you can’t hear my groans?

So often I feel like I’m all alone. That there is no one who really understands. The ones I turn to for understanding just look the other way. They’re embarrassed by what they see

It’s Friday and times are hard.

2 My God, I cry out in the daytime. But you don’t answer.

I cry out at night. But you don’t let me sleep.

Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I feel like screaming. Mostly I just bury it inside. The world is spiraling downward. What will stop it? There is nothing.

But Sunday’s Comin’

3 But you rule from your throne as the Holy One.

You are the God Israel praises. 4 Our people of long ago put their trust in you. They trusted in you, and you saved them. 5 They cried out to you and were saved. They trusted in you, and you didn’t let them down.

Then there are times like today. When I return to the ancient stories. When somehow the words, the large wooden cross, the knowing look of fellow pilgrims, they all bring God back into focus for me.

When I look at my personal heroes I find the courage and the stamina to go on. Dorothy Day looked at the filthiest person off the street and she saw Jesus. My friend who worked with Mother Teresa saw the awesome power of love as she held the dying babies of Calcutta in her arms.

But then I remember it’s Friday.

6 Everyone treats me like a worm and not a man.

They hate me and look down on me. 7 All those who see me laugh at me. They shout at me and make fun of me. They shake their heads at me. 8 They say, “He trusts in the Lord. Let the Lord help him. If the Lord is pleased with him, let him save him.”

How often have I slipped into worrying about how others see me. I worry about my looks. I worry about how others perceive me. Will they like me? My best friend who is a Down’s Syndrome child was made fun of by the most important person in the land. Sometimes it seems too much.

Then I remember, Sunday’s comin’ and hope around the bend.

9 But you brought me out of my mother’s body.

You made me trust in you even when I was at my mother’s breast. 10 From the time I was born, you took good care of me. Ever since I came out of my mother’s body, you have been my God. 11 Don’t be far away from me. Trouble is near, and there is no one to help me.

But then, Friday is still here.

12 Many enemies are all around me.

They are like strong bulls from the land of Bashan. 13 They are like roaring lions that tear to pieces what they kill. They open their mouths wide to attack me. 14 My strength is like water that is poured out on the ground. I feel as if my bones aren’t connected. My heart has turned to wax. ~~It has melted away inside me. 15 My mouth is dried up like a piece of broken pottery. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. You bring me down to the edge of the grave. 16 A group of sinful people has closed in on me. They are all around me like a pack of dogs. They have pierced my hands and my feet. 17 Everyone can see all my bones right through my skin. People stare at me. They laugh when I suffer. 18 They divide up my clothes among them. They cast lots for what I am wearing~~.

But what keep’s me going is that Sunday’s comin and You, Lord, will lift me up

19 Lord, don’t be so far away from me.

You give me strength. Come quickly to help me. 20 Save me from being killed by the sword. Save the only life I have. Save me from the power of those dogs. 21 Save me from the mouths of those lions. Save me from the horns of those wild oxen.

If we can find the place within us to call for help, to admit that we can’t save ourselves, that is the place where help arrives. For God is in the saving business. Not the condemning business.

I am sure that Sunday’s coming – that’s Good News people.

22 I will announce your name to my people.

I will praise you among those who are gathered to worship you. 23 You who have respect for the Lord, praise him! ~~All you people of Jacob, honor him! All you people of Israel, worship him! 24 He has not forgotten the one who is hurting. He has not turned away from his suffering. He has not turned his face away from him. He has listened to his cry for help~~.

Perhaps the single greatest and most important truth I ever heard came to me unbidden. I wasn’t expecting it. Someone, somehow, at some time, said to me that God suffers with those who suffer – and at that moment I knew that I had heard the voice of God. It was simple good news.

It’s still Friday but I’m still here to keep the story going. The story that starts so long ago and dips to that sorrowful place on Golgotha but doesn’t stop til the women discover the empty tomb. Sunday’s coming.

25 Because of what you have done,

I will praise you in the whole community of those who worship you. In front of those who respect you, I will keep my promises. 26 Those who are poor will eat and be satisfied. Those who seek the Lord will praise him. May their hearts be filled with new hope! 27 People from one end of the earth to the other will remember and turn to the Lord. The people of all the nations will bow down in front of him. 28 The Lord is King. He rules over the nations.

Kneel down in awe and wonder my friends. We are in sacred territory. The land of the living and of the dead. “All people that on earth do dwell …”

29 All rich people of the earth will feast and worship God.

All who go down to the grave will kneel in front of him. Those who cannot keep themselves alive will kneel. 30 Those who are not yet born will serve him. Those who are born later will be told about the Lord. 31 And they will tell people who have not yet been born, “The Lord has done what is right!”

Good Friday like no other day teaches us in paradox. It is the most ancient of liturgies. It speaks to the world that we live in today. It is most profoundly honored by submission before the symbol of the cross. Silence speaks as loud as any words. Friday is filled with sorrow and death. Friday comes with the promise of Sunday.

The paradox of our lives is that it’s Friday. But Sunday’s Comin’.

Paradox of Francis’ Prayer

No other combination of words speaks that paradox to me better than these: the so-called St. Francis Prayer.

Lord make me an instrument of your peace
Where there is hatred let me sow love
Where there is injury, pardon
Where there is doubt, faith
Where there is despair, hope
Where there is darkness, light
And where there is sadness, joy
O divine master grant that I may
not so much seek to be consoled as to console
to be understood as to understand
To be loved as to love
For it is in giving that we receive
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned
And it’s in dying that we are born to eternal life
Amen.

May the power of this paradoxical day we call Good rest with you and yours this day and all the days of your life. Amen.

Maundy Thursday

Maundy Thursday 2018

Homily: St. Paul’s, Monroe

There are a number of places in the NT where Jesus just comes out and says, “Do this.” Not a lot of them, mind you. I think because he knew that the human condition was such that when you order somebody to do something, our response is often, “Oh, yeah.”

But there are some places. Tonight we hear from a couple of them. “Do this in remembrance of me.” “Love one another.” It’s how the night gets its name.

Also, tonight we begin the longest liturgy of the year. You’ve heard me say that my goal with any liturgy is to hear the response, “I’m glad I came.” Among the most rewarding times for me was when I heard that response after a service that was ca. 2?? hours long. Well, tonight we begin a liturgy that doesn’t end until Saturday night.

Furthermore, tonight we hear together some of the most vivid scenes in all the Bible. The Passover / Exodus is evoked. Paul and 3 of the gospels recall for us the time that Jesus proclaimed that he was the new Passover, to be received in the Eucharistic meal. And from John’s gospel we are confronted with Jesus command to love on another in humility and vulnerability.

Mandatum

The English word “Maundy” comes from the Latin mandatum, which means “commandment.” As recorded in John’s gospel, on his last night before his betrayal and arrest, Jesus washed the feet of his disciples and then gave them a new commandment to love one another as he had loved them (John 13:34).

My first priest boss gave me quite a few commandments. Along the lines of “You will do this. Or you will not do this.” It started when I wore my Birkenstock sandals to an early morning mass I attended – even before I was employed. He said, “We will not have any ”hippy priests“ at this church.” – I’m wearing sandals tonight.

Another commandment he gave us was that we were never to sing the song They will know we are Christians by our Love because it was so patently not true.

Today we remember that we were commanded to love one another. To serve one another. To listen to one another. To be a community. Together. That’s pretty heavy stuff.

I think of the old wag from G. K. Chesterton: “Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried.” It is not easy. But each one of us tonight has heard the commandment and responded. I commend you.

Vulnerability

I am particularly fond of Holy Thursday because it vividly puts before us the notion that to be a Christian is to get outside of our comfort zone. I pointed to this dynamic last Sunday when I spoke of my fondness for processions that got us out of the comfort of our pews in a church building and got us to proclaiming what we believed in the public square, so people could see.

Tonight it is a more intimate setting for a different kind of challenge. It speaks of intimacy and vulnerability, even nakedness, vulnerability, and relinquishing control. It’s amazing the challenge behind the symbol of washing another’s feet. It’s outside of our comfort zone. It was outside of the disciples’s comfort zone.

1. vulnerability
2. letting go
3. drowning to life
4. the sun rises

It’s Friday, but Sunday’s comin’

Symbol

As I said earlier, I’m wearing sandals tonight. It’s actually for convenience in moving to the foot-washing. But I relish the opportunity for another reason. I realized while in Hawai’i that for some folks going barefoot in church was a really big deal. I found it out – well, to back up just briefly – you may know that going barefoot is fairly common in Hawai’i. I cherish the memory of a good friend, elderly Japanese lady, who told me about in the 1930’s the public school passed a rule that you had to wear “slippers” to school. Nobody wore them inside – they were all stashed at the doorway – but somebody was trying to “civilize” the local kids.

Well, a priest at one of the downtown churches began celebrating Eucharist barefoot. It was amazing how dramatic the feeling was. He explained to me one day that he did it follow the commandment of God addressed to Moses in the cave – when the got acquainted for the first time. God told Moses to take his shoes off because he stood on holy ground. As time went on I discovered other people – some of them my friends who took their shoes off in church.

Christians, it turns out, like all other human beings, love symbols. One person wrote that we are “symbol-mongerers”. We need to celebrate that, not hide it. We have powerful symbols in tonight’s liturgy.

• 1st reading is Exodus 12 – "It is the Passover of the Lord
• “Christ our passover is sacrificed for us”
• Washing another’s feet. Letting another wash our feet.

These are powerful symbols. And as symbols always do, they have the potential to change us. In this case, to change us more and more into the likeness of Christ.

Richness of combined readings

There is a richness about us tonight. In the readings. In the gestures we make to night. In the celebration of the sacred meal we share as Christians.

Tonight is a night that unfolds our sacred story – it’s a big story. It begins at the very beginning – well, at the beginning. And it ends with the empty tomb and a new proclamation of a new life.

Dismissal

The tradition for this liturgy is that there is no dismissal. It is a 3 day story/liturgy and traditionally the next step in the sacred story would be vigil before the sacrament that would last until the Friday service.