A Picnic in a War Zone

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Sermon for Easter 4, Year A

Psalm 23

Psalm 23 is one of the most well-known passages of religious literature in the world, from any religious tradition.

It’s comforting. And so we often read it at funerals. We cross-stitch it onto nice, fluffy pillows. And it’s one of those passages that we kind of take for granted. We hear it several times a year—that’s what many of us do—and we don’t really continue to think about it.

But I’d like to change that today.

I’d like to take a closer look at it. And it might help to keep your bulletins open to it so that we can really internalize these words. Our psalm is on page six—we just sang it together a few minutes ago.

We’re going to go through this and take a closer look at why this psalm is so comforting, and why it speaks both to our ancestors in the past and can still speak to us today.

So let’s start right now.

In this first verse, “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not be in want.”

That word “want” is really interesting. It’s the same word that was used in the Torah, in Deuteronomy chapter 2, verse 7, when Moses is talking to the Israelites about their forty years wandering in the wilderness. He says, “These forty years the Lord your God has been with you; you have lacked nothing.”

Older translations say, “You wanted for nothing.”

And in Hebrew, it’s the same word as in the psalm—chesar, if you like learning other languages.

And that word choice is really intentional, because it ties this psalm back to the earlier stories of Israel.

It would be like if, in American dialogue, someone used the phrase “certain inalienable rights.” We would immediately recognize that as a reference to the Declaration of Independence.

In the same way, this word is a reference back to their ancestors’ story.

So what the author of the psalm is saying here is: these times are not unprecedented. Just as God was with our ancestors back then, God is with us now. And just as they got through hard times then, we are going to get through this hard time now.

It’s the same story. It’s connected.

So when it says, “I shall not be in want,” that’s the first reason why this psalm is comforting.

Let’s move on.

“He makes me lie down in green pastures.”

This is another interesting image.

Sheep, as we know, are prey animals. And prey animals don’t survive by having big claws or being stronger than predators. They survive by hypervigilance—by watching all the time.

If you’ve ever seen a deer in a field, you know what that looks like.

Prey animals don’t lie down easily. Many animals, like cows, learn to sleep standing up so they can run quickly if a predator comes near.

They only lie down when they feel completely safe.

So when the psalm says, “He makes me lie down,” it’s describing that level of trust. That sense of safety.

Any cat people here? Dogs love belly rubs. Cats? Only if you are their very special person.

I have a cat who will let me rub her belly—but only after everyone else has gone to bed, and no one else is around. Then she decides, “Okay… now you can.”

Because that’s when she feels safe.

That’s the relationship being described here.

Let’s keep going.

“He guides me along right pathways.”

Again, something we might take for granted—but it’s referring to something very specific in shepherding culture.

The ancient Israelites were a shepherding people. Their ancestors worked the same land for generations. There were no paved roads, no GPS.

But over time, the safest routes through the wilderness became worn into the land. Paths formed by generations of shepherds who had learned where to go and where not to go.

So those “right pathways” are the collective wisdom of those who came before.

Which leads into the next verse:

“Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil; for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”

The shepherd’s staff—that crook—is a familiar image. Our bishops carry something similar as a symbol of their pastoral office. “Pastor” literally means shepherd.

That staff is a weapon—not to beat the sheep into submission, but to defend them. To fight off predators when necessary.

The wilderness is dangerous. So it’s comforting to know that the shepherd is with you, ready to protect you.

And then we come to this remarkable image:

“You spread a table before me in the presence of those who trouble me.”

Older translations say, “in the presence of my enemies.”

Picture this:

Two armies lined up on a battlefield, ready to charge.

And then one general strolls out into the middle of no man’s land… lays out a blanket… pulls out a basket of sandwiches and lemonade… and sits down for a picnic.

Can you imagine?

The enemy soldiers would be watching and thinking, “That guy has a lot of nerve. He’s either very brave or very foolish.”

There is nothing more unsettling to an opponent than someone who remains calm in the face of danger—who doesn’t panic, who doesn’t react, but simply holds their ground.

That is what faith looks like.

It looks like the audacity to have a picnic in the middle of a war zone.

Psalm 23 is comforting not because it describes perfect, peaceful surroundings, but because it describes a way of being—a kind of serenity—that can exist even when things are not safe.

That’s what it looks like to trust the Good Shepherd.

And the beautiful part is this:

When we trust the Good Shepherd, we begin to become the hands and feet of the Good Shepherd in the world.

We begin to offer that same sense of safety and care to one another.

This can take many forms.

It can look like bringing meals to someone who is sick—like so many of you did for my family this week when my wife had surgery. Thank you. She’s doing well.

It can look like offering rides to church.

It can look like creating a space where someone who is going through something hard can come, speak freely, and know they will be safe—that they will be held, metaphorically, in the arms of love.

All of these are ways we become the hands and feet of the Good Shepherd.

There’s another way I’ve been learning about over the past several years—something specific to my experience as a man—and I suspect many of my brothers here can relate.

My wife once asked me: if I were walking through a dark parking lot at night and saw another man walking nearby, what would I think?

And I said, “Honestly? I’d probably be thinking about what I need to get at Meijer.”

And she said, “My first thought would be: I hope he doesn’t attack me.”

That was eye-opening.

It made me realize that many of our sisters are navigating the world with concerns that have never even occurred to me.

And it made me start thinking: what are some simple ways I can be the hands and feet of the Good Shepherd?

Sometimes it’s very simple.

If you’re walking through a parking lot and there’s a woman a few steps ahead of you, you can slow down. Give her space.

You might just be thinking about eggs, milk, bread.

But she doesn’t know that.

So creating that space communicates something: safety, respect.

This isn’t about politics. It’s about what our mothers and grandmothers taught us about being gentlemen—literally, gentle men.

It costs us almost nothing. A few extra seconds.

But the impact is powerful.

It creates space. It communicates care.

It’s one small way we can walk those “right pathways”—those well-worn paths of respect, kindness, and gentleness.

There are many other ways. You can think of your own—I’ve seen you do them.

And I look forward to seeing the ways you continue to create spaces of safety and love in this community.

Spaces that reflect the care of our Good Shepherd.

Amen.

A New Story

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Sermon for Easter 3

Luke 24:13–35

Stories are how human beings make sense of the world. We do it all the time. We can’t help ourselves. It’s just how our brains are made.

From the earliest days of human history, children would sit around the campfire with their elders and ask, “Why are things the way they are?” And the elders would tell a story.

Across cultures and religions, one thing is always true: we tell stories.

And if I were to ask you who you are, you would tell me the story of your life.

Stories are how we make meaning.

Now, the most interesting stories are the ones where things don’t go according to plan. That’s where the good stuff happens.

Nobody wants to see a movie with no conflict. There’s no plot.

When that happens, we tend to fall into three kinds of stories:

The fix-it story,
The forget-about-it story,
And the figure-it-out story.

The fix-it story is the one we prefer. Something goes wrong, but we come up with a plan and get things back to the way they ought to be. And a lot of the time, that works.

But sometimes it doesn’t.

Sometimes there are situations we simply can’t fix, no matter how hard we try.

And that’s when we fall into the forget-about-it story.

When everything falls apart, we sit in the ashes and say, “Forget about it. What’s the point?”

But if we don’t give up entirely, if we keep going, we may begin to enter another story: the figure-it-out story.

This is the story that doesn’t fix the problem, but doesn’t give up hope either.

Out of the ashes of the old story, something new begins to take shape—a meaning we didn’t expect, a kind of good we never saw coming.

Not because the suffering was good, but because something real can still emerge within it.

I saw this often in my work as a hospice chaplain.

People would come to me after being told there was nothing more the doctors could do for them.

At first, many of them were living in that forget-about-it story—grieving the life they could no longer return to.

And my work was simply to walk with them.

I would ask about their lives, and I would listen.

And slowly, something would begin to shift.

As they told their stories, they began to see them differently.

They thought about the people they wanted to thank. The people they needed to forgive. The love that had shaped their lives.

And those final weeks or months often became deeply meaningful.

Not because anything was fixed, but because they were finally able to see what mattered.

That journey—from fix-it, through forget-about-it, to figure-it-out—is exactly where we find the two disciples in this morning’s Gospel.

They had hoped that Jesus “would be the one to redeem Israel.”

But things didn’t turn out that way.

Instead of victory, there was a cross.

And when Jesus died, it seemed like all their hopes died with him.

That was the end of their fix-it story.

So when the stranger meets them on the road to Emmaus, they are living in the forget-about-it story.

“They stood still, looking sad.”

They say, “We had hoped that he would be the one to redeem Israel.”

And Jesus just listens.

And then he begins to reinterpret their story.

He shows them that suffering was not the end of the story, but somehow part of it.

And something begins to stir.

They say, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road?”

That’s the beginning of the figure-it-out story.

But it isn’t complete until they reach the table at the end of their journey.

There, Jesus takes bread, blesses it, breaks it, and gives it to them.

And suddenly, their eyes are opened.

They recognize him.

The story doesn’t go back to what it was, but reveals something deeper than they had ever imagined.

And then… just like that, he’s gone.

But Jesus is still there, in the blessed and broken bread.

And that’s when they run back to Jerusalem to tell the others.

Kindred in Christ, that same journey is the one we take every time we come here.

We come from weeks that did not go as planned, carrying burdens we cannot fix.

Sometimes we sit here wondering if any of this really matters.

And yet, here, our stories are reframed.

In the reading of Scripture.
In the prayers.
In the breaking of bread.

Sometimes, our hearts burn within us.

And sometimes, our eyes are opened.

We learn to see Christ here, in this bread and this wine, so that we can learn to see Christ everywhere else.

And we go back out into the world to tell the story:

That Christ is alive.
That he meets us in the middle of our stories.
And that somehow, even now, our stories are being drawn into the greater story of God.

And so, as we go back out into the world this week—a world where life rarely goes according to plan, and some problems are just too big to be fixed—when we are tempted to throw up our hands and say, “Forget about it,” I want to invite you to keep holding on.

Keep walking that road to Emmaus.
Keep listening to each other’s stories.
Keep trying to figure it out.

Trust that Christ is with you in the midst of the mess, working not to take things back to the way they were, but to bring forth a new story from the ashes of the old.

Go forth into this world, transformed by the power of Scripture and Sacrament.

And proclaim, not only with your lips but with your lives, the good news:

That the Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia.

The Patron Saint of Critical Thinkers

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Sermon for Easter 2 A

Text: John 20:19–31

This is one of the most defensive sermons that I preach in a given year.

Because, every year on this week, the gospel reading is the story of Saint Thomas, often called “doubting Thomas,” because he would not believe in the resurrection until he saw Jesus and touched his wounds.

And every year, I want to say:
“Hey now. That’s not fair.”

And I wanna say this for two reasons:

First of all, because doubt is not a sin. Doubt means that you’re taking something seriously enough to ask tough questions. So if anything, St. Thomas the Apostle is not a “Doubting Thomas,” but the patron saint of critical thinkers.

And second of all, Thomas is not the only person in this story who has doubts.

St. Mary Magdalene goes to the tomb and sees actual angels. They tried to explain the situation to her, but she doesn’t believe them.

Later on, she sees Jesus and goes back to tell the disciples—but they don’t believe her either, until Jesus finally shows up and shows them his hands and his side. That’s when they believe.

So when Thomas comes along and says, “Unless I see the mark of the nails… I will not believe,” he is not asking for anything special; He is simply asking for the exact same thing that the others had already received.

So why is he the only one who gets stuck with the label, “Doubting Thomas?” It’s not fair.

So no, I don’t think that Thomas deserves the bad reputation he gets by asking to see the marks of the nails in Jesus’ hands. That’s why I want to come to Thomas’ defense.
He’s not a doubting Thomas; he’s the patron saint of critical thinkers.

But here’s the thing:
I don’t think this story is actually about Thomas. I think it’s about all of us who came late to the party of the resurrection.

Like Thomas, we don’t get to see what the other disciples saw on that first Easter Sunday. We don’t get the luxury of absolute proof; we have to live with the uncertainty.

Because of that, it’s easy to sometimes feel like we are second class citizens in the kingdom of heaven. We were late to the party, so we don’t get what the others got.

I don’t know about you, but I feel like that a lot of the time. I look around the church and wonder if maybe everyone else understands something that I’m missing.

Other people seem so confident in their faith, but I know that I am riddled with doubt.
Other people seem so peaceful, but I know that I am overwhelmed with anxiety.
Other people seem so kind and loving, but I feel the fire of anger within me.

It makes me wonder: am I missing something?

If I’m not alone in that feeling, if you’re feeling it too, then Thomas is our guy.

Because Thomas knows what it feels like to be late to the party, to feel like you missed something important, and now everyone else gets something that you don’t.

Thomas is right there with us, in the middle of that angsty feeling, and so is Jesus.

Behind the locked doors of fear and doubt, Jesus appears again: Speaking not judgment, but peace.

Another interesting detail is that the risen Jesus keeps his wounds, even in his resurrected body. Whatever resurrection means, it does not erase the pain we have endured.

He shows us his wounds, not just as proof of the miracle, but as signs of compassion. He says, “Are you hurt? Look: So am I. You are not alone in your pain.”

That tender place is where the encounter happens that inspires Thomas to proclaim his great statement of faith: “My Lord and my God!“

And then Jesus says something that “breaks the fourth wall.”

If you’re not familiar with that term, it comes from television and movies. “Breaking the fourth wall“ is what happens when a character on screen looks into the camera and speaks directly to the viewers at home. It’s a way of including the audience in the story itself.

And that’s exactly what Jesus is doing when he says, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

When Jesus says that last line, he’s no longer speaking just to Thomas; he’s speaking to all of us as well: “Blessed, are you who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

Kindred in Christ, what this means is that you are not late to the party. You have not missed out on something that everyone else gets.

You are blessed. Because you have not seen and yet have come to believe.

This is a bold statement. What I’m going to say next is even bolder:
That if this blessing applies to us, “who have not seen and yet have come to believe,” then it also applies to those who have not believed, and yet have come anyway.

Blessed are those who keep showing up, even though they’re not sure about what they believe.

When those who stand outside traditional faith choose to do the right thing, they do it for its own sake, not in hope of eternal reward or fear of eternal punishment. They do what’s right out of the goodness of their hearts and we Christians could learn a thing or two from that.

“Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” Blessed are those who have not believed and yet have kept showing up anyway.

Kindred in Christ, there are no second class citizens in the kingdom of heaven. The blessing is bigger than we think. The Holy Spirit is already at work in the lives of those who don’t even have words for it.

So then, the message for us in today’s gospel is actually very simple:
Go easy on Thomas.
Go easy on yourself.
And go easy on each other.

Faith is not a finish line;
it’s a process.
And sometimes that process looks like asking a lot of tough questions.

Sometimes it looks like showing up week after week, not because you have it all figured out, but because something in you has a hunch that something here is worth holding onto, even if you can’t yet identify what that “something” is.

And the good news is this:
Wherever you are in that journey of faith and doubt, Jesus shows up.
Behind the locked doors of fear and doubt.
In the middle of our questions and uncertainties.

And the words that he speaks are not words of judgment, but of peace.

“Peace be with you,” he says.

So, don’t be afraid of being called a “doubting Thomas.”

Keep asking those tough questions.
Keep showing up.

Because it turns out…
that’s exactly where the blessing is.

How God Handles Rejection

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon2 Comments

Sermon for Easter Sunday

“The same stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.” (Psalm 118:22-23)

“The same stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.” (Psalm 118:22-23)

These two verses from Psalm 118, which we read this morning, have something to teach us about how God handles rejection. And they are absolutely perfect for Easter Sunday.

Most of us have some funny ideas about God and rejection. Maybe because we’ve been taught them, or just picked them up from human relationships, but we have this idea that if we reject God, then God will reject us. That we have a kind of constant level of anxiety with that assumption in our minds.

We think, well, what does rejecting God entail? And often the answers people come up with are believing the wrong things, doing the wrong things, saying the wrong things. That, oh, you know, if I leave this church, then I’ve rejected God. If I don’t believe this or that doctrine, or if I commit some circumstance, then I turn from God, and therefore God will reject me right back. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. Go directly to hell.

Again, we assume this based on human relationships, because humans, as we know, have needs. Humans have egos. A lot of our relationships are built on that mutual exchange where we help one another out. I’m nice to you, you’re nice to me, but if I’m not nice to you, maybe you’re not so nice to me.

And we project that onto God.

But the thing is, God doesn’t have any needs. And God doesn’t have an ego to bruise. So that kind of creates a question mark over our assumption that if we reject God in some way, that God will reject us.

But that’s where this verse comes into play:

“The same stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.”

I was reading a story earlier this week that illustrated this really well.

There was a five-year-old kid in a store who wanted his mom to buy him a toy, and she said no. And the five-year-old kid, as five-year-olds sometimes do, lost it and just shouted, “I hate you!”

And the mother—her mom was so great in this moment. Mom didn’t freak out, didn’t punish, did not reject the kid who had rejected her, and said, “Okay, you hate me. But I love you. And your hate doesn’t change my love.”

That’s how good parents are.

And when we think of our image of God in the Christian tradition, that parental imagery is a big part of that. And so if our human parents can understand that rejection is not mutual—that the parent’s love is not undone by the child’s hate or the child’s momentary tantrum—how much more does God understand that?

Here on Easter Sunday, of course, we are celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. Our first reading outlines this handling of rejection a little more concretely.

They say Jesus came among us doing good, healing those who were sick. And people didn’t like that, for some reason. And they killed him by hanging him on a tree—a euphemism for crucifixion.

But then God raised him up on the third day.

That is the ultimate way of rejecting rejection, which is what God does.

God does not reject those who reject God.

God is love itself, and therefore love itself rejects rejection itself. That’s just how love works. And it is the fundamental truth of our entire existence—of your existence.

You are loved. Full stop.

That’s it. You are loved, and there’s nothing that you can do about it. Absolutely nothing.

We think that oftentimes our doubts about theology or faith or belief get in the way of our relationship with God. We think that our sins have that power. We get anxious about that. And we’re anxious, and, oh no, my doubts, my sins, can keep God from loving me.

But then sometimes these fancy preachers tell us, “Oh, God is loving and God will forgive you,” but we’re still feeling anxious. So now I’m anxious about the fact that I’m anxious, and I’m just spiraling.

And it is in that moment that it’s worthwhile to remember that fundamental truth of your existence: that you are loved. There’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.

God rejects your rejection, but does not reject you.

So when those feelings are arising in you—your doubts, your sins, your anxiety, your anxiety about your anxieties—just take a breath and let it be there in that moment.

Because that’s the raw material of your own resurrection that’s happening.

You know, if you’re experiencing doubt, that just means you’ve got a really good, critical-thinking brain. If you’re wrestling with sinful desires of whatever kind, all that means is that you have some legitimate needs that you’re trying to get met. If you’re anxious, that just means you’re trying to keep yourself safe. If you’re anxious about being anxious, what that means is you care about what’s right.

And all of those are good things that God will work with in the building—perhaps the rebuilding—of your world.

You are not rejected. You don’t have that much power.

You know what? This isn’t even theology—it’s just math.

Think about it: a finite creature does not have the power to out-sin the love of an infinite God. It’s just math.

So if you’re experiencing any of those anxieties, or your anxiety is about your anxiety, if you live with that fear that something you’ve said or believed or done is going to separate you from God, I invite you to let that go and return to the fundamental truth of your existence:

That you are loved, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it.

That is how God handles rejection.

And that is the truth that the Church proclaims on this and every Easter Sunday:

That the Lord is risen indeed.

Alleluia.

God in the Hands of Angry Sinners

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Sermon for Good Friday

John 18:1-19:42

When I was in high school, we had to read a famous sermon called Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.

It’s a sermon that many people know about—even if you’ve never read it. And it has often come to represent a certain image of God: a God who is angry at sinful human beings, a God whose wrath must somehow be dealt with before we can be saved.

There’s just one problem with that:

When we read the Passion Gospel—as we just did—that is not the image of God we see there.

In this Gospel, Jesus is not handing out wrath.

In fact, one of his disciples tries to do that, and Jesus rebukes him. In an older translation, this is where we get the phrase, “Those who live by the sword shall die by the sword.”

Again and again, Jesus chooses nonviolence.

Compassion.

Forgiveness.

Love—even for those who wish him harm.

That is the image of God we are given on Good Friday.

Andrew Marr, the abbot of St. Gregory’s Abbey—Three Rivers, puts it this way:

“What we see on the cross is not sinners in the hands of an angry God, but God in the hands of angry sinners.”

That is the image of God we are given on Good Friday:

A God who takes on flesh and dwells among us in the person of Jesus.

A God who endures violence… and does not return it.

A God who does not require violence in order to forgive.

A God whose wrath does not need to be satisfied before humanity can be brought back into relationship with God.

Now, the sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God does, in many ways, represent an image of God that has been communicated by the Church for much of its history—at least in the West.

But it is not accurate to the image of God that is revealed in the person of Jesus.

And what we see here instead—God in the hands of angry sinners—is not only something we see in Scripture…

It is also something we recognize because it feels familiar.

If you think back to your own school days, you may remember how this works:

Kids growing up, feeling awkward about themselves—about their bodies, about who they are, about where they fit in the world.

And what often happens?

They find someone else to carry that discomfort.

Someone who is different.

Someone who doesn’t fit the mold.

Someone who can be singled out.

And that person becomes the scapegoat.

All of the insecurity, all of the fear, and all of the confusion gets projected onto that one person.

And that person is bullied… excluded… sometimes even tormented.

But what’s really happening is that everyone else’s insecurity is being acted out on them.

And this isn’t just something kids do.

We know that the politics of the locker room can become the politics of the boardroom.

Too often, people don’t grow out of this.

They continue to project their own self-hatred onto others.

They continue to bully.

They continue to enact violence—sometimes physical, sometimes emotional, sometimes systemic—in order to make themselves feel more secure.

That is the way of the world.

But it is not the way of God.

And we are reminded of that every year on Good Friday.

Because what we see here is a God who says:

“I am not here to overpower you.

I am not here to force you into submission.

And if this is what you need to do—if you need to reject me, if you need to harm me—then I will not resist you.”

“I will offer myself willingly.”

That is the God we meet in Jesus.

A God who is willing to be handed over into the hands of angry sinners.

A God who bears our sins—our fear, our violence, our self-hatred—and responds not with retaliation, but with love.

And if this is who we believe God to be…

Then there is a response that God calls forth from us:

We are called to go out into the world and look for those who are being scapegoated.

Those who are excluded.

Those who are made to carry the weight of everyone else’s fear and anger.

And we are called to stand with them.

In the name of Jesus.

In the name of the God who is love.

And this, as we know, is not the end of the story.

Because today is Good Friday.

And in just a few short days, we will celebrate something more.

We will celebrate the truth that violence does not have the final word.

That hatred does not have the final word.

That God continues to love while falling into the hands of angry sinners.

And that God’s love is stronger than death itself.

But that is a story for another day.

One Step Closer

On By J. Barrett LeeIn SermonLeave a comment

Sermon for Maundy Thursday

John 13:1-17, 31b-35

When my family and I first adopted our two cats, we didn’t see them for about a month. They hid down in the basement and would only come out after the noisy humans had all gone to bed.

That’s just how cats are:
If you try and chase them, they will look at you like, “You make poor life choices,” and then run away.
You can’t chase a cat into loving you back. You have to respect its boundaries, sit still, and let the cat decide if and when it’s going to come close to you. If you do that, it might, eventually, cuddle up to you.

Now, that’s not just about cats. It’s about us too. Because human beings, like cats, don’t open up unless they feel safe.

This is certainly true in our relationships with others, but it’s also true in our relationship with ourselves, and it’s even true in our relationship with God.

Tonight’s Gospel places us in a small room. Before the crowded spectacle of the cross and the empty tomb, this is a very quiet and intimate scene.

And it’s also deeply uncomfortable, because Jesus does something strange: He gets up from the table, takes off his outer robe, wraps a towel around himself, and then he kneels down to wash their feet. Not as a teacher giving a lecture. But as a servant. He comes uncomfortably close.

When he comes to Peter, Peter does what many of us would do: He resists.
He says, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”
It’s too much for Peter.
And Jesus doesn’t force him.
He doesn’t grab Peter’s foot and say, “You’re going to get this, whether you like it or not!”

Instead, he has a conversation.
He says, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.”
Peter doubles down, “You will never wash my feet.”
And Jesus responds, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.”

Jesus doesn’t coerce Peter, but he’s honest about what’s at stake:
Because, at some point, if we never let ourselves be loved in ways that might make us feel uncomfortable, we miss the opportunity to be in an honest relationship.

Love meets us where we are…
and then it respectfully asks, “Can I come a little closer?”

I saw something like this play out years ago when I was in chaplaincy training.

In my training cohort, there was a resident who was very clear about their boundaries from the beginning—emotional boundaries, physical boundaries, what was okay and what wasn’t.

Someone else in the group kept trying to push past those boundaries… and it created a lot of tension.

But there was also someone in the group who took the boundaries seriously.
Who let things be what they were—and didn’t push or try to get more than what was being offered.
And over time, something shifted. Trust began to grow.
And one day, the person who had been so guarded was the one who initiated a hug with the one who had respected their boundaries…

Respect created trust, which made intimacy possible.
It wasn’t forced.
It was chosen.

And that brings us to tonight.

After washing the disciples’ feet, Jesus said to them, “I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you… If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.”

So, in a few moments, you’ll be invited forward to participate in a reenactment of Jesus’ foot washing ritual.
And I want to say this clearly:
You have options.

  1. You can come forward and have your feet washed.
  2. You can come forward and have your hands washed instead.
  3. You can remain where you are and take it in with your eyes.

And here’s the most important moment in this ritual:
Not the moment when feet are getting washed, but the moment just before that, when you’re deciding which option you will accept.

Pay attention to what you’re feeling in that moment.
What’s happening inside of you?
Is it fear? Curiosity?
And then—after checking in with yourself—I want you to honor your boundary.
If it feels safe enough…
take one step beyond your comfort zone.
Not ten steps all at once.
Just one step.

Because love meets you where you are.
And it invites you to come closer.
But it never forces you.

This isn’t just about what happens here tonight.
This moment is a small picture of something larger:
It’s about how love works in the rest of your life.

There are places where you need to draw boundaries—and that is good.
Healthy boundaries protect what’s important.
But sometimes, we draw those boundaries farther out than they need to be. Instead of protecting us, they keep us from experiencing the love we want.

There are places where love is waiting, not demanding, but inviting us to come closer.

Maybe it looks like a conversation you’ve been avoiding.
Maybe it looks like telling yourself a hard truth about something that matters.
Maybe it looks like offering a small act of care where it would be easier to just look the other way.

Not a leap.
Just one small step.

Tonight, we begin with a ritual: A symbolic act where the deepest pattern of love is revealed.
But the real test is how we choose to live, after we leave this place.

Love meets us where we are…
and invites us to come closer.
The question is: What do we do with that? Will we take the next step?

Just like Jesus said, “If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.”

Why Jesus Wept

On By J. Barrett LeeIn SermonLeave a comment

Sermon for the Fifth Sunday in Lent

John 11:1-45

I was thinking this week about the moment when I realized that I wanted to ask my wife to marry me.

Growing up, I had always been told that when I met “the one,” I would “just know”—and that all the love in my heart would cancel out whatever fear or anxiety I had.

But the funny thing is that when the moment finally came, I realized that the love I had for Sarah did not, in fact, cancel out my fear about the future.

Neither did my fear about the future cancel out my love for Sarah.

I held love in one hand, and fear in the other, and both were true in the same place at the same time.

Many of you who are married or partnered will know exactly what I’m talking about.

And many of you will also have experienced that same reality in other places—some of which are a lot more difficult.

I’m thinking of places like hospital rooms,

at gravesides,

and in that middle-of-the-night phone call—

where we’re holding love in one hand

and loss in the other,

and both are equally true in the same place at the same time,

neither one canceling out the other.

If you’ve ever been in that place, first of all, I’m sorry. I wish no one would have to go through anything like that.

And second of all, you’re not alone.

Because that place is exactly where today’s Gospel meets us.

In this Gospel, the sisters Mary and Martha are coping with the loss of their brother Lazarus—holding their grief in one hand and their trust in Jesus—even as they struggle to understand him—in the other.

The raising of Lazarus is one of the best-known—and least understood—passages in John’s Gospel.

It’s a passage that makes me mad, because as a former hospice chaplain, I really wish Jesus had not raised Lazarus from the dead, but had simply comforted Mary and Martha in their grief and assured them that death is a part of life, and we will get through this together.

Instead, Jesus—ignoring my opinions, as usual—goes ahead and raises Lazarus from the dead, while proclaiming, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”

Later on, Jesus makes me mad again by saying, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

I’ll be honest: I hate those verses—because if they mean what they sound like they mean…

And I’m not being flippant or disrespectful toward Jesus or dismissive of the scriptures…

I hate those verses because I, as a loving and caring priest, would not dare to dare to tell a grieving family that their loved one died due to the family’s lack of faith. That would be the pinnacle of cruelty.

As a hospital and hospice chaplain, I sat at the deathbeds of literally hundreds of people. I saw miracles of the human spirit that defy my imagination—but not once did I see a deceased person rise up and begin walking around again.

Every single person who died under my care stayed dead.

I offered prayers and comfort to their families. I officiated funerals and memorial services for the departed. But not once did I dare to say, “Lazarus, come out,” and expect to see their departed loved one getting up out of the coffin.

The human experience of the finality of death is what makes this passage seem so offensive to those of us who have lost loved ones—and those who care for those who have lost loved ones, too.

Jesus really seems to have backed himself into a corner on this one.

And those of us who minister in his name are left wondering how he’s going to talk himself out of it.

Thankfully, Jesus is a much smarter man than I am.

And the way he talks himself out of it… is that he doesn’t.

Jesus, in his divine wisdom, lets the paradox stand.

He holds the tension between faith and grief and refuses to allow one to cancel out the other.

On the faith side, he says, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.”

Jesus knows who he is and what he is about to do, and yet that knowledge does not stop him from being fully present with those who weep for the loss of their loved ones.

The Scriptures are crystal clear in telling us that divine omniscience and omnipotence are not barriers to the human love that knows how to “weep with those who weep,” as St. Paul says in Romans 12:15.

It is from this incarnational union of the fully divine and fully human that we get the words of the shortest verse in the Bible: John 11:35—“Jesus began to weep.” Other translations render it in an even shorter and more memorable form: “Jesus wept.”

This verse has been a favorite memory verse of confirmands over the years because of its brevity. As the shortest verse in the Bible, it is also the easiest to memorize.

But I would not be quick to dismiss it, because it contains a profound spiritual truth that lies at the heart of today’s Gospel.

Jesus wept because Jesus loves.

Jesus loves people who are hurting. Jesus loves us when we are at our worst and at the end of our ropes.

In the midst of the impassable chasm of death—between the way things are and the way they ought to be—Jesus loves.

Whatever we do with this biblical text—whether we take it literally or figuratively—the central truth remains: Jesus wept because Jesus loves.

When Jesus says, ‘I am the resurrection and the life,’ he is not promising that we will avoid death.

He is claiming that even death cannot separate us from the life of God.

Love is the only way to bridge the gap between the way things are and the way they should be.

Love is the tar that keeps our heels glued in place, between the realities of life and death.

Our faith in the resurrection power of God to overcome the power of death does not negate our sorrow at the fact of death in this present age.

Grief is not a failure of faith. It is the inevitable consequence of choosing to love.

When we know that life, in its present form, is not yet eternal, “grief,” as author Jamie Anderson says, “is just love with no place to go.”

That’s why grief is not a problem to be solved. It’s not a sin or a lack of faith. It is the inevitable consequence of those who choose to love in spite of the reality of death.

Today’s Gospel teaches us that those who love will not escape grief. But those who grieve need not grieve without hope, for death will not have the final word.

The paradox of grief and faith can hold both extremes together because they are bound together with the unbreakable bonds of divine love, which transcends death.

Kindred in Christ,

If the Gospel is true, then our calling from God is not to choose between grief and faith, but to learn how to hold both together in the same place at the same time.

Jesus calls us to love wholeheartedly, even though we know it will cost us.

Jesus calls us to grieve honestly, but not “as others do who have no hope” (1 Thessalonians 4:13).

Above all, Jesus calls us to trust—stubbornly—that love is never wasted.

Because if Jesus really is the resurrection and the life, as he said he is, then grief is not a sin, and death does not have the final word.

When we grieve, we are not doing something wrong. We are doing something deeply human—and deeply divine:

We are choosing to love in a world where the work of love is not yet finished.

Amen?

The Faithful Tension

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Sermon for the Fourth Sunday in Lent

John 9:1-41

I heard a story about a physics professor who began the first day of his quantum mechanics class in an unusual way:

He looked out at the room full of students and said, “Right now, the difference between you and me is that you understand quantum mechanics and I do not.
But if you study hard and pay attention this semester, by the end of this course you too will not understand quantum physics—just as I do not.”

The deeper someone studies the universe, the more they discover how strange it is.
In fact, the physicist Richard Feynman once said, “I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics.”

The more you learn, the more you realize how much you don’t know.
Which is interesting, because most of us tend to assume the opposite.
We assume that knowledge leads to certainty.
But sometimes knowledge leads to humility.

⸻

Psychologists have a name for this: the Dunning–Kruger effect. People who know the least about a subject often feel the most confident about it. And the more someone actually learns about something, the more aware they become of how much they still don’t understand. In other words, the first step toward wisdom is realizing that we don’t know as much as we thought we did.

But our culture doesn’t reward that kind of humility. Our culture assumes that mature opinions are strong ones, that faith equals certainty, and that clarity means figuring everything out. The only problem is that the social pressure—to have the answers—can keep us from seeing what’s actually in front of us.

⸻

Today’s gospel is about being able to see what’s right in front of us.
In it, Jesus heals a man who was born blind.
But the healing itself turns out not to be the main point of the story.
The real story is about how people interpret what they see.

In fact, the story begins with a question from Jesus’ own disciples.
They see the blind man and ask, “Rabbi, who sinned—this man or his parents—that he was born blind?”
It’s an understandable question. But notice what they are doing.
They are trying to explain what they see by fitting it into a neat category. In that culture, people saw any kind of suffering as divine retribution for sins.
Someone must be to blame. Someone must have caused this.
That instinct—to explain things quickly, to sort the world into clear black & white answers—is something all of us share.

After the man receives his sight, the religious leaders begin questioning him. They want to know how it happened, who did it, and what it means.
And very quickly, three very different responses begin to emerge.
First, there are the Pharisees.

They keep repeating the same phrase:
“We know.”

We know this man is not from God.
We know this man is a sinner.
We know that God spoke to Moses.

They are certain.
Their minds are already made up.

Then there are the man’s parents.
When the authorities question them, they say something different:
“We do not know.”
But the Gospel tells us why they say this: They are afraid.

The religious authorities have already announced that anyone who openly supports Jesus will be expelled from the synagogue. So the parents step carefully. They avoid taking a stand. They say just enough to protect themselves.
“We don’t know.”

And then there is the man who was healed.
He speaks differently from both groups.

At one point he says, “I do not know.”
He admits he doesn’t understand everything that has happened.
But he doesn’t stop there.
He also says,
“One thing I do know: though I was blind, now I see.”

Do you hear the difference?

The Pharisees claim certainty about things they cannot see.
The parents retreat into uncertainty because they are afraid.
But the healed man holds two things together at the same time.

He is honest about what he does not know and truthful about what he does know.
Real faith often lives in that tension.

“I don’t know whether he is a sinner,” he admits.
“But one thing I do know: I was blind, and now I see.”

And as the conversation continues, something remarkable happens.
The more certain the Pharisees become, the harder their hearts grow.
The parents remain cautious and quiet.
But the man who stays honest about both his knowledge and his ignorance begins to see more clearly.

You can watch his understanding grow as the story unfolds.

At first he simply refers to “the man called Jesus.”
Later he says, “He is a prophet.”
Then he goes further and says,
“If this man were not from God, he could do nothing.”
His faith is developing.
Not because he started with perfect understanding.
But because he stayed honest about what he had experienced.

Eventually the religious leaders lose patience with him. They say, “You were born entirely in sins, and are you trying to teach us?”
And then the Gospel says something that would have been devastating in that world.
They drive him out.

Being expelled from the synagogue was not just embarrassing.
It meant being cut off from the center of life. It meant exclusion, isolation, and possibly even the loss of family relationships.
All because he refused to deny what he had seen.

And for a moment, the story becomes very quiet.

The man who was once blind now sees.
But he stands outside the community.
Alone.

Then the Gospel says something very simple.
Jesus heard that they had driven him out.
And then he found him.

That line is easy to miss.
But it is the turning point of the entire story.

The man does not go looking for Jesus.
Jesus goes looking for him and finds him.
And when they meet, Jesus asks him,
“Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
The man answers with the same honesty he has shown all along.
“Who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?”
He still does not pretend to know.

And then Jesus says something extraordinary:
“You have seen him.”

And when the man hears this, the Gospel says,
“Lord, I believe.”
And he worships him.

Think about the irony of that moment:
The people who insisted that they could see clearly remain blind.
And the man who admitted that he did not know is the one who finally sees.

That brings us to the promise at the heart of this story:
We see more clearly, not when we have all the answers, but when we’re honest enough to admit we don’t.
That can sometimes be a lonely place to stand, but it is exactly where Jesus meets us.

⸻

The willingness to be both honest and humble, even when we don’t have all the answers, makes a practical difference in the real world, as well as in our spiritual lives.

Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis

There was a doctor who lived in Vienna in the 1840s named Ignaz Semmelweis. His name is not widely known today, but he laid the groundwork for huge medical advances that continue to save lives.

While working in the maternity ward, Dr. Semmelweis noticed a disturbingly high mortality rate due to postpartum infection, known at the time as “Childbed Fever.”

These were the days before humans understood what germs are, so the prevailing medical theory was that diseases were caused by the body’s four humours being out-of-balance.

As a man of his time, Dr. Semmelweis did not understand the true cause of his patients’ deaths.
But as a man of science, he knew to trust the evidence of his eyes. He noticed that the patients in the ward run by midwives had a much lower mortality rate than the patients in the ward run by the doctors.

His best guess, after examining the evidence, was that his student physicians were coming into contact with some kind of toxic particles while working on cadavers before coming to the maternity ward.

So, he came up with a creative solution that would go on to revolutionize the practice of medicine and save lives in the future: he had the doctors wash their hands with disinfectant before examining their patients.

Today, we would look at this simple solution and say, “Well, duh!“ but at the time, it was highly controversial. Dr. Semmelweis’ idea flew directly in the face of established medical theory and practice for the time. He was reviled and insulted by his fellow doctors until he had a nervous breakdown.

But years later, Dr. Semmelweis would be vindicated by Dr. Louis Pasteur, who discovered germ theory and made it central to the practice of medicine, as it is today.

Like the man born blind in today’s gospel, Dr. Semmelweis was ostracized from his community for questioning the established orthodoxy of his day, but in so doing, he saved lives. Not just in his own day, but in ours as well.

I invite you to give thanks to God for Dr. Semmelweis the next time you use a bottle of hand sanitizer.

Even though he paid a price for his honesty and bravery, I believe that Jesus was with him, just as Jesus was with the formerly blind man after he was expelled from the synagogue.

Kindred in Christ, I invite you today to stand with Jesus, in the company of those who have been exiled from their families and homes, because they have dared to question the way things have always been, and trusted instead in the evidence of their own eyes.

I invite you to share in the honesty and humility of the man born blind in today’s gospel. I invite you to share in the courage and curiosity of Dr. Semmelweis, who changed the practice of medicine.

I invite you to stand also with President Thomas Jefferson, who rejected the divine right of kings and proclaimed instead: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal: That they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.”

I invite you to stand with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, who had a dream that his children would “one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Each and every one of these people had the humility and curiosity to say, “I don’t know,” to the prevailing prejudice of their day. And they had the honesty and courage to say, “one thing I do know,” to the evidence of their own faith and experience.

From the perspective of this world, they stood alone, but we the people of faith know in our hearts that Jesus stood with them, as he stands with us still, in the faithful tension between what we know and what we don’t know.

When the world demands certainty from us, we answer with humility: “I don’t know.”
When the world demands silence from us, we answer with courage: “One thing I do know, that though I was blind, now I see.”

Amen?

Awkward Conversations with Jesus

On By J. Barrett LeeIn SermonLeave a comment

Sermon for the third Sunday in Lent

John 4:5-42

Human beings are incredibly creative when it comes to avoiding awkward situations.

For example, have you ever been in the grocery store when you suddenly spot someone you know… and you realize you’re not ready to talk to that person today?

Instantly, you become fascinated by the cereal aisle.

You pick up a box and start reading the fiber content like you’re preparing for a medical board exam.

You turn the box over and keep reading… even though you have absolutely no intention of buying that cereal.

At that moment you’re not shopping anymore; you’re hiding behind granola.

Human beings are remarkably good at avoidance.

We avoid awkward conversations.
We avoid difficult people.
We avoid situations that might get uncomfortable.

And sometimes that instinct is harmless, even wise. But sometimes avoidance becomes something deeper.

Sometimes wounds run deep enough that people stop trying to heal them.

Families and friends stop speaking.
Communities quietly segregate themselves into invisible boundaries.
Politics turns into tribal warfare where the goal is no longer understanding but simply defeating the other side.
Religious groups stop listening to one another and start caricaturing each other instead.

Over time, something shifts:
It’s not about anger anymore.
It’s about resignation.

People begin to assume reconciliation is impossible.
At that point, the strategy becomes very simple:
Just walk away.
Go around.
Avoid the difficult conversation.

And that’s exactly what people did in Jesus’ day.

By the first century, Jews and Samaritans had centuries of bad history between them. Political betrayal, religious disrespect, ethnic suspicion, and generations of mutual resentment.

Most Jewish travelers going between Galilee and Jerusalem would go miles out of their way to avoid Samaritan territory altogether. They just went around it.

But John tells us something different about Jesus: He says that Jesus had to go through Samaria.

Now geographically speaking, that wasn’t true.
There were other routes.
Most people took them.

But John says Jesus had to go through Samaria, not because the road required it, but because love did.
The mission of God runs straight through the places that human beings prefer to avoid.
That’s why Jesus walks straight into Samaria and arrives at a place called Jacob’s well.

The time is about noon, the sun is high, and the air is hot.
Jesus is tired from his journey, so he sits down by the well.
And then a Samaritan woman comes to draw water.

Now, if you pause for a moment and imagine that scene, you can almost feel the tension: a Jewish rabbi and a Samaritan woman. Two people from communities that had been avoiding each other for generations.

You might expect confrontation, suspicion, or awkward silence. But Jesus does something surprising: He asks her for a drink.

That’s the opening move. It’s not a sermon or an argument; it’s just a simple request: “Give me a drink.”

What’s remarkable is that Jesus begins the conversation by placing himself in a position of vulnerability.
Instead of approaching her as a teacher, he approaches her as a human being in need.

And that’s the moment when the conversation really gets going: the woman questions Jesus, they discuss theology, they talk about worship, the Messiah, and where God is to be found.

Meanwhile, the disciples show up and look at the whole situation with suspicion, but Jesus stays engaged in the conversation.

The woman eventually goes back to her village and tells people about the encounter.

The villagers are curious enough to come out and meet Jesus. They end up inviting him to stay for two more days, and he does. Two days of conversation, meals, and shared life.

And by the end of that time the villagers say, “We know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”

The people everyone avoided become the first ones to recognize that Jesus’ message is good news for the whole world. And it all began with a tired traveler sitting at a well and asking, “May I have a drink?”

Here’s the heart of what this story shows us:

We often organize our lives around avoiding the places that hurt—but Jesus walks straight into those places, and healing begins when people are willing to sit down together and talk.

That’s the movement of the Gospel. Jesus goes into the place where everyone else goes around. He begins reconciliation, not with power, but with vulnerability.

Now, before we go any further, I want to say something important:
When the Gospel talks about reconciliation, it does not mean that people should remain in situations where they are being harmed.

Jesus teaches forgiveness and healing, but he never asks people to accept abuse or violence as normal.
Sometimes the most faithful thing a person can do is create distance and seek safety.

This is not a story about enduring harm; it’s a story about what happens when God steps into the deep divisions between communities and begins something new.

If we look closely at the way Jesus approaches this encounter, we can see a pattern:
First, Jesus goes where others refuse to go. He refuses to organize his life around avoidance.
Second, he takes the vulnerable seat. Instead of dominating the conversation, he asks for help.
Third, he stays in the uncomfortable conversation. The woman challenges him with a theological argument, and instead of escalating the conflict, Jesus answers in a way that both acknowledges the disagreement and points beyond it.
Finally, Jesus gives reconciliation time: two days in the village.
Healing rarely happens in a single moment; it grows over time.

This leaves us with a question: Where are the “Samarias” in our own lives: the places we’ve learned to walk around, instead of going through?

Maybe they are strained relationships with family members, community divisions that feel too complicated to address, or a group of people we’ve quietly written off because the history feels too difficult to untangle.

Whatever the case may be, the Gospel suggests that healing often begins in a very simple way:
Someone sits down at the well, risks vulnerability, and begins the conversation, not with an argument, but with a moment of shared humanity.

Most travelers in Jesus’ day went around Samaria.
It was easier, safer, and less awkward.
But Jesus walked straight through it.
When he arrived, he didn’t begin with a lecture or a debate.
He sat down and said, “I’m thirsty; may I have a drink?”

Sometimes reconciliation begins with something that small: an honest conversation and a willingness to sit down, instead of tiptoeing around the issue.

Here’s a remarkable modern example:

Daryl Davis

There is a blues musician, a man of color named Daryl Davis who spent years doing something that most of us would never even consider possible: He sat down and talked with members of the Ku Klux Klan.

Imagine that for a moment: a black man sitting across the table from racists who had spent their lives believing he was inferior.

Most of us would assume those conversations would end in shouting, anger, or worse, but Daryl Davis didn’t begin with arguments; he began with questions.

He would ask them, very calmly, “How can you hate me if you don’t even know me?”
And then he would listen.

They talked about music and life.
Sometimes they would even argue, but he kept showing up.

Over time something remarkable began to happen: one by one, some of his newfound friends began leaving the Klan.

And when they left, many of them gave Daryl Davis their robes. Today he has a closet full of them.
Each robe is a reminder that sometimes the hardest walls between people don’t come down through force or argument; they come down when two people are willing to sit down and have a conversation.

That’s exactly what Jesus does with the Samaritan woman at the well: he walks into a place that everyone else avoids, sits down, and says, “I’m thirsty. May I have a drink?”

Sometimes reconciliation begins with something that small.

Kindred in Christ, most of us will probably never sit down with members of the Ku Klux Klan the way Daryl Davis did, but we might start somewhere closer to home.

We might reach out to a family member or neighbor we’ve quietly stopped talking to. We might listen to someone whose political views make our blood pressure rise. We might sit down with an acquaintance, a coworker, or someone at church and choose curiosity instead of suspicion. We might do this, not to win an argument, but just to begin a conversation.

Today’s Gospel suggests that healing rarely begins with grand gestures.
More often it begins the way that Jesus began it on that day in Samaria:
With someone sitting down and saying something as simple as, “I’m thirsty. May I have a drink?”

Into the Secret

On By J. Barrett LeeIn SermonLeave a comment

Sermon for Ash Wednesday

Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

Sermon starts at 15:18

Comedian Emo Philips tells a story about an encounter he had on a bridge with a man about to jump:

“I said, “Don’t do it!”
He said, “Nobody loves me.”
I said, “God loves you. Do you believe in God?”
He said, “Yes.”
I said, “Are you a Christian or a Jew?”
He said, “A Christian.”
I said, “Me too! Protestant or Catholic?”
He said, “Protestant.”
I said, “Me too! What franchise?”
He said, “Baptist.”
I said, “Me too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?”
He said, “Northern Baptist.”
I said, “Me too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?”
He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist.”
I said, “Me too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?”
He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region.”
I said, “Me too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879 or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?”
He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912.”
I said, “Die, heretic!”
And I pushed him off the bridge.”

Obviously, that’s a joke.
But it’s a joke about what happens when faith stays on the surface—
when being right matters more than being loving,
and religion doesn’t change the way we actually live.

Surface-level religion is about doctrines, laws, and rituals. It’s the kind of religion where people worry about who is really “saved” and who isn’t. Who belongs and who doesn’t.

The surface-level is where different religions clash and beliefs compete.
That’s where faith becomes something to defend, perform, or argue about.

It’s a bit like the spokes of a wheel:
Out at the rim, the spokes are far apart. But the deeper they go, the closer they come to each other.

When the spokes reach the center of the wheel, the distinction between one spoke and another has become less meaningful.

That’s something many of the great spiritual masters have pointed toward.

And that’s what Jesus means when he talks about “your Father who is in secret.”

The secret in which God dwells is the secret of existence itself.

I don’t have perfect language for this, but here’s the best way I know how to say it.
God isn’t an object we possess, and not really a thing we can point to.
God is something that happens—an event that unfolds.
And it almost always happens quietly, in secret, in the deepest parts of our lives.

So maybe another way to say this is that God isn’t so much a noun as a verb.
And if that sounds strange—or even a little unsettling—I’d point us back to Scripture itself.

Scripture says, in 1 John 4:16, “God is love.”
And love isn’t a thing we possess.
Love is something that happens.
It’s something we do.

So if God is love, and love is a verb, then God is a verb too.
That’s what I mean when I say: God happens.

Quietly.
In secret.

So when I say I believe in God, what I really mean is that I trust in love.
I trust that love is not wasted.
I trust in the power of love—to heal, to forgive, to repair what feels broken.
And I trust that when love happens, God happens—often quietly, often in secret.

This ought to reframe the whole idea of the Christian religion for us.

Our instinct is to turn the spiritual life into a project.
To ask, Am I doing enough? Am I doing it right?

But Jesus keeps pulling us back to a different question.

Not what am I doing?
But how am I doing it—and why?

Am I doing this to be seen by others?
Am I doing it to earn God’s approval?
Or am I doing it to make room for love to take deeper root in my life?

Because if God happens quietly, then the loudest things in our spiritual life may be the very ones getting in the way of our true spiritual growth.


The spiritual path that Jesus offers us isn’t about finding the perfect Lenten discipline.

Lent gives us many possible practices:
fasting,
prayer,
journaling,
walking,
volunteering,
caring for the body,
stepping back from habits that drain us rather than give us life.

All of these are potentially helpful.
But none of them is the point by itself.

The point is whether our spiritual practices help us attend to the depths—
whether they move us away from performance and toward presence,
away from the surface and into the quiet places where love can happen.

Jesus assumes we will pray.
He assumes we will give.
He assumes we will fast.

But underneath all of it, he keeps asking the same question:
Who is this for?


In a few moments, visible ashes will be placed on our foreheads.
But the reality they point to is not visible.

They point to the quiet truth that we are finite, and fragile, and loved anyway.

So maybe that’s the invitation of Lent:
not to add more religion to our lives,
but to descend.
To attend.
To trust that love—practiced quietly, imperfectly, often unseen—is where God is already happening.

May this be a season where we stop trying to prove our faith,
and start practicing trust.

May we choose paths that lead us inward,
away from the surface,
and into the secret places where love takes on flesh.