I tried to think of something insightful for today’s MLK holiday, but it’s no surprise that my words could never come close to Dr. King’s. I’ll shut up now and let him speak for himself:
There’s also a fantastic article from our local newspaper, the Utica OD:
http://www.uticaod.com/features/x1254711284/Martin-Luther-King-Jr-The-man-of-God
Finally, because it just wouldn’t be me without a U2 reference, here’s their song ‘Pride’ with footage of Dr. King:
Happy Martin Luther King Day!
Today’s sermon from First Pres, Boonville.
The text is John 1:29-42.
Click here to see the famous video mentioned in the sermon.
At the end of 2004, an 18 year old named Gary Brolsma in Saddle Brook, New Jersey was goofing around on his computer one night. He came across a catchy pop song sung by an eastern European boy band. As a joke, he used his webcam to record himself lip-synching and dancing along to the tune. He posted the video online for his friends to chuckle at.
Within a few months, Gary’s video had been viewed by millions of people all over the world. People everywhere started imitating Gary’s improvised dance and posting their own videos online. The song was re-recorded by artists in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, North & South America, and Africa. Gary himself became an overnight celebrity. Today, most people under the age of thirty will smile and nod their heads if you ask them about “the Numa Numa Guy”.
If you watch the video yourself (it can still be found on Google and You Tube), it’s easy to see why people took such an instant liking to it. Here is an average-looking, young person throwing all self-consciousness and inhibition to the wind. He’s just going for it, dancing and singing along in a language he doesn’t even know: “Nu ma, nu ma iei!” He is totally “in the moment”, relishing the joy of being alive and silly.
Sociologists and pop culture enthusiasts have coined the phrase “going viral” to describe people, ideas, and products like this one, that rise to fame without the aid of professional publicists or corporate marketing campaigns. Advertising executives are extremely jealous of the Numa Numa Guy and the dance that he inspired. They desperately want to figure out what causes videos like this to “go viral” (i.e. attain overnight recognition through word-of-mouth). Personally, I think people watch and imitate the Numa Numa dance because they want to share in the experience of that kind of joy and freedom. I think people’s desire to live life to its fullest is what has caused the Numa Numa dance to “go viral”.
In today’s gospel reading, we can see another instance of an experience “going viral”. But this time, it’s not the experience of a video but of a person, Jesus Christ. John, Andrew, and Simon all experience something in Jesus that they then pass on to the next person. As we read about their experiences, we learn about who Jesus is and what we can expect from our experiences with him.
First, we learn from John that his experience with Jesus is surprising and unexpected. We know from other parts of Scripture that John was a prophet and a revival preacher who was not afraid to say what was on his mind and in his heart. He was expecting the arrival of a judge who would come “with the Holy Spirit and fire”. When Jesus finally shows up, what John sees is a “lamb” and not a judge. Furthermore, the Holy Spirit comes “as a dove” and not “with fire”. The reality of Jesus is so far off from John’s expectations that John himself is forced to admit that he would have missed the experience entirely had it not been for the direct intervention of the Holy Spirit. He says, “I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’”
John’s experience with Jesus begins to go viral as he shares it with his friend Andrew and one other person. Shortly thereafter, Andrew has his own experience with Jesus. He experiences Jesus as an inviting and hospitable person. During their first encounter, Andrew and his friend express an interest in getting to know Jesus better. Jesus invites them both to “Come and see.” He opens his home to them and (literally and figuratively) lets them in.
The viral spread of this Jesus experience continues as Andrew shares his experience with his brother Simon. More than anything else, Simon’s experience with Jesus can be described as “revealing”. Jesus looks at Simon and gives him a new name (“Cephas” or “Peter”). This is not just a nickname that Jesus came up with. Jesus is making a statement about who Simon is. The name “Peter” means “Rock”. This statement of Christ’s became significant as Simon Peter went on to become a leader in the early Church. He would be a “rock” that others could lean on for support. Already, in this early moment, Jesus is revealing to Simon something about his true self and his true calling in the world.
Like John, Andrew, and Simon, I too have experienced Jesus as surprising, inviting, and revealing. Growing up in the Bible belt of the American south, I came to think of Jesus as a fiery judge. I was afraid of him. But as I grew to know him better through the Scriptures, I heard his stories of the lost sheep and the prodigal son. I saw him forgiving sinners and befriending the outcast. Like John the Baptist, I was surprised at who Jesus turned out to be. Like Andrew, I found him to be a warm and welcoming person who wants to be close to us. In time, I came to think of Jesus as my friend. Instead of fearing him, I grew to love him.
This change in the way I think about Jesus sparked a corresponding change in the way I think about myself. Because Jesus loves and accepts me as I am, I can love and accept myself. If there is one miracle that Christ has worked in my life, it has been the slow but steady melting away of my self-consciousness and inhibitions when it comes to life and relationships. Like Simon Peter, I feel like Jesus is helping me to gradually discover my true self and my true calling in the world. In Christ, I am beginning to experience the joy and freedom in life that people are reaching for when they do the Numa Numa dance.
That’s the story of my experience with Jesus. Yours will undoubtedly be different. Each one of us experiences Christ in a way that is unique to us. No two people experiences are identical. John, Andrew, and Simon all met the same Jesus, yet each one of them had an experience that was different from the others. John experienced Christ as “surprising”, Andrew experienced him as “Inviting”, while Simon experienced him as “Revealing”. Likewise, some of us here might have come to faith in Christ through a radical moment of conversion. Others of us have gradually grown in faith without a dramatic “before” and “after” story. Some of us have come to understand Christ as a teacher or healer. Others primarily think of him as the One who forgives our sins.
Whatever your experience of Jesus is, whatever Christ means to you, I want to encourage you to tell your story. Tell it to yourself. Tell it to someone else. Let your individual experience of Jesus inform and inspire those around you. That’s what “going viral” means. One person has an experience and shares that experience with another person.
I pray that our individual experiences of Jesus will “go viral” in our church and our community. I pray that others will be inspired by our witness to “come and see” for themselves what life with Christ is all about. And I pray that their subsequent experience of Christ’s love will lead them to dance and sing with the same uninhibited exuberance that inspired Gary Brolsma and the millions of others who sang his song: “Nu ma, nu ma iei!”
Jay Bakker on NPR’s ‘All Things Considered’.
For those who haven’t seen it, the ‘One Punk Under God’ documentary miniseries on the Sundance Channel is amazing. Well worth a watch. Link below:
The Scriptures tell us in James 3:6 that “the tongue is a fire”. Fire can be used for constructive or destructive purposes. It can warm a person up or burn a house down. We must take great care in the way we attend to fire. In the same way, we must also take great care in the way we attend to the language we use on a daily basis.
When we use language, are we using it to heal or to hurt? Do our words build others up or tear them down? The tongue is a fire, indeed. Like a fire, it can also burn quickly out of control and cause unspeakable damage.
This truth has been driven home for me in a fresh way as I sit here in these days following the brutality unleashed in Tucson, Arizona. I listen as media reports pour in on a daily basis, containing not only information but also interpretation about the horrible things that have happened there. I notice that voices on every end of the political spectrum are quick to paint their own version of events, each with its own cast of villains, victims, and heroes.
Each side implies that the other may have secretly hoped for this disaster or may be secretly trying to benefit from it. As a result, the political language in this country has become increasingly polarized and inflammatory. Each side wants to associate its enemies with the kind of violence and insanity we witnessed in Tucson.
I believe it is imperative for us to tend the tongue’s fire carefully in moments of crisis, not because some might use that language to incite violence, but because most will not. Most of us are better than that. Most of us will listen to others who want to make this world a better place. Most of us can respect the intelligence and good intentions of those with whom we disagree.
Let’s allow our language to reflect the very best that is in each of us and draw out the very best that is in each other. Let us tend to the fire of the tongue with grace.
God of compassion, you watch our ways, and weave out of terrible happenings wonders of goodness and grace. Surround those who have been shaken by tragedy with a sense of your present love, and hold them in faith. Though they are lost in grief, may they find you and be comforted; through Jesus Christ who was dead, but lives and rules this world with you. Amen.
-from the Book of Common Worship
This morning’s sermon from First Pres, Boonville. Forgive the pun in the title. I couldn’t resist!
The text is Matthew 3:13-17.
Click here to listen to the podcast.
I’ve been baptized three times. And no, I don’t mean three times, as in “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit”. I mean that I’ve received the sacrament of baptism on three separate occasions.
The first time was when I was a baby. My uncle, a Wesleyan minister, baptized me in his church. The second time was when I was thirteen years old. The church my family attended at the time believed that baptism should only be administered to those who have already made a conscious decision to follow Jesus. The third time was when I was in college. The church I attended at that time believed that people should only be baptized after they’ve had a certain kind of spiritual experience.
Each time I was re-baptized, I did it with the most sincere faith I could muster at the time. I wanted so badly to please God. Each time, I wanted to be absolutely sure that I “got it right”.
If my story about three different baptisms sounds bizarre to you, don’t worry: it should sound bizarre. While my faith was sincere, I think as I look back that I was operating out of a very basic misunderstanding of what baptism is. I was assuming that baptism is all about what I do. I had to get baptized in the right way, from the right person, at the right time. I thought it was up to me to “get it right”, otherwise the baptism didn’t count.
But nowadays, as I study more of the Bible, theology, and church history, I’ve come to believe that baptism is not really about what we do; I believe that baptism is mainly about what God is doing in us.
This truth is illustrated beautifully in today’s gospel reading. It’s the familiar story of Christ’s baptism in the Jordan River. The first thing we notice is that this is no empty ritual. Neither is it “just a symbol”, as some Christians tend to think of it. Something is happening here. Something mystical. Something wonderful.
We read, first of all, that as Christ came up from the water, “the heavens were opened”. We don’t know exactly what that means, but the general sense is that, for just a moment, the boundary between this world and the next (i.e. between “earth” and “heaven”) became paper thin. So thin, in fact, that you could see and hear through it. I imagine the scene going down like this: a sudden hush falls over the group. Then the hair on their arms and the backs of their necks stands up. They start to look around at each other and suddenly realize, “We’re not alone in this place!” Just then, a voice speaks out, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” This is a moment of revelation. We are being let in on a big secret. In this moment, God is revealing something very important about who Christ is and, by extension, who we are.
The voice says, “This is my Son”. This is a direct quote from the Old Testament. It comes from Psalm 2:7. This psalm is what’s called a “coronation psalm”. It’s all about the king of Israel. The title, “Son of God”, is usually applied to the king. When we hear this title applied to Jesus, it’s a clear indication to us that Jesus comes from a royal heritage and is bound for a royal destiny.
As it is with Jesus, so it is with us. Just as he passed through the waters of baptism, so do we. Just as the heavens opened over him, they do so over us. Just as he was empowered by the Holy Spirit, so are we.
In baptism, God shows us who we are as beloved sons and daughters. You are not an anonymous face in the crowd to God. Like Christ, the unique treasure stored in your life (and every life) has royal dignity. As God’s children, you and I bear the image of God, the Holy One who gave us birth. Each one of us reflects that image in a totally unique way. If even one of us was missing, a part of that image would be lost forever.
As God’s sons and daughters, the text also tells us that we are “beloved”. This is where I think “baptism” is especially appropriate as a word and as an image. The word “baptize” means “to immerse” or “to soak”. You and I are literally surrounded by God’s love (like water in a hot tub). We’re soaking in it. You and I are floating on an infinite ocean of love. We’re carried along by its currents. If you use your imagination, you can picture it in your head. That’s what I like to call “seeing with the eyes of faith” or “seeing with your heart”. Now, we can’t physically see God or God’s love with our eyes. God is a mystery. So, we have to use our imagination and trust that God is actually there. Baptism, as a ritual, makes this invisible mystery more real to us in a tangible way.
So then, baptism is about what God is doing in us. In baptism, God reaches out to us. God shows us, through Jesus Christ, who we truly are as unique and beloved sons and daughters of God. God empowers us, through the Holy Spirit, to trust in the unseen and infinite reality of love that surrounds us. When you look at it like that, it gets pretty hard to think about baptism as something that we do for God. Suddenly, it doesn’t even make sense to think that God is shaking God’s head and going, “Gosh, you didn’t do that right. You’d better do it again if you want it to count.” To think of baptism as something we do for God misses the point completely.
This truth was brought home for me in a fresh way last year. There is a guy who I’ll call Sam (not his real name) who I know through my ministry on the streets in Utica. Sam is a mentally ill alcoholic who occasionally finds himself homeless in our area. I’ve known him for years through various agencies and organizations in the community. A few years ago, he started attending our Thursday night Bible study at St. James Mission. His participation would vary from week to week. Sometimes he showed up reeking of booze and his comments on the text were nearly incomprehensible. At other times, he would engage with others in lively discussion. He brought insight and compassion from a street-perspective that left us all feeling enlightened and enriched. In spite of his many problems, we’re glad that Sam came to be part of our community.
After he had been coming for a while, Sam told me that he would like to be baptized. He and I began meeting together on a weekly basis to discuss the meaning of baptism and the basic beliefs of the Christian faith. Things started well but quickly fell apart. Sam’s psychological condition was deteriorating. He would show up to his appointments, rambling about nonsensical ideas, reading poetry off blank pieces of paper, and talking to imaginary bodyguards through an invisible headset. It was abundantly clear to me that any discussion of theology or spirituality would be pointless.
During this time, I considered delaying Sam’s baptism until he could get himself into a healthier place. I thought a good dose of tough love might be just the thing to push him to get help. However, I decided to go ahead with Sam’s baptism in the end. We did it at our Thursday night Bible study. He dressed his best and invited a whole slew of friends and family to celebrate the occasion with him. And there, in all his confusion, Sam was immersed in the infinite ocean of God’s love for him.
Was this baptism a waste? Maybe so. But if we admit that it is a waste, then we also have to admit that God’s love is wasteful. According to Jesus, God “makes the sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous.” Don’t we place our faith in that same wasteful love when we bring our children to be baptized as infants, long before they can make any decision or response toward the Gospel of Christ? Don’t we all have lean on that wasteful love time and time again when we struggle and fail in our Christian walk? I know that I do.
God’s love is wasteful. God opens the heavens and pours it out over those who need it most and deserve it least. We are all soaked in it. Baptism makes real to us the mystery of God’s love in a way that we can see and touch. The faith we proclaim in our baptismal vows is only a grateful response for what God has already done for us. As we meditate on the subject of baptism this morning, I pray that it will not be an empty ritual for you. I pray that the reality of God’s love will soak you to the bone in a fresh way. I pray that you would walk out of here this morning refreshed and renewed, ready to take this infinite ocean of love with you into a world that is dying of thirst.
Whew! Two sermons in one week! Christmas is definitely a working holiday for me. The text is Matthew 2:13-23.
Click here to listen to the podcast.
One of the singular (and often dreaded) features of the Christmas season is the plentitude of family reunions that take place. The kids in every family prepare to have their hair tousled, their cheeks pinched, and great aunt so-and-so’s lipstick smudged on their foreheads.
For some strange reason, grown-ups have an irresistible urge to identify themselves (or their relatives) in the kids around them. “Look at him,” they say, “Ain’t he a chip off the old block?” Or “Oh my goodness, she’s just like her mother used to be!” (To those of you who are kids: I would like to apologize on behalf of grown-ups everywhere. We know it’s annoying. We don’t know why we do it. We just do it.) There’s something inside of us that wants to connect the dots between the present and the past.
You and I are not the first people in history to connect those dots. People have been doing it for thousands of years. In fact, if you look at today’s gospel reading, you can see it happening with the baby Jesus himself! Let’s check it out:
In the part of the story we read today, an evil king is killing all the baby boys in the land and one family has to do some very sneaky things in order to save the life of one very special baby. Can you think of another time in the Bible when something like this was happening?
If you guessed ‘Moses’, you’re right! In the book of Exodus, the Pharaoh of Egypt is scared that his Hebrew slaves are getting too difficult to control. He feels like his power is being threatened by them. So, he institutes a program of genocide, ordering that all the baby boys born to the Hebrew slaves should be killed. But baby Moses’ family hides him in a basket of reeds in order to protect him.
In today’s reading from Matthew’s gospel, King Herod, another evil king, is scared because he has heard that a new ‘King of the Jews’ has been born in Bethlehem. Herod liked his crown right where it was, so, in an effort to protect his power, he orders that all the baby boys in Bethlehem should be killed. But baby Jesus’ family sneaks him out of town in the middle of the night in order to protect him. Don’t these two stories sound similar? The author of Matthew’s gospel did that on purpose. You and I are supposed to notice that the story of Jesus sounds a lot like the story of Moses.
This kind of thing happens a lot in Matthew’s gospel. We get lots of little hints that Jesus is like Moses. For example, Jesus gets baptized in the Jordan River and then walks through the desert for forty days. Doesn’t that sound a lot like the time when Moses led the Hebrews through the waters of the Red Sea and then wandered in the desert for forty years? In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus walks up a mountain and starts to teach people about God in his (aptly titled) Sermon on the Mount. Doesn’t that sound a lot like the time when Moses walked up Mount Sinai and came back with the Ten Commandments? When we read Matthew’s gospel, we’re supposed to think, “Hey, this Jesus guy is a lot like Moses!”
Why is that important? Well, first of all, it’s important to remember that Jesus and most of his early followers were Jewish. Moses is a very important person to Jews. He liberated their people from slavery and genocide in Egypt. In the same way, the early Jewish Christians believed that Jesus had liberated them from slavery as well. But this time, the threat wasn’t coming from some foreign Egyptian king. This time, the threat was coming from within their own people. Their own kings, like Herod, were starting to act as evil and nasty as old Pharaoh once did in Egypt. Their culture was rotting from the inside out. Even their spiritual and religious leaders couldn’t be trusted! It was time for another Exodus!
The author of Matthew’s gospel intentionally portrays Jesus as the ‘New Moses’ because Jesus is the one who would liberate the people from slavery in their own homeland.
There’s another reason why the author of Matthew’s gospel compares Jesus to Moses. As the New Moses, Jesus stands in continuity with his Jewish heritage. This would have been very comforting to the early Jewish Christians. It meant that Jesus honored the very best part of their tradition, even as he took it in a new direction.
Jesus challenged their ideas about inclusivity. Traditional Jews thought of themselves as God’s unique and chosen people. They alone, of all the nations of the earth, had received the Torah of Moses and the prophets. But then Jesus comes along and says of a Roman Centurion (a pagan), “This Roman has more faith than any Jew I’ve ever met!” The early Jewish Christians wrestled with statements like that. Eventually, it led them to the conclusion that God was now accepting people of all races and nationalities as “chosen”, not just Jewish people. They opened the doors of the Church to include the whole world in God’s embrace. To traditional thinkers, that would have sounded like heresy.
Likewise, Jesus also challenged traditional ideas about sin. For example, work was forbidden on the Sabbath day (including healing), but Jesus would heal people whenever he had the opportunity (even on the Sabbath). Wasn’t that a sin? Didn’t it go against the commandment to “Remember the Sabbath Day and keep it holy”? Was Jesus asking them to sin against God?! Jesus responded to questions like that by saying things like, “The Sabbath was made for people, not people for the Sabbath.” Statements like this made Jesus’ Jewish followers very uncomfortable. It helped them to know that Jesus honored the very best parts of their tradition, even as he challenged other parts and led their people in a new direction.
Today, I am introducing you to this idea of Jesus as the New Moses. We’re going to come back to it a lot during the coming year as we read from Matthew’s gospel. We’ll see again and again how Jesus is leading people out of an old (but familiar) slavery and into a new (yet challenging) Promised Land. At the same time, he honors and stands in continuity with the very best their tradition has to offer.
Those of us who are part of the Church today are no different from those early followers of Jesus.
Like them, we wrestle with questions about inclusivity and traditional ideas about sin. Who is “in” and who is “out” when it comes to church life and ministry? Who is God calling us to embrace as our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ? How can we be faithful Christians in this time and place? How might faithfulness to God look different for us than it did for our ancestors in the faith?
All of these are questions of tradition and innovation. Unfortunately, there are no easy answers to these questions. Some say we should dig our heels in and defend traditional ideas and practices. Others call for us to throw all traditional worship and doctrine to the wind in favor of innovation. Somehow, I think both of these simplistic answers are deficient. When I read Matthew’s gospel, I see Jesus honoring tradition, even as he challenges it.
As we face these questions together, let us remember that we are not the first ones to do so. Christians in every age have had to wrestle with their own questions. While it may seem sometimes like we are just wandering back and forth through a barren desert, we are ultimately following Jesus, our New Moses, who has promised to never abandon us, and he can be trusted to faithfully deliver us to the place where we are supposed to be.
Here is my first Christmas Eve sermon at my new congregation in Boonville, NY. The text is Luke 2:1-20.
Click here to listen to the podcast.
What is the first thing you say when you meet an angel?
(Screams loudly)
Most of us are used to what I call the “Hallmark” version of angels: chubby babies with little wings. These “angels” can be found all over cartoons and greeting cards during this time of year. Most people are probably also familiar with the lithe and glowing figures that float on clouds and play harps. This is where we probably get our idea of the word “angelic” from.
But did you notice the first words out of the angel’s mouth in tonight’s gospel reading? “Do not be afraid”! In fact, this is the third time an angel shows up in Luke’s gospel and each time, the angel says to a human, “Do not be afraid”. Why is that?
I think it would make more sense if we understood what an “angel” was to ancient Jews. When angels appear in the Bible, they’re anything but cute. In fact, they’re quite fearsome. They’re described as huge creatures with multiple sets of wings. They have faces like lions and eagles and oxen and humans. Lightning flashes around them. Sometimes they carry massive swords. Some of them are on fire. When you think about it like that, it’s easier to understand why the shepherds in tonight’s reading felt more than a little intimidated!
But these angels haven’t come to dole out wrath and judgment. They have a message to deliver. In fact, that’s what the word “angel” literally means: “Messenger”. In verse 10, we read that this particular messenger has come to announce “good news of great joy for all the people”. And, of course, the angel is talking about the birth of the baby Jesus, who, for Christians, is more than just our favorite philosopher/action hero. For us, Jesus is “Immanuel”, which means, “God with us”.
Christians believe that God became present to us through Jesus in a unique way. We don’t claim to know how this happened. We can’t explain it logically. All we can do is experience the mystery and try our best to share our experience with others.
That’s what faith is. Faith is not a dogmatic arrogance that claims to have the answer to life, the universe, and everything. Faith simply means keeping an open mind toward our experience of the mystery of God’s presence with us. As a messenger, the angel in tonight’s reading is pointing the shepherds (and us) toward that mystery.
I can’t say that I’ve ever seen an actual angel for certain. I’ve never seen those fearsome, flaming creatures lighting up the heavens with the brilliance of their song: “Gloria in excelsis Deo! Glory to God in the highest!” I believe they exist, but I’ve never seen one. However, I have seen other “messengers” that point me toward the mystery of the divine presence in my life.
I think of creation itself as a kind of messenger (“angel”) that points us toward faith. Over our heads every night is another kind of “heavenly host” (I’m thinking of the stars themselves). If we listen with the ears of our hearts, we can hear their song just as clearly as the shepherds heard the angels’ song on the first Christmas Eve. Psalm 19 tells us:
“The heavens are telling the glory of God;
and the firmament* proclaims his handiwork.
2 Day to day pours forth speech,
and night to night declares knowledge.
3 There is no speech, nor are there words;
their voice is not heard;
4 yet their voice* goes out through all the earth,
and their words to the end of the world.”
One of the Jewish prophets tells us that, not only the stars, but the Earth itself sings a hymn of praise. This prophet wrote, “the mountains and the hills… shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.” When we look at the splendor of creation around us, we can choose to see it as a random collection of atoms and electrochemical reactions or we can choose to see it as the holy handiwork of a loving being who has given it depth and meaning. Then, I think, we will begin to hear the song of the Earth and the cosmos, singing us back toward the divine mystery that we call God.
Another place where I sometimes think I see messengers (“angels”) is in the people I meet. God seems to take special delight at getting humans involved in the process of making this world a better place. I can’t even think of how many times, when I’ve felt down, some friend came along with a word or gesture of affection and support that gave me the strength to keep going through a difficult time. That’s an experience that most of us have had at some point or another. In that moment, I think those people can be messengers (“angels”) to us, pointing us back toward faith, hope, and love. The author of the book of Hebrews in the New Testament advises us, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it.”
I remember one such encounter that happened when I was in college. I was on my way to class one morning when I crossed paths with a young woman on the sidewalk. We both looked up at the same time and I said, “Good morning”, intending to walk on. But to my surprise, she stopped and began talking to me! She told me all about how excited she was to get a letter from a child she sponsored in Latin America. She was so nice, our short conversation made my day. A little while later, I remembered that verse from Hebrews, “some have entertained angels without knowing it.” I had never seen her around campus before. Could that have been…? Maybe!
As it turns out, I bumped into her again a few months later and we became friends. Her name is Cathy and she is very much a human being. However, our brief meeting on the sidewalk that morning left my mind just a little bit more open to the ways in which God might surprise me in the midst of my everyday life. To this day, I jokingly refer to Cathy as my “guardian angel”.
As we gather together in this church tonight, we are celebrating the mystery of the divine presence in song, in story, and in candlelight. These rituals are good because they can help us to sense the presence of this mystery in a concentrated form. But the real power of Christmas lies in what we take with us into the rest of our year. As you go out into this Christmas season, I want to invite you to keep an open mind about God. Pay attention to the love of the people in your life and the beauty of the world around you. Try to see these things as messengers, angels leading you to embrace the presence of that divine mystery in your life. As you do so, I pray that you will be able to hear and join in the song of the angels, the saints, the heavens, and the earth: “Gloria in excelsis Deo! Glory to God in the highest!”
Like anyone else in this country, I have my own political opinions. Those who know me personally or read this blog are probably aware of the directions in which I tend to lean. However, I normally try to avoid a direct discussion of partisan politics on this blog. I fervently believe that the kingdom of God cannot be reduced to the platform a political party (of whatever ideological stripe).
In that vein, I normally choose to not acknowledge the polarized “infotainment” of both right and left. It is my opinion that neither Michael Moore nor Glenn Beck are worth my precious time. However, a recent rant by Bill O’Reilly has captured my attention.
Click here to read Mr. O’Reilly’s column in its entirety.
Mr. O’Reilly is responding to the question, “What does a moral society owe to the have-nots?”
“There comes a time when compassion can cause disaster. If you open your home to scores of homeless folks, you will not have a home for long…
…Personal responsibility is usually the driving force behind success.
But there are millions of Americans who are not responsible, and the cold truth is that the rest of us cannot afford to support them.
Every fair-minded person should support government safety nets for people who need assistance through no fault of their own. But guys like [U.S. Rep. Jim] McDermott don’t make distinctions like that. For them, the baby Jesus wants us to provide no matter what the circumstance. Being a Christian, I know that while Jesus promoted charity at the highest level, he was not self-destructive.
The Lord helps those who help themselves. Does he not?”
What strikes me is the similarity between Mr. O’Reilly’s comments and the following passage:
“We know something of Christian duty and love toward the helpless, but we demand the protection of the nation from the incapable and inferior… We want an Evangelical Church which roots in the national character, and we repudiate the spirit of a Christian cosmopolitanism.”
This sentence appears as part of the platform for the so-called “German Christians” who were ardent supporters of Hitler’s Nazi agenda during the Third Reich. Pastors such as Paul Tillich, Karl Barth, and Dietrich Bonhoeffer vehemently opposed this agenda (some of them paid for their opposition with their lives). I found the above passage in chapter 2 of Shirley Guthrie’s classic: Christian Doctrine, Rev.Ed. (WJK: 1994).
There are many things one could say in response to this, but I think I will let the passages from O’Reilly’s column and the “German Christian” platform simply stand side-by-side.
In his typical tongue-in-cheek manner, Stephen Colbert had this to say in response to Mr. O’Reilly:
“If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn’t help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we have to acknowledge that he commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition (and then admit that we just don’t want to do it).”
I highly recommend hearing Colbert in his own voice. A link to the video is posted below:
This week’s sermon from First Presbyterian Church of Boonville, NY.
The text is Matthew 1:18-25.
Click here to listen to the podcast.
If you were to ask the average person in the street what they think of Christianity, you’re likely to get a response that contains some combination of the words morals and values. Those who have a favorable opinion of Christianity might say something like, “More people should go to church, so they can learn positive morals and values.” Others who are more hostile toward Christianity might say, “Who do those Christians think they are? They shouldn’t impose their morals and values on everyone else!”
While these statements might seem to be polar opposites of one another, they proceed from a common assumption about who God is and what God wants. They assume that God is primarily interested in creating a perfect moral universe where everyone acts as they should and everything works according to plan.
Christians, to be fair, have certainly done their part in perpetuating this idea of a “perfect moral universe”. Theologians have called it “legalism”. Historically speaking, the proceedings of the Salem Witch Trials remind us of legalistic Christianity at its worst. More than two dozen people were wrongfully accused of practicing witchcraft and were executed by their neighbors in Massachusetts during the 17th century.
The legalistic spirit of this era was portrayed by the novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne in his literary classic, The Scarlet Letter. In this story, the main character, Hester Prynne, mothers a child out of wedlock and is subsequently ostracized by her neighbors. They force her to wear a scarlet letter ‘A’ at all times as a reminder of her transgression. Meanwhile, the child’s father (who happens to be the local minister) secretly and slowly tortures himself to death as self-inflicted punishment for his sins.
Examples of legalism in the Christian church are unfortunately not confined to volumes of history and literature. Even today, many Christians find themselves spiritually (and sometimes literally) homeless when they confess their inability to live up to the moral standards set by their church communities. The unspoken message that people in our society tend to hear from Christians is that there is no place in our churches for unwed mothers, divorced couples, addicts, or anyone else who doesn’t conform to this image of moral perfection.
When we hear these personal stories of people exiled from their homes and churches, when we read novels like The Scarlet Letter or reflect on historical accounts like the Salem Witch Trials, I think we have to ask ourselves: Is this really what God wants from us as Christians?
It’s tempting to answer “yes”, especially at Christmas. After all, isn’t Christmas the “most wonderful time of the year”? Doesn’t everyone want things to be “just perfect” at Christmas? But when we read the Christmas story as it appears in today’s gospel reading, we see a situation that is far from being “just perfect”.
Our scene opens with Mary, the mother of Jesus, finding out that she is pregnant out of wedlock. Biblical scholars estimate that Mary is probably about thirteen years old at this point in the story. So our story literally begins with an unwed teenage mother. In our society, this state of affairs would certainly make her the subject of raised eyebrows and town gossip. But in first century Galilee, the stakes were much higher. She was engaged to Joseph, who was quite certain the child wasn’t his. To be betrothed to one man in that society and having someone else’s baby was considered adultery. Mary could face the death penalty for that! The shame on her family’s honor would damage their standing in the community long after she was dead. So, when we read that Joseph was “unwilling to expose [Mary] to public disgrace”, we have to understand that this meant more than public embarrassment. Her life was on the line.
Joseph, it seemed, was caught in the middle of an impossible situation. His fiancée had apparently betrayed him. He was a good and faithful Jew who obeyed the Torah, but in this case, strict adherence to the Bible meant putting Mary to death. Even in his sorrow and anger, he wasn’t willing to do that. What was he supposed to do? He decided that the best thing for everyone would be to call of their engagement quietly, in hopes that the real father would step forward and take responsibility. In that scenario, Mary and her baby would at least have a chance at leading decent lives. It wasn’t a perfect solution, but it was the best he could do.
That night, during what I imagine must have been a fitful and restless sleep, Joseph had a dream. In this dream, an angel stood before him and called out, “Joseph, son of David!” This would have sounded odd to Joseph, because his father’s name was Jacob. Sure, his family was related to the legendary King David, but one would have to go back centuries to trace that lineage. Nevertheless, the angel calls him according to his royal heritage: “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.”
“Wait a second,” Joseph must have thought, “now you’re telling me that God is responsible for this? And all of this has something to do with royal blood in my distant family history?”
The angel in the dream continued, “She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
“Now, hold it right there,” Joseph thought, “Name him? You want me to name him?! That means I’m claiming him as my own! I’m saying to the world, ‘Yup. It was me. I did it. I’m the father.’ I’d be ruined for life over something that’s not even true! Are you saying God wants me to lie?!” If he were alive today, this is where Joseph would probably say, “I’ve really got to switch to decaf after 6pm!”
Remember that this was “just a dream”. How many times have you and I dreamed about something that was going on in our lives and dismissed it as stress subconsciously working itself out? It would have been very easy for Joseph to do the same. Besides, what this “angel” was saying went against everything he believed about God, morality, and the Bible.
Yet, we Christians believe this is how God chose to enter into human history. The author of Matthew’s gospel cites a prophecy from the book of Isaiah as if to say, “This was God’s plan all along!” We often marvel at the humility of Christ, who was willing to become incarnate among working-class peasants in Galilee. However, have we ever stopped to think about how scandalous this situation must have been for the people involved? Jesus was not born into a morally perfect situation.
Most of us are familiar with the story of the first Christmas from paintings, films, and pageants (like the one our kids have prepared for us after church today). We are familiar with idyllic images of the baby Jesus, lying on a soft bed of hay in the stable, surrounded by warm and soft light while angels and shepherds look down with love. But let me ask you this: What does a stable smell like? It’s not pretty! It’s not even hygienic. It’s messy, just like life.
When the eternal mystery of God took on flesh and became incarnate in our world, it happened in the messiest possible way. God is not afraid of our mess. God does not wait for us to get our morals and values in order. God meets us right where we are. Ironically, it is God’s acceptance of our moral imperfection that mysteriously gives us the power to live transformed lives. The Apostle Paul said it like this in his letter to the Romans: “God’s kindness leads to repentance.”
The French novelist Victor Hugo wrote about this kind of transformation in his book, Les Misérables. In this story, an ex-convict named Jean Valjean stops for the night at a bishop’s residence. At dinner, he remarks that, after a hot meal and a warm bed, he’ll “be a new man in the morning.” During the night, Valjean gets up and robs the bishop of his best silver and takes off. He is caught and arrested the next day. The police take Valjean back to the bishop’s house for questioning. When they arrive, the bishop lies and tells the police that he gave the silver to Valjean, who is then set free. Before sending him on his way (with even more silver), the bishop says to Valjean, “With this silver, I’ve purchased your soul. I’ve ransomed you from fear and hatred. And now I give you back to God.” The rest of Hugo’s novel tells the story of how Valjean’s life was changed forever by that radical act of graciousness. The bishop met Jean Valjean in the midst of his messiness and moral imperfection. So it is between God and us.
This is good news. It changes the way we look into the mirror. When God comes into our lives on Christmas (or any other day), God takes us as we are, with all our messiness and moral imperfections. There is no longer any need for us to beat ourselves up for our sins or hide from the One who loved us before we were born.
This good news also changes the way we look at each other, especially when our neighbors are mired in scandal. Maybe they are facing a tough legal battle, like Mary. Maybe an entire family is facing public humiliation in the community, like Mary’s. Maybe an unwed or teen mother is facing a difficult choice, just like Mary. Do Christians in these situations cross their arms and shake their heads in silent judgment?
If we take the gospel seriously, we have to recognize that it was in the midst of a messy and morally questionable situation like this that God chose to enter into human history. So, if we are looking for God in our lives today, it only makes sense to start looking in the same kinds of messy and morally questionable situations.
If we can find the faith to do that, then I truly believe that we, like Jean Valjean, will discover our lives being transformed by God’s grace. With open minds and open hearts, we’ll take our place this Christmas in that smelly, messy stable alongside the shepherds with their sheep, the ass, and the angels, beholding the glory of God’s eternal mystery coming in to our lives once again.
O come, let us adore him!
This week’s sermon from First Presbyterian Church of Boonville, NY. The text is Isaiah 35:1-10.
Click here to listen to the podcast.
We’re going to be talking about poetry today, so I’d like to begin with a short poem:
A young, psychic midget named Marge
went to jail on a most heinous charge.
But, despite lock and key,
the next day, she broke free,
and the headlines read: “Small Medium at Large”.
This poem is an example of a limerick: a short poem with a particular structure of rhyme and rhythm and a zinger or punchline that typically comes at the end. This is a common feature in English poetry.
Hebrew poetry, on the other hand, is quite different. Hebrew poems don’t much rely on rhyme or rhythm. They depend instead on the way certain ideas or images go together.
Also, a Hebrew poem is kind of like an Oreo cookie: all the good stuff is in the middle. There is often one central idea that gets flanked on either side by repeated secondary ideas. Biblical scholars call this form a “chiasm” and it looks something like this: idea A, followed by idea B, followed by the central idea C. Then the pattern reverses itself: idea B gets repeated, then, at the end, idea A gets repeated. It has a kind of symmetrical structure: A-B-C-B-A.
Why are we talking so much about Hebrew poetry? Because our Old Testament reading, from the book of the prophet Isaiah, takes the form of a poem. Hebrew prophets, like Isaiah, often delivered their message through poetry. I like to imagine them as folksingers like Woodie Guthrie or Bob Dylan, hitchhiking across the country singing “The Times Are A-Changin’”. Verses 1-7 fit this pattern (this “chiastic” structure) perfectly. Let’s take a look:
We’ll start with the central idea in the middle. We’re twisting open the Oreo and licking the cream out, if you will. The central idea in this poem comes in the second half of the fourth verse: “Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you.” In Hebrew, it literally says, “Behold! Your God!” If this were a circus magician’s act, this would be the point when the curtain flies open and the band goes, “TA-DA!!!” This is the moment when God’s presence is revealed (made known) to the people. “Here is your God.”
Now that God’s presence has been revealed (“Ta-da!”), the next thing we learn is what God intends to do now that God is here. Isaiah uses the words “vengeance” and “terrible recompense” to describe God’s intentions. These words probably make most mainline Christians squirm in their pews just a little. Language about God’s “vengeance” is usually found on the lips of zealots and fanatics who use the name of God and the text of the Bible to justify their own apocalyptic agendas. It might help to learn that these words have a much broader and deeper meaning in the Hebrew language. When Isaiah talks about God’s “vengeance” and “terrible recompense”, he is referring to God’s intention to fix all that is wrong with the world and finally set things right, once and for all. You and I are not alone when we feel sad or angry that all is not well in the world. God sees it too. God feels our pain. And most of all, God intends to do something about it.
What, exactly, does God intend to do? Isaiah tells us at the end of verse 4: God intends to “save” us. “Salvation” is another word that has a much broader and deeper meaning than it is usually given in our culture. In order to understand what Isaiah means by “salvation”, we’ll have to take a look at the other two sections of his poem.
In the verses immediately surrounding Isaiah’s central idea, the prophet develops the idea of “salvation” as he understands it. The images he uses are primarily images of healing: “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. 4Say to those who are of a fearful heart, ‘Be strong, do not fear!’” (v.3-4a) Later on he describes how “the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy.” (v.5-6a) Salvation, for Isaiah, is something very practical. Nothing in this passage indicates that he might be talking about “pie in the sky when you die”. No, salvation, as it appears in this text, has to do with the transformation of people’s lives in this world.
Isaiah continues to expand the concept of salvation in the next section of his poem. God’s saving activity is not just limited to the lives of human beings in this world. It includes the world itself. All creation is invited to celebrate the blessing of God’s love: “The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus 2it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the Lord, the majesty of our God.” (v.1-2) Later on the prophet describes how “waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; 7the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.” (v.6b-7) Writing about the salvation of the natural world, Isaiah speaks in threes. First, he describes the “before” image (i.e. the initial desolation of the land): “wilderness”, “dry land”, and “desert”. Then he describes the “after” image (i.e. what the land will be like when God is finished): “Lebanon”, “Carmel”, and “Sharon”. These three places were some of the most fertile lands around in the Ancient Near East. To put it in terms of North American geography: Isaiah is effectively saying that the arid badlands of North Dakota will be as lush and fertile as the Everglades in southern Florida.
All of this is relevant because Jews in Isaiah’s time felt like they were living on a planet that was spinning wildly out of control. They were threatened with invasion from without and corruption from within. People grew more fearful and cynical with each passing day. Isaiah was often critical of the society in which he lived. His poetry could be quite harsh at times. During his lifetime, his ministry met with only limited success. Empires continued to rise and fall around him. The moral fiber of the Jewish people continued its downward spiral into corruption and cynicism until they too were eventually conquered and dragged into exile by the Babylonians in the 6th century BC. But, in spite of these facts, Isaiah refused to give in to anxiety or despair. He held on tight to this vision of an all-inclusive salvation. When God was finished, even the most barren corners of the earth would join in the celebration of life.
Isaiah placed no faith in the powers-that-be for the establishment of God’s paradise on earth. God is the one who began the work of salvation on the earth and God is the one who can see it through to the end. And there is nothing that power-hungry nations, corrupt leaders, cynical people, or even the powers of death and chaos themselves can do to thwart God’s presence and purposes in this world.
Isaiah’s message, while directed toward Jews in the 8th century BC, is still relevant for us today. We too live on a planet that feels like it’s spinning out of control. The forces of death and chaos threaten to overwhelm us in the midst of our daily lives. In a deceitful effort to alleviate our fear, the culture around us capitalizes on our cynicism, tempting us to place our trust in political parties, nuclear arsenals, or the almighty dollar.
The crises of this world seem so great that we cannot hope to fix them all. We cannot even solve the little problems that creep up in our own community, our families, or our individual lives. What good is our little effort in the face of so much chaos?
By itself, our best effort is useless and meaningless. Try as we might, we cannot “save” ourselves through political programs, business transactions, or religious institutions. We are utterly dependent on the sovereign grace of God to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves. God is working the miracle that we cannot.
We can put our hearts and minds at ease by embracing Isaiah’s vision of humanity and all creation transformed and renewed through the saving presence and power of God. This vision can give us hope to carry on when it seems that all other hope is gone. As Isaiah himself said, faith in this vision can “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees”. With this hope in mind, we can say to our fearful hearts, “Be strong, do not fear!”
Our little efforts to better our lives, our families, our community, and this world are part of God’s bigger project of salvation. The entire process does not depend on us; it depends on God. God has graciously invited us to play a small part in that salvation. None of our kind words or good deeds are ever lost in the sight of God. Each one has eternal value as part of God’s project for setting things right in this world.
When you feel tempted to despair in your struggle with sin, death, and chaos in this life, I invite you to do as Isaiah did: Turn your spiritual gaze inward and upward. Meditate on the presence of God within you and around you. Say to yourself, “Here is your God!” Witness the creative and transforming power of the Holy Spirit at work in God’s creation. Remember that God started this good work in you and will see it through to the end. Rest in this truth and you shall, in the words of Isaiah, “obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”
Hopping Hadrian's Wall 