Tag: Jesus

The Amazing Grace People

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon1 Comment

Sermon for the Third Sunday after the Epiphany.

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church,
Coldwater, MI

The biblical text is Luke 4:14-21. Click here to read.

In the 2001 movie Shrek, the titular ogre tries to explain to his friend, the donkey, how ogres are complex beings.

“Ogres are like onions,” says he.

The donkey replies, “Why? Because you smell bad?”

Shrek: “No.”

Donkey: “Because you make people cry?”

Shrek: “No… because we both have layers. Onions have layers; ogres have layers. You get it.”

Just like ogres and onions, today’s gospel also has layers. Specifically, it has three layers: Jesus, Isaiah, and Jubilee. We are going to have to unpack each of those layers in order to fully appreciate what Jesus is saying in this passage of Scripture.

In the first layer, we have Jesus preaching a sermon at the synagogue in his hometown of Nazareth. This would have been very exciting for the people of that town. Many of our parishioners at St. Mark’s will remember the late Bishop Tom Shaw, who grew up in this parish and later became a monk, a priest, and a bishop in The Episcopal Church. We still keep a candle burning in his memory between the pulpit and the altar. Imagine how exciting it would be for Bishop Shaw to come back and say Mass here, at the parish church where he grew up. That’s how big a deal it would have been for the people of Nazareth when Jesus came home to preach.

This story is also a big deal in the gospel according to Luke because the author uses it as Jesus’ inaugural address at the beginning of his ministry. In the same way that a president’s inaugural address sets the tone for that president’s term of office, this sermon is Luke’s way of setting the tone for the rest of Jesus’ ministry.

So, what is the tone that Luke is trying to set? To understand that, we need to look at the second layer of this passage: Isaiah.

The passage of Scripture that Jesus read in the synagogue comes from the book of Isaiah, chapter 61. The prophet, in this section of Isaiah, is writing to the Jewish people as they return from a half-century of exile. In 587 BCE, the Babylonians invaded the southern kingdom of Judah and hauled their leaders away as slaves. During the next 50 years, the Babylonians tried to do to the Jewish people what white settlers did to indigenous tribes in North America: They displaced the people from their homeland and tried to erase their culture by outlawing the speaking of their language and the practice of their religion.

Thankfully, the early Jews resisted this attempt at forced assimilation. They pushed back against their enslavers, wrote down their ancestral stories in the Torah, taught those stories to their children, and went on strike once a week, on the Sabbath, to remind themselves and their captors that they were not the property of the Babylonians, but beloved children of God. After two generations of resistance, the Persians conquered the Babylonians and allowed the Jews to return home and rebuild.

Isaiah 61 was written as the Jews were beginning that process of rebuilding after the Babylonian Exile. During this time, the people were looking for some kind of inspiration to guide them in that process. The prophet provided that inspiration by looking even further back into Israel’s history. When Isaiah talks about “good news to the poor,” “release to the captives,” and “the year of the Lord’s favor,” he is talking about the year of Jubilee, which leads us to the third and final layer of this story.

The year of Jubilee was prescribed as one of God’s laws in the Torah. It appears in chapter 25 of the book of Leviticus. According to this law, there was to be a general amnesty of debts, once every fifty years. All debts would be forgiven, all enslaved people would be freed, and all land would return to its original owners. Practically, this would mean doing a hard reset on the economy. It would interrupt patterns of generational poverty and allow a fresh start, so that grandchildren were not still paying for the mistakes of their grandparents. Spiritually, the year of Jubilee communicated to the ancient Israelites that their God was a God of fresh starts and new beginnings. The God of Israel is, not just a God of law, but also a God of mercy. Compassion and forgiveness were established as foundational principles in the Torah, which is why Isaiah pointed to them as foundational principles of the new society that Jews were rebuilding after their return from slavery and exile in Babylon. The people had just been through a horrible period of collective trauma, so the prophet wanted to ensure that their new society would be a safe place to heal from that trauma. That’s why Isaiah pointed to the year of Jubilee as the model for what this new society would look like. The ancient prophet Isaiah understood what the 21st century prophet, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, also understood: that “there is no future without forgiveness.”

This brings us back to the first layer of our story: the layer of Jesus. Jesus appeals to the prophet Isaiah, who appeals to the year of Jubilee, to establish the fact that the foundational principle of God’s kingdom on Earth is the principle of mercy.

Mercy is the driving force behind everything that Jesus says and does. He demonstrated mercy by healing the sick and feeding the hungry. He showed mercy by welcoming tax collectors and sinners. He taught mercy by saying, “Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy” (Matthew 5:7) and “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me” (Matthew 25:40). Finally, Jesus embodied mercy in his death on the cross, praying for his executioners, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).

The reason why the author of Luke’s gospel has Jesus quote this passage from Isaiah, who refers to the year of Jubilee, in his first sermon, is to establish the fact that mercy is foundational principle of Jesus’ ministry on Earth. Therefore, if mercy is the driving principle behind Jesus’ ministry, then it ought to be the driving principle behind the Church’s mission as well.

Mercy is, and ought to be, an unsettling topic. Mercy takes away any sense of power from those who need and receive it. Mercy is shocking to those who still cling to their illusions of control. Mercy is offensive to the self-righteous, but, in the words of the late author (and Episcopalian) Rachel Held Evans, “What makes the gospel offensive is not who it keeps out, but who it lets in.”

Scripture and history are rife with examples of people for whom the mercy of Jesus became the central fact of their life. St. Paul the Apostle was transformed, by God’s mercy, from a persecutor of the Church to its first theologian. He writes, “I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain” (I Corinthians 15:9-10). In the same way, the Rev. John Newton, who began his career as the captain of a slave ship, later experienced the mercy of God, repented of his sin, and became an Anglican priest. He dedicated the remainder of his life to ending the Atlantic slave trade and penned the most famous hymn in all of Christian history: “Amazing grace! How sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.”

According to Luke, in today’s gospel, mercy lies at the heart of everything Jesus does, therefore it ought to lie at the heart of everything the Church does in his Name. As receivers and conduits of God’s mercy, we are, and ought to be, the “Amazing Grace People.” The world ought to look at us with shock and awe when they see how indiscriminately we lavish the mercy of God upon those who deserve it least. As sinners, saved by grace, we ought to be offensive in our witness to the mercy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Mercy was the driving force behind the year of Jubilee in Leviticus 25; mercy was the foundational principle of the new society that the prophet was rebuilding in Isaiah 61; mercy was the theme of Jesus’ ministry in the gospel according to Luke; and mercy is the Church’s reason for existing today.

Kindred in Christ, we have opened the Scriptures and examined Church history to wrap our minds and hearts around this overarching theme of God’s mercy. One question still remains: Where does this leave us, today? Will we be Christians or not? Will we risk everything to be conduits of God’s shocking and offensive mercy or not?

Thankfully, because of you “Amazing Grace People,” I don’t have to look very far to find an answer to that question.

Last Friday, I had the privilege of touring and speaking with the staff of Tommy’s House, which you may already know as a transitional residence for women recovering from the disease of addiction. The director of Tommy’s House, a parishioner in our congregation, explained to me how Tommy’s House provides a safe and supportive environment for its residents, helps them get back on their feet, and empowers them to begin new lives, beyond the shackles of chemical dependency.

During the tour, one of the staff members (who had previously been a resident in their program), asked me, “Why is it that, wherever we go, we always find that it’s the Episcopal churches in a city that open their doors to our Twelve Step recovery meetings?”

What a great question! There are two answers.

First, Episcopalians were there when the Twelve Steps were invented. Bill Wilson, the original author of the Twelve Steps, had a spiritual mentor named Fr. Samuel Shoemaker, who was an Episcopal priest. Bill W. often referred to Fr. Shoemaker as “the co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous.” Fr. Shoemaker, of course, denied this allegation and gave full credit back to Bill. The fact remains, however, that The Episcopal Church was there when it happened and continues to be recognized as a safe space for Twelve Step recovery meetings.

The second, and more spiritually significant, reason why Episcopal churches are frequently known as reliable hosts for AA and NA meetings is because we are an “Amazing Grace People.” We believe that God is a God of second chances. We understand that a finite sinner cannot out-sin the mercy of an infinite God, therefore we are “the Amazing Grace People.”

Friends, I send you into the world this week in full assurance of the infinite mercy of God, which easily overwhelms the finite number of your sins. May the mercy of God be the foundation of your new life, from this day forward, just as it was for Isaiah, Jesus, and all who continue to minister in his holy Name. And “May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all evermore. Amen” (II Corinthians 13:14).

Do Whatever He Tells You: A Practical Guide for Turning Water into Wine

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon, Uncategorized1 Comment

Sermon for the second Sunday after the Epiphany, Year C.

Delivered at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, Coldwater.

Click here to read the biblical passage.

“The key to the perfect wedding day is imperfection.”

That’s the one piece of advice I give to every couple who asks me to officiate their wedding. So long as both parties arrive at the ceremony safely, say their vows in front of an officiant and witnesses, and sign the license, it qualifies as a successful wedding. Everything else is extra. You can bank on some kind of hiccup with the DJ, the catering, or the dress. At my own wedding, the pre-recorded entrance music cut out while my wife was still halfway down the aisle, so she had to walk the rest of the way in silence. It was still a lovely day and a successful wedding.

In biblical times, however, things weren’t so simple. Weddings back then were week-long affairs that involved the entire town. The ceremony was a reaffirmation of the social bonds that held their community together; the couple served as a sacred symbol of God’s covenant with the people of Israel.

Furthermore, wine itself was an important symbol of blessing and joy, so it’s absence would have undoubtedly be interpreted as a bad omen for the new couple.

Running out of wine during such an auspicious occasion would have brought permanent shame on the family. This level of shame, more than mere embarrassment, would lead to the entire family being cut off from the community and not allowed to participate as functioning members of society. The closest thing our culture has to this kind of shaming is when a celebrity gets ‘cancelled’ for acting inappropriately with staff or fans. The difference is that the stakes were much higher: Firstly, because the people involved were regular, working-class folks and, secondly, because the bar for getting ‘cancelled’ was much lower than it is today. The shame of running out of wine at a wedding would have absolutely ruined the family involved.

Knowing this cultural background helps us understand the urgency in Mary’s voice when she informs Jesus, “They have no wine.”

Jesus’ curt response, then, seems shocking: “Woman, what concern is that to me and to you?”

This is a sentence that requires some explanation. At first glance, it sounds rude and dismissive, like a teenager who has just been asked to clean his room (“Ugh… whatever, bruh!”), but a careful examination of the language reveals a very different tone.

First of all, the term “woman” was a term of respect, much like “ma’am” or “madam” would be today. Since our culture uses different words for respect, I would personally not recommend calling your wife, partner, or mother, “woman.” (If you would like to test this hypothesis for yourself, I invite you to do so, and I will happily come to visit you in the hospital afterward.)

Second of all, the comment “what concern is that to me and to you” is meant to be more reassuring than dismissive. If Jesus had been Australian, he might have said, “No worries, mate!” In America, we might say, “No problem. Piece o’ cake!” That phrase is used in other parts of Scripture when a minor issue does not present a barrier to a relationship between two people. In essence, what Jesus is saying here is, “Don’t worry, ma’am. Everything is fine.”

Of course, this response is also shocking, albeit in a different way. Given what we just learned about weddings and wine in ancient Galilee, it would have been perfectly understandable if Mary had said, “What do mean, Jesus?! Everything is not fine! This is a real crisis!” But Mary doesn’t do that. Instead, she calmly turns to the servants and says, “Do whatever he tells you.”

The rest of the story plays out as we read it in today’s gospel. The servants follow Jesus’ instructions and a miraculous transformation ensues. Symbolically, the joy and abundance of life is restored to an even greater level than where it was before.

I’d like to think that I would have the same quiet confidence as Mary during a catastrophe, but I’m not 100% sure that I would. (Then again, maybe that’s why God chose her, instead of me, to be Jesus’ mother.) I’ve been known to indulge in more than my fair share of “doom-scrolling.” Like so many of us, I frequently feel overwhelmed by the crushing pressure of crises, in my life and in the world, that I can do nothing to fix. Mary’s plea to Jesus, “They have no wine,” has often escaped my own lips as a cry for justice, freedom, or hope, sometimes for others and sometimes for myself. When I imagine Jesus telling me, “Don’t worry, sir, everything is fine,” I want to shout back at him, “No it isn’t! We’re in a real crisis, here!”

It is then, when I find myself in times of trouble, that I need Mother Mary to come to me, speaking words of wisdom: “Do whatever he tells you.”

When I hear those words from Mary, I think of the things that Jesus has always told everyone to do: Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, give to the poor, welcome the stranger and the outcast, visit the sick and incarcerated, and love your neighbor as yourself. There is so much wrong in this world that I have no power to fix or control. What I do have power over is my own choices. I can choose to give in to despair and cynicism, or I can choose to be the kind of person that Jesus was by doing the kinds of things that Jesus told me to do.

The popular author (and dedicated Episcopalian) Brené Brown refers to this power-to-choose as “micro-dosing hope.” She says:

“I have no access to big hope right now, however, I am asking myself how I can support the people around me. The people on my team, in my community. How can I make sure that, in the maelstrom of my emotions, I stay committed to courage, kindness, and caring for others regardless of the choices made by others? Doing the smallest next right thing is hard, but sometimes it’s all we’ve got.”

There is a particular community of Christians that has been practicing this principle for more than a millennium: the Benedictine Order of monks and nuns. They were founded in the early sixth century by St. Benedict of Nursia as a community committed to round-the-clock prayer. Every three hours, starting in the middle of the night, they would stop whatever they were doing and chant psalms in the church. Their practice forms the basis for the Daily Offices of Morning and Evening Prayer, which we use in The Episcopal Church today.

The Benedictine commitment to a life of prayer also opened their hearts to the practice of radical hospitality. Whenever strangers would present themselves at the monastery gates, the monks and nuns would welcome them as if it was Christ himself knocking at their door.

Over a thousand years later, the monks and nuns of the Order of St. Benedict continue to live by their rule of prayer and hospitality. In fact, they have a community just 30 minutes away from here by car: St. Gregory’s Abbey of Three Rivers. This small group of Episcopalians has lived by the Rule of St. Benedict since their founding in 1939. [NOTE: Your current rector is an oblate of St. Gregory’s Abbey. If you would like to know what that means, please feel free to ask me after the service or stop by my office sometime.]

[Click here to learn more about St. Gregory’s Abbey, Three Rivers.]

This dual-commitment to prayer and hospitality led the Benedictines to establish sustainable communities with adequate food, shelter, healthcare, and education. The stability of the monasteries made it possible for the Benedictines to preserve the cultural treasures of Western Europe, even as the Roman Empire was collapsing around them.

The entire goal of Benedictine monasticism is to become the kind of person that Jesus was by doing the things that Jesus told people to do. The monks did not set out to save civilization, but the miracle is that they ended up doing so, almost by accident.

This historical example presents us with a possibility for how we too might transform “water into wine” by putting the teachings of Jesus into practice in our own lives. Beyond voting in elections and writing letters to our elected officials (both of which we should absolutely be doing), there is little we can do to directly effect the biggest problems of the world. We can, however, “do whatever Jesus tells us” by putting into practice the things he taught his disciples. We can take care of each other and the most vulnerable people in our community by feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, sheltering the homeless, welcoming the outcast, and loving our neighbors as ourselves. Each of us can choose to be the kind of person that Jesus was.

This, I believe, is the secret for making it through tough times. In the days to come, I pray that each of us (myself included) will understand the reassuring words of Jesus: “Don’t worry ma’am/sir/friend, everything is fine.” I pray that each of us (myself especially) will heed the advice of Mary: “Do whatever he tells you.” I pray, most of all, that we will become the kind of people that Jesus was: Transforming the water of crisis into the wine of hope.

May it be so. And “may the God of peace give us peace at all times in all ways” (II Thessalonians 3:16).

Love in the Past Tense: Grief Without Shame

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon, Uncategorized1 Comment

Sermon for the Feast of All Saints.

The text is John 11:32-44. Click here to read it.

Here is the video of the entire service. The sermon starts at 32:23.

“Jesus began to weep.”

John 11:35

This brief verse, John 11:35, rendered even more concisely in other translations as, “Jesus wept,” is well-known as the shortest verse in our Bible. For that reason, it was a favorite among students at the Christian high school I attended, where our teachers required us to memorize a Bible verse each week.

As a teenager, I liked this verse because it was short, but today, in my middle age, I have found other reasons to love it. I continue to love John 11:35 (“Jesus wept”) because it puts the grief of our fully divine and fully human Lord and Savior on full display and, thereby, it gives us mere mortals permission to grieve, when we feel the need to do so.

Grief is a tricky subject. We pragmatic Americans tend to think of grief as a problem and grieving as an emotional symptom of said problem. When we operate under this misconception, we try to solve the “problem” of grief by making the “bad feelings” go away. This is why so many well-intentioned friends tend to offer so many problematic platitudes like:

  • They’re in a better place;
  • Everything happens for a reason;
  • Heaven needed another angel;
  • God has a plan;
  • It’s not up to us to question the will of the Almighty;
  • Maybe God is trying to teach you a lesson.

If you’ve ever found yourself in a state of grief, and heard this kind of pseudo-theological drivel spat at you by well-intentioned believers, then you too know just how unhelpful such slogans can be. These kinds of “bumper sticker theology” serve to comfort the minds of the bystanders more than the hearts of the bereaved.

Through my years of service as a hospice chaplain, I have come to realize that the beliefs that “grief is a problem to be solved” and “grieving is a feeling” are fundamental errors. Grief is not a problem; it is a process, and grieving is not a feeling; it is a skill. And frankly, speaking as a fellow pragmatic American, grieving is a skill at which we tend to be very, VERY bad.

If we were to look for a culture that is more skilled at the art of grief than our own, I think we need look no further than the Jewish culture of our Lord Jesus. Jewish culture tends to understand the process of grief better than our own. Our Jewish neighbors have, over the course of several millennia, developed a practical approach to mourning that guides people through the process of grief in a systematic way.

During the first stage of grief, between the death of a loved one and their funeral, Jews recognize that people are in an initial state of shock. The bereaved are exempted from performing many of the commandments of the Torah while they process the loss of their loved one. For the first week after the funeral, they are said to be “sitting shiva,” where they are not expected to go to work, leave the house, or even prepare meals. During this time, friends will visit the family to bring food, sit with them, tell stories, and say prayers. Gradually, after this week of sitting shiva, family members will begin to reintegrate into society. There are certain limitations placed on their activity for the first month and the first year after their loss. After that first year, life has more-or-less returned to normal, but they still pause once a year to remember their loved one on the yahrtzeit, the anniversary of their death. Jewish culture understands, better than American culture, that grief is a process and grieving is a skill that must be taught and can be learned.

In today’s gospel reading, we get to see an example of Jesus sitting shiva with his close friends, Mary and Martha, after the death of their brother Lazarus. What’s amazing about this passage is how Jesus meets each of the sisters where they are, according to their distinct personalities. Both sisters begin their conversation with Jesus in the exact same words:

“Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.”

John 11:32

And then, with Martha, the more practical and intellectual of the two, Jesus engages in a theological discussion about resurrection; with Mary, the more emotional and contemplative sister, Jesus says nothing, but simply weeps.

Though we know, from the rest of the gospel story, that Jesus is about to miraculously raise Lazarus from the dead, that knowledge does not stop Jesus from being fully present with these bereaved sisters in their grief. Jesus knows what he is about to do, but he still takes time to meet people where they are.

The most beautiful thing about the Christian faith is our belief that God, in Christ, has entered fully into the human experience, including our experience of grief and death. Divine omnipotence does not create a stoic barrier between us and our feelings, but allows us to enter into them more fully. Real faith enables us to skillfully navigate the troubled waters of grief, charting a steady course between the way things are and the way they ought to be.

When I, as a hospice chaplain, am invited to the bedside of one who has recently died, I notice how often the bereaved family members feel ashamed of their grief. While I stand silently by, they sometimes say to me, “I’m sorry for crying; I know they’re in a better place and I should have more faith, but I just miss them so much!”

Those are the moments when I, as their chaplain, will break my silence by referring to the very Bible verse that inspired this sermon. I say to them, if they are Christian, “When Jesus visited the grave of his friend Lazarus, the Bible very clearly tells us that ‘Jesus wept.’ If it’s okay for Jesus Christ himself to weep at the death of a loved one, then it’s okay for you to do it too.”

As further evidence for my position on this matter, I would cite St. Paul the Apostle, in his first letter to the Thessalonians, chapter 4, verse 13:

“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.”

1 Thessalonians 4:13

St. Paul does not say, “so that you may not grieve;” he says, “so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.” Grief is a very good and natural part of human life, even for the life of a Christian. Grief, as I like to say, is simply “love in the past tense.” Others have said that grief is just “love with no place to go.” Grief is not a sin. Grief is not a problem to be solved. Grief is a normal process, which we all must go through. Grief is a natural consequence of love, which our Lord Jesus commands us to do.

Kindred in Christ, I want you to hear today that there is no shame in grief; it is simply “love in the past tense.” If you feel sad because you are working through the process of grief, I want you to know that Christ is with you in your grief and this shortest verse of the Bible, “Jesus wept,” is spoken for you this day.

The grief that you experience might be for a loved one who has died; it might also be because of the loss of a job or the end of a relationship. Your grief might be part of coming out of the closet, because you yourself or someone you love is not the person you thought they were. The grief you experience might even be because of something good, like getting married, having a baby, graduating from school, or retiring from a career after many years of faithful service. All of these events are good things, but each of them also involves the end of a previous identity and way of life.

Whatever the source of your grief is today, I want you to know that it is healthy, normal, and good. Jesus Christ does not stand in judgment over you for your grief, but kneels down in the dirt and weeps with you for your loss.

I pray that you will take this mental image with you into your experience of grief. I pray that it will give you the grace to go easy on yourself while you are going through the process of grief. I pray further that your self-acceptance, and your faith in Christ’s acceptance, will give you the wisdom to have mercy on others who are going through their own process of grief.

Through it all, may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep our hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God, and of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, our Lord. And may the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, be amongst us and remain with us always.

Amen.

The Way That We See

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Sermon for the Last Sunday of Epiphany, Year B

The text is Mark 9:2-9.

Canadian singer/songwriter Bruce Cockburn penned the following lyrics in his song, Child of the Wind:

Little round planet in a big universe:
sometimes it looks blessed, sometimes it looks cursed.
Depends on what you look at, obviously,
but even more it depends on the way that you see.

(Bruce Cockburn, Child of the Wind)

The way that we see things matters. Our worldview matters. Some see the world as a battleground between us and them, the haves and the have-nots, the fit and the unfit, or the good guys and the bad guys. What matters, according to this worldview, is ensuring that our side wins and the other side loses.

Some see the world as a meaningless conglomeration of matter and energy that is ultimately indifferent to the needs and wants of individual human beings. What matters, according to this worldview, is imposing our will and our ingenuity onto the chaos and forcing it to satisfy our desires.

The Christian worldview does not see the world in either of these ways. As Christians, we follow the guidance of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, who teaches that our Father in heaven “makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45). Later on, Jesus says, “Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them” (6:26) and, “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these” (28-29).

Jesus sees the universe as a good place that is constantly being created and cared for by God. According to the creation stories in the book of Genesis, which Jesus grew up reading, God created a wonderfully good universe, formed humankind in the divine image, and placed us in the world in order to help care for this beautiful place. Anyone who has read the account of the life and teachings of Jesus in the gospels knows that Jesus is not blind or indifferent to the complicated realities of conflict and suffering, but he regards all of that as secondary to the central truth of a good God who created a good world and continues to sustain it in love.

The fourteenth century English mystic, Julian of Norwich, was the first woman to write a book in English. While lying sick in bed and near death, Julian describes her own experience of the kind of worldview that Jesus wanted to instill in his followers.

Julian writes that God

“showed me something small, no bigger than a hazelnut, lying in the palm of my hand, and I perceived that it was as round as any ball. I looked at it and thought: What can this be? And I was given this general answer: It is everything which is made. I was amazed that it could last, for I thought that it was so little that it could suddenly fall into nothing. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasts and always will, because God loves it; and thus everything has being through the love of God.”

(Showings, IV)

The way that Julian and Jesus see the world is very different from the way that nationalists, terrorists, and other fanatics see the world. For Julian and Jesus, there is no struggle between us and them, no cosmic indifference to suffering, because there is only the God whose name is Love.

In today’s gospel, we get to see the beginning of the Christian worldview taking root in the minds of Jesus’ disciples, Ss. Peter, James, and John. We read that Jesus takes these three friends up a mountain and there, far away from the bustling crowds, “he was transfigured before them” (Mark 9:2). The text of Mark’s gospel only describes the change in his clothes, which “became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them” (3). While this might sound like the beginning of a commercial for laundry detergent, no sales pitch was forthcoming. The gospel writers preserved this story in order to express the way they saw Jesus. For them, Jesus was more than just a good man or a wise teacher; he was full of divine radiance. In later centuries, the bishops of the Church would develop this experience into the doctrine we now know as the divinity of Christ. One of the things that makes Christianity unique among the religions of the world is that we find God in a person. In Judaism and Islam, Moses and Muhammad are respected as prophets who proclaim the divine message, but in Christianity, Jesus Christ is the message itself. Through the story of the Transfiguration, we begin to see God in Jesus and, through Jesus, we begin to see God everywhere else.

Nowhere is this truth more apparent than in the mystery of the Eucharist. In the Eucharist, we take grain and grapes that have been shaped into bread and wine. This means that, when our ushers present the elements at the altar, they are symbolically offering to God the fruits of the Earth and the genius of human labor. Every wheat stalk and grapevine, every farm worker and truck driver, every hillside and highway are already present on the church’s altar, even before the prayer of consecration has even begun. The Offertory in our liturgy is, not simply a moment for fundraising, but a giving back to God of everything that God has given to us.

Once the priest has received this offering, she blesses it and offers it back to us as the consecrated Body and Blood of Christ. Then we, the people of the Church, rise and gather around the altar to receive Christ. In that moment, it no longer matters who is rich or poor, male or female, black or white, gay or straight, cis or trans, conservative or liberal, Israeli or Palestinian, Ukrainian or Russian. The only truth that matters, in that moment, is that the Body of Christ I receive into my body is the same Body of Christ that you receive into your Body, therefore “we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread” (1 Corinthians 10:17). This is what I mean when I say: Through the story of the Transfiguration, we begin to see God in Jesus and, through Jesus, we begin to see God everywhere else.

The way that we see things matters. When our worldview is shaped by religious fundamentalism or secular atheism, we will see the world as a battle over who is right. When our worldview is shaped by the class warfare of Marxism or the market forces of capitalism, we will see the world as an endless fight for survival. But when our worldview is shaped by the Gospel, our Transfigured Lord will show us a transfigured world that glows brightly with the radiance of God.

I think about the story of the Transfiguration whenever I am outside in the evening and happen to catch those glorious moments near sunset, when all the trees and buildings seem to be shining with a golden light. I feel like I have to stop and make the sign of the cross because it seems like God is granting us a moment, however brief, when we get to see the world the way God sees it all the time.

I think also of another moment of transfiguration, that took place on a busy streetcorner in Kentucky. It was recorded by a 20th century monk named Thomas Merton.

He writes:

“In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness… This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud… I have the immense joy of being [human], a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate. As if the sorrows and stupidities of the human condition could overwhelm me, now I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.”

(Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, p. 156-157)

Friends, the way that we see things matters. I encourage you this week to draw inspiration from Thomas Merton and Julian of Norwich. I invite you to attend deeply to our next celebration of the Eucharist. Above all, I urge you to be followers of Jesus, to see the world as he sees it, full of divine glory. May this Christlike way of seeing transfigure you from the inside out and lead you out to transfigure this world in the name of God, whose name is Love, and in the name of Love, whose name is God.

Amen.

To Err is Divine

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Bible study reflection, church, Evolutionary Thoughts, poetry, religion1 Comment

Matthew 9:9-17

Karl E. Peters writes: “To err is divine.”

This phrase feels uncomfortable to most religious practitioners in the Judeo-Christian tradition. We have been conditioned to think of the Divine as an all-powerful being who has established unchanging standards of truth and righteousness in the world. Peters, on the other hand, identifies “God” as “the creative process working in our midst.”

Biological evolution happens by mistake. Mutations are copy errors in an organism’s genetic code. Most genetic mutations have a neutral or adverse effect on an organism’s chances for survival, but some of them turn out to be beneficial. When a mutation gives an organism a survival advantage, that error gets incorporated into the genetic code and is more likely to shape future generations.

Cultural evolution happens in much the same way. When Jesus invited outcasts into his grassroots movement and challenged established moral and theological standards of his culture, the leaders of his culture regarded his actions as mistakes. The appointed guardians of tradition branded Jesus as a dangerous heretic because he did not practice his spirituality in the “right” way or with the “right” people.

The early followers of Jesus incorporated his tendencies toward inclusion and innovation into the cultural DNA of their movement. These cultural mutations gave that community the independence it needed to survive and thrive after the Roman Empire razed the second Jewish temple in 70CE. Other religious movements survived because they centered their faith and practice in the study of the Torah, rather than the rituals of the temple. These two movements evolved into the religious traditions we now recognize as Judaism and Christianity.

The following questions arise: What creative mistakes are we making in our lives today? How might today’s heretics become tomorrow’s leaders? How might “the creative process working in our midst” be adapting our communities to include new voices and invent new ways of doing things?

Peters asks:

“Are these mistakes mutations in religious thought that ought to be destroyed or might they be something else, a new and helpful way of portraying the sacred? That will be determined not by what I am saying. It will be determined only by how you and others respond, by whether these ideas help you make sense of your own experience in living.”

Karl E. Peters. Dancing with the sacred: evolution, ecology, and God (Trinity Press International: 2002).

Now
is the space between
what is known and
what is new.

It is a constant
coming into existence.

No respecter
of who belongs
or how it’s done.

Some mistakes
turn out to be correct
and vice versa.

Some heretics
turn out to be prophets
and vice versa.

Your Greatest Gift is You

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Preaching on the Feast of the Holy Name of Our Lord at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Kalamazoo, MI.

Click here to read Luke 2:15-21

Your greatest gift to the world is you.

Do you hear me in that?

Your greatest gift to the world, the Church, or your family is you.

This is an important truth that we are in grave danger of losing in the world. We live in a world that measures the “worth” of human beings in terms of the money they earn, the possessions they own, the positions they hold, or the degrees on their wall.

In a negative sense, this world judges people based on categories like race, ethnicity, nationality, gender identity, and sexual orientation. We dismiss the ideas of our fellow human beings because they come from someone of a different political party or religious tradition. We project all our self-hatred and insecurity onto people who live with a disability, mental health diagnosis, or criminal record.

When we meet new people at cocktail parties, our first question is usually something like: “So, what do you do?” I would be far more interested to ask, “So, who are you, really? What makes you tick? What thrills/hurts you? What brings you enough hope to get out of bed in the morning?” (And that’s probably the reason why I don’t get invited to many cocktail parties…)

Truth is always inconvenient. Someone has said, “The truth will make you free, but not before it’s done with you.” As broken people living in a broken world, we are not predisposed to face the honest truth about who we really are. We are afraid that we are nobody, or that we are so ugly, stupid, and boring that no one could possibly love us, if they were to see us as we really are. So, we hide. We try to cover ourselves with the paltry fig leaves of our accomplishments and failures, thinking that we have successfully tricked the world into believing that this nobody is somebody, but secretly fearing that the truth about our inner nothingness might one day be found out.

Brothers and sisters, I come to you this morning with good news that these deep fears of ours are entirely unfounded. Beneath the tattered rags of the false identities we have constructed for ourselves is not an ugly emptiness, but the glory of the Divine Image that has been revealed and redeemed for us by our Lord Jesus Christ.

Today the Church celebrates the Feast of the Holy Name of our Lord. Today’s gospel recalls the eighth day after the Nativity, when the infant Messiah was brought to be initiated into the community of God’s chosen people through the rite of circumcision. Today is the day when the name of Jesus was first spoken out loud to the world.

There is tremendous power in a name. Names tell us something about who we are. Doctors put a lot of energy into diagnosis: accurately naming an illness in order to treat the patient. Parents know that if you raise a child, calling names like “bad, stupid, ugly, and worthless”, that child will grow up believing those things about him/herself and acting accordingly. In the Bible, names are of the utmost importance: the patriarch Jacob is given the new name Yisrael, meaning “he wrestles with God” after struggling all night for a blessing from an angel. Avraham, the exalted ancestor of Jews. Christians, and Muslims, is so-named because he is “the father of many nations.” Jesus names his disciple Petros because he is the “rock” upon which the Church will be built.

In today’s gospel, our Lord is given the name Jesus, Yeshua in Hebrew, which means “salvation, deliverance, or liberation” because he is destined to free God’s people from slavery to sin. The name of Jesus was not an arbitrary label attached to this person after-the-fact, but was first whispered into the Blessed Virgin Mary’s heart at the Annunciation by the angel Gabriel. At that time, the angel said of Jesus:

“He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give to him the throne of his ancestor David. He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.” (Luke 1:32-33 NRSV)

The Holy Name of our Lord is a statement about who Jesus is. Behind and beyond the rough exterior of an uneducated, working-class carpenter, born in the parking lot of a Motel 6, in a backwater town of an occupied country, deeper than all of that: we can see with the eyes of faith the Son of God, the Savior of the world.

As millennia have gone by, the Church has continued to ponder the full meaning of Jesus’ identity. Bishops and theologians have met repeatedly in great Councils, endlessly tossing the question back and forth while the answer eludes them. After two thousand years, all the Church can really say is that the mystery of Jesus’ identity is a question that can never be answered. He is fully human and fully divine in a way that transcends human understanding. Anytime people have stood up and claimed to have the final solution to this problem, the Church has been quick to tell them they are wrong. Christian orthodoxy is not a matter of holding tightly to unquestionable answers; Christian orthodoxy is a matter of standing in reverent awe before unanswerable questions.

Even after all these years, the unanswerable question of Jesus’ identity continues to haunt and bless the Church on earth. We can never claim to fully understand it, but we can give testimony to our experience of it. And we express this experience in poetry, story, ritual, and song: that in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, eternity has become embodied in time, heaven has taken up residence on earth, and divinity and humanity are now one.

Jesus reveals the mystery of his identity to us by entering into full solidarity with the human condition. In today’s gospel, Jesus enters into solidarity with the people of Israel through the rite of circumcision, which Jews today call a bris. The closest equivalent to this rite of initiation in the Christian tradition is the sacrament of baptism, which Jesus would also receive later in life, at the hands of his cousin John.

In baptism, we Christians receive our identity. That is, we learn who we really are in Christ. The water is an outward and visible sign of the washing away of the false identities we construct for ourselves. In the Church, we are no longer presidents or panhandlers, no longer grad students or gangstas, no longer trust-fund babies or crack babies, no longer doctors or drag queens. In baptism, all of these constructed identities are washed away: “We renounce them.”

In baptism, we are stripped of our fig leaves and stand naked before our Creator.

And this, brothers and sisters, is the Good News: that underneath the stained and tattered rags of ego is not the ugly nothingness we feared. In the moment of baptism, we stand beside the font, dripping and shivering like a toddler fresh out of the bathtub, and hear the voice from heaven saying to us what it said to Jesus at his baptism: “You are my Son (Daughter), the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.” (Luke 3:22)

Brothers and sisters, this is the truth about who we really are. This is the truth that God reveals to us by taking on our humanity and dwelling among us in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I dare you today to allow this truth to soak into the marrow of your bones. Allow it to transform you from the inside out. Allow it to turn upside-down the way you look at the world.

In baptism, Jesus liberates us from all our false, constructed identities. If you wash away everything you have, every one of your accomplishments and failures, everything you’ve ever done, everything that’s ever been said about you, what would be left? Only a mysterious voice from heaven saying, “You are my Child, the Beloved.”

The poet Gerard Manley Hopkins once wrote, “The world is charged with the grandeur of God.” Jesus gives us eyes to see it. Jesus gives us the ability to see ourselves and our world through the eyes of God. This is how St. Paul is able to say, in his second letter to the Church in Corinth:

“From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh; even though we once knew Christ according to the flesh, we know him no longer in that way. So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!” (2 Corinthians 5:16-17)

This is why we make the promise, in our Baptismal Covenant, to “seek and serve Christ in all persons” and “respect the dignity of every human being”. We promise this because Christ is in all persons and every human being has an eternal dignity that deserves to be respected. You reflect the image and likeness of God in a way that is utterly unique, that has never been seen before in all of history, and never will be again. Without you, and without each and every person around you today, some small part of God would remain unknown forever.

And that is why I tell you today, brothers and sisters, that your greatest gift to the world is you.

Sharing the Keys

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Uncategorized4 Comments

One of the blessings that Christian faith brings in a person’s life is a sense of purpose. God has created, chosen, and called each and every one of us. Some are called to do this as bishops, priests, and deacons. Some are called to serve ministries within the Church, such as the Vestry, the Choir, or the Sunday School. Some are called to serve the community outside the walls of our parish. All of us are called to be the hands and feet of Christ in the world today.

To fulfill this calling, we need the Church to raise us up “to the full stature of Christ” (Eph. 4:13 NRSV). Through the Church, Christ baptizes and confirms us, reconciles us and heals us, enlightens us with the Word, feeds us in the Eucharist, and empowers us for ministry.

When new people come into the Church, they aren’t interested in simply being consumers of a product, nor are they interested in filling a pre-defined slot on a committee. They want to discover and realize that deep sense of purpose that God has placed in their hearts.

Christ understood this truth and used it to empower his apostles for ministry. He said to St. Peter, “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven” (Mt. 16:19). Do you remember getting the keys to your first car? Your home? Your office? With keys comes power. By giving away the keys of the kingdom of heaven, Christ is willingly stepping aside to make room for others. He shares his divine power so that others can participate in building God’s kingdom “on earth as it is in heaven” (Mt. 5:10). We, as members of Christ’s Body in the world today, must do the same.

This can seem like a scary thing for long-time parishioners. We wonder, “What if the person with whom I share power proves to be inept or irresponsible? What if their vision for the Church’s worship and ministry differs widely from my own? What if my own parish becomes unrecognizable to me?”

These are indeed frightening questions, but the alternative is even more terrifying. We might ask instead, “What if our parish ceases to be a dynamic force for good in our community? What if there are people in my neighborhood who do not yet know the love of Christ, or the deep sense of purpose that life in Christ can bring? What if one such soul were to visit us and find only a stagnant institution that is wedded to its own comfort, rather than invested in the gospel of Jesus Christ?”

Questions like these should chill us to the bone. To be sure, there are many parishes in the world today that fit this sobering description. I remember speaking once with an older parishioner (not at St. Thomas) who had a moment of clarity during a congregational crisis, when no new leaders could be recruited to continue the basic functioning of the parish. She was in her late 70s, speaking to a clergyman in his 30s. She observed, “When I was younger in the Church, I remember the older generation intentionally stepping aside to let us lead the Church in a new direction. It occurs to me now that my generation has not done the same thing for yours.”

To be clear, I don’t think the situation in our parish is nearly that dire. We are already making room for newer and younger people in leadership. The word “Youth” appears prominently on our signage, not because we have a large program for teenagers or young adults, but because we invite younger people to be present in all areas of parish life: Staff, Vestry, Altar Chapter, Choir, Sunday School, and Summer Breakfast Program can all point to persons under the age of 40 in their leadership. This is a great start. The next step is to learn from them, listen to them, and let their ideas and concerns challenge our status quo.

There is no competition here. We need each other. The solution is not for older or longtime members to go away or stop serving, but for those who currently have the power to share it willingly with those who do not. What we need from learned, experienced, and wise elders is mentorship.

Younger and newer members need the wisdom of their elders to guide them along the right path. Longtime parishioners need the dynamic energy of the young to drive them forward. If the Church was a car, the young would be the engine and the elders would be the steering wheel. Lose the steering and you have a dangerous wreck; lose the engine and you have a useless hunk of metal.

Christ taught his apostles saying, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. It will not be so among you; but whoever wishes to be great among you must be your servant” (Mt. 20:25-26).

Let us lead by becoming servants to one another in Christ. Let us make room for one another in the leadership of the Church. Let us share with one another “the keys of the kingdom of heaven,” as Christ did with St. Peter. Let us set aside our power, our privilege, and our preferences and invite one another to fulfill the high calling that God has placed in our hearts.

Telling Stories

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon, Uncategorized1 Comment

This week’s sermon from North Presbyterian, Kalamazoo.

Click here to read the biblical text

Sermon text

One of the funnest (and funniest) parts of Thanksgiving dinner is when family and friends start sharing stories around the table. They often start with something like, “Remember that time Uncle Harvey…”

In our family, my wife and I have one that we never get tired of telling the kids. It’s the classic story of “How I met your mother… twice.”

I first met Sarah at a student conference in western North Carolina in the summer of 1999. We had a nice chat on a group hike, established that we had a mutual friend, shook hands, and parted ways. Four years later, I was getting onto a bus in Vancouver, Canada, having just moved there to begin seminary. The woman across the row from me struck up a conversation. We had a nice chat, established a mutual friend, and… suddenly both of us had a major case of déjà vu.

As it turns out, she was the very same person I had talked to four years prior. When life gives you a second chance like that, you take it. We began dating less than a month later and married before the end of graduate school.

People love to tell family stories like this, especially during the holidays, because they help to give our lives a sense of meaning and purpose. In a world that often seems so random and out-of-control, these stories give us a hunch that there is some other Will working itself out through our existence. They remind us that we are not alone in this universe and that life itself is meaningful and good. We never get tired of telling or hearing them.

Of course, these stories don’t just exist in our families. They are a major reason why we come to church. The Bible itself, even though it is a collection of many different stories, tells one Big Story that continues to shape and change our lives today.

The biblical story is that the infinitely loving God of the universe created the world and called it Good. When we humans, in our selfishness, turned away from God and each other and fell into slavery to sin, God did not abandon us. After centuries of reaching out to us through prophets and sages, God took on flesh and came to dwell among us in the person Jesus Christ. When we refused to listen to Jesus and tried to silence him by the violence of crucifixion and death, God summarily rejected our rejection by raising Jesus from the grave. Now, we who are baptized into Christ share the healing power of his resurrection and function with the world as his Body, his hands and feet, on earth until he comes again in glory. On that day, the dead will rise and the whole creation will be made new, as God originally intended, and governed with divine justice and mercy.

This is the story we Christians tell ourselves each Sunday in church. We hear it in the Scriptures and see it in the Sacraments. We leave the liturgy each week, fed with the Body and Blood of Christ, and are sent out into the world to be the Body of Christ. It cannot be understated just how important that mission is in this world, where life often seems so empty and meaningless.

Jesus talks about this Christian story in today’s gospel reading. Like any good story, this one has a beginning, a middle, and an ending. Today, Jesus is talking to us about the ending.

He starts by undermining two thousand years of Christian speculation about the end of the world. Look in the Religion section of any bookstore, and you will find multiple books claiming to have figured out the scoop on when and how the end times will take place. But Jesus says in this passage, “But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”

St. John Chrysostom, a bishop in the early Church, agrees with Jesus on this. He wrote that human beings “should not seek to learn what angels do not know.” Jesus does not give his followers any “insider information” on the end of the world. What he asks of them is far more difficult.

What Jesus asks of Christians is that we “stay awake” and “be ready” for history to reach its conclusion. This is important. Life on this planet often feels chaotic, empty, and meaningless. To the eyes of a person without faith, it seems like a random series of events that are just happening. Without a sense of purpose in life, we are wont to slip into a mindless pursuit of pleasure and avoidance of fear.

In Jesus’ mind, this state of existence is not unlike the condition of the world immediately before the great flood of Noah. He says, “For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man.”

Another way of saying this is that it was “business as usual” for everyone until the moment when the rain began to fall. They were so caught up in their little plans and schemes, they didn’t realize that God’s great story was in the process of unfolding all around them. When the moment of truth came, they were not ready.

Jesus reminds us that the world does not revolve around us. The universe will not stop its ordinary operation to accommodate our plans, however great we think they may be.

The good news is that God has an even greater plan, and we are invited to play a part in it. Jesus invites us today to reorient our lives around God’s vision for the world. God’s dream is to renew the face of the earth so that it reflects the harmonious beauty that God intended for it to have at the beginning. God dreams of a world where the hungry are fed, the sick are healed, strangers are welcome, and sinners are forgiven. Jesus often referred to God’s dream as “the kingdom of heaven”. It is the one thing around which he oriented his entire life and ministry.

The work of the kingdom of heaven has been going on since the dawn of time. It began in earnest with the incarnation, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It continues today through Christ’s Body on earth, the Church, and will draw to a conclusion at some unknown point in the future. It is God’s dream and Jesus is inviting us to be a part of it. We come to church each week and tell each other these stories in order to be reminded that this universe is no accident, and our lives are no random series of events.

This week, we begin the liturgical season of Advent, as we prepare to celebrate that beloved moment in God’s story when Jesus Christ, the Word of God, “took on flesh and dwelled among us.” But it is also a time when we look forward to Christ’s second coming at the conclusion of history. It is a time when we are invited to reorient our lives around the divine vision of a renewed creation, the vision for which Jesus lived, died, and lives again in us.

In this coming holiday season, let us not get caught up in our cultural patterns of materialism and greed. Let us also avoid the backward-looking nostalgia for the “good old days” of Christmases past. Let us instead look within and around us for the work that Christ is giving us to do in this world today. Finally, let us look forward to the day when God’s story finishes with a happy ending and all of creation joins in the song of unending praise to its Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier.

Let us pray.

“O Come, Desire of Nations, bind all peoples in one heart and mind; bid envy, strife, and discord cease; fill the whole world with heaven’s peace.” Amen.

Peace! Be Still!

On By J. Barrett LeeIn UncategorizedLeave a comment

Mark 4:35-41
Lectio Divina

35On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.”

Jesus, help us to hear and heed your call to do great things: Help us to leave familiar shores behind and cross into the unknown territories with you.

36And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was.

Jesus, help us to take you as you are and accept life on life’s terms. Save us from our own delusions and dreams.

Other boats were with him.

Jesus, everyone we meet is fighting a secret battle. Though we may often feel alone, we are never alone. You are with us always, and you also give us the gift of each other. Help us to reach out and ask for help when we need it.

37A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped.

Jesus, blowing wind and living water are common symbols for your Holy Spirit. Sometimes, you do things that are inconvenient for us and lead us into situations where we would rather not go. Help us to trust you, even when the wind and the waves threaten to break our little boats. And when these boats finally sink, show us how to walk on water.

38But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion;

Jesus, you show us that faith sometimes looks like sleep, that the most convincing speech is silence, and that stillness is the most effective course of action. Help us to rest in you, as in the eye of the storm.

and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?”

Jesus, we are so prone to panic that we forget who we are and who you are. Forgive us when we malign your character and strike the rocks to which we should speak. Help us to see that you do not actually care about the fate of our little, inconsequential boats, our false selves, our ego-attachments. SOS, Jesus: Save our souls, our true selves, and bring us safe and sound to the place you have prepared for us, where you are working in us greater things than we can ask or imagine.

39He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!”

Jesus, I wonder whether you are speaking to my circumstances or to me? Sometimes you calm the storm and sometimes you calm your child.

Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm.

Jesus, you speak your Word into the substance of the universe and creation takes on the qualities you carry within yourself: Shalom, Stillness. Speak, not only to the winds and waves of my life, but to me also. Make me more like you. Let me be the change I wish to see in the world.

40He said to them, “Why are you afraid?

Jesus, you are the great diagnostician. Your incisive questions cut to the heart of the matter and expose the sicknesses within us. Faithful are the wounds of a friend. You ask us these questions, not because you require information, but so that we might see ourselves more clearly. Help us to explore these difficult questions with you, that we might gain wisdom and insight. May your questions show us how our attachment to (and identification with) these little boats is keeping us from the peace we so desperately cry for.

Have you still no faith?”

Jesus, your questions are the surgeon’s scalpel. You cut straight to the heart of the matter. We are too caught up and identified with things that are not us. In spite of all the time we have spent sitting at your feet, we still have no faith. We still have no clue who you are, and therefore, we haven’t the faintest idea who we are.

41And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

Jesus, sometimes the beginning of faith looks like a really good question. Lead us, by the power of your infuriating sleepiness and the cutting of your questions, to ask better questions. Instead of “Do you not care?” let us ask, “Who then is this?” And may your silent response be all the answer we need.

Not Even One Stone

On By J. Barrett LeeIn Sermon2 Comments

I delivered this sermon this morning just after announcing to the congregation our session’s decision to leave our building and move our church’s ministry to a new physical location after almost a century at the corner of Burdick & Ransom. I don’t think it was a coincidence that today’s gospel reading in the lectionary is the story of Jesus predicting the destruction of the Jerusalem temple. Some weeks, the Holy Spirit makes more work for me…

The text is Mark 13:1-8.

If you knew that you only had a week, month, or year to live, how would you choose to spend that time? What do you want your life to stand for? When other people look back at your life, what would you want them to remember about you? These are the questions that a wise person asks in the face of mortality.

The truly wise among us realize that life cannot last forever, therefore the truly wise among us also realize that each life must be lived for something larger than itself. Every mortal life, it seems, is a means to an end.

Each of us has probably known, met, or heard about at least one person who made his or her mortal life meaningful by dedicating it to something larger than himself or herself. We tend to respect or admire such people when we meet them. Their examples might even inspire us to look more deeply at our own lives, face our mortality in new ways, and discover meaningful possibilities within us that we hadn’t noticed before. It’s a beautiful thing when that happens.

As it is with individuals, so it is with groups of people. These groups might last much longer than we do, but they too will one day fade from existence. Families are mortal. Surnames and lineages come to an end through a lack of offspring. Churches and other faith communities are mortal. There comes a point when dwindling membership and a lack of funds causes an institution to close its doors. Nations are mortal. The Roman Empire was once the dominant superpower in the world, unlike anything else that had come before it. Where is the great Roman Empire today? Buried under the rubble of history and preserved in ruins frequented by tourists in Bermuda shorts. Finally, even the planets and stars are mortal. One day, our very own sun will burn up all of its hydrogen fuel and explode into a violent supernova, momentarily becoming the brightest star in some distant sky.

If coming to grips with our own individual mortality is difficult, accepting the mortality of families, churches, species, and stars feels almost impossible. Yet, the same truth applies to these larger mortal beings that first applied to mortal human beings: it is in facing mortality that we find meaning.

Let’s look at this idea in relation to this morning’s reading from Mark’s gospel. The story opens as Jesus and his disciples are leaving the great Jerusalem temple, the epicenter of Jewish worship in the first century CE. Jesus, as usual, is storming out in a huff after yet another fight with the established religious authorities.

It’s at this point that Jesus’ disciples, in their usual tactless and somewhat dimwitted manner, decide to stop and admire the lovely architecture of this religious icon and national monument of Judaism. They say of the temple, “Teacher, look! What awesome stones and buildings!”

Jesus is unimpressed. He says, “Do you see these enormous buildings? Not even one stone will be left upon another. All will be demolished.”

He’s talking about mortality of the temple: this central symbol of religious and national identity for the Jewish people. They were under the impression that this sacred building would stand forever under divine protection. For them, the temple was immortal. It was an end in itself as a center of worship. The idea had never occurred to them that it might not be there one day.

As it turns out, Jesus’ prediction was spot-on. The Jerusalem temple, like any human being, was mortal. It was eventually burned to the ground by the Romans during an uprising in the year 70 CE. It was never rebuilt. The site where it once stood is now occupied by the Dome of the Rock, one of the most sacred places in Islamic religion.

The destruction of the temple was unthinkable to the average Jew, but to Jesus it was inevitable. The wisdom of Jesus did not stop with an awareness of his own individual mortality, but extended to embrace the mortal and finite nature of all things. Just as it was for individuals, so it is for temples, religions, countries, species, planets, and stars: to face mortality is to find meaning.

If our great struggle in life is limited to ensuring the continued existence of particular people, places, institutions, or things, then we have already doomed ourselves to failure. Nothing lasts forever. We need to accept that. What Jesus said about the Jerusalem temple, we could say about anything: “Do you see these enormous buildings? Not even one stone will be left upon another. All will be demolished.” All things are mortal.

The sooner we realize this truth, the sooner we can get on with the business of asking the really important questions about existence in reality. Concerning our individual selves, we can ask: “What am I living for? What will people remember about me when I’m gone? What will be my lasting contribution to the world around me or the universe as a whole? What is the meaning of my life?”

The day will come when we, along with our families, our church, and our country, will only exist as a chapter in a history book. Accepting the inevitability of this fact, we need to ask ourselves: “When that day comes, what will we want that chapter say?”

As a congregation, we’ve been asking ourselves some very hard questions this year. We’ve been participating together in the New Beginnings assessment and discernment process. Throughout this process, the biggest and most pressing question we’ve had to ask ourselves is: “What is the church?”

Is the church a building? Is it an institution?

Or is it a community of people on a mission? A community of people, called together by Jesus Christ, living together in Christ, and following Christ into the world to live that mission?

Our final answer has been that third option: the church is a community of people on a mission.

Because we believe this, we have been able to make a bold new decision this week. We have decided to leave the building where we have worshiped for almost a century in order to continue the ministry of our church in a new location. The session, the presbytery, and I are currently working together on the details, and we will call a congregational meeting in a few weeks to let you know what the plan is.

This new move is not a death, but a resurrection.

We are not doing this because the church is dying; we are doing this because Jesus is alive.

We are honoring the heritage of the ministry that has been passed down to us, not by preserving it, but by continuing it.

We are doing this because:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon [us],
because the Lord has anointed [us].
He has sent [us] to preach good news to the poor,
to proclaim release to the prisoners
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to liberate the oppressed,
and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

We are doing this because Jesus said:

“I’ve received all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that I’ve commanded you. Look, I myself will be with you every day until the end of this present age.”

Our ancestors in the faith (and in this church) believed this, I believe it, and the session believes it. Brothers and sisters, do you believe it?

Let’s go follow Jesus.