08 December 13 “Repent” Matthew 3:1-12

08 December 13 “Repent” Matthew 3:1-12 Last Sunday we were admonished to “Stay Awake.” This morning we are to “Repent,” and “Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.” Someone is trying really hard to help us this Advent season. I realized the other day the change coming about at our house as we sat to plan for the holidays. With family coming, cleaning came up. We could not seem to get beyond the need to make sure the house was clean. Then I thought, what an appropriate way to jump-start our Advent preparation. What if Jesus were to be a guest in our homes? What would we need to clean before he came? Then things sort-of spiraled out of control. If Jesus were to be a visitor where we work, what would we want to be sure we fix up before the visit? If Jesus were to come to a special called family gathering, who would we invite and what sort of celebration would we prepare? If Jesus called and asked if he could come by and sit on the porch with just you, what would your talk about? We are not always the easiest folk to be around. And Jesus, well, Jesus knows us all to well. Jesus’ coming may create so much anxiety we RSVP and decline the invitation. I suppose we can try to decline the invitation. But Jesus is persistent. Here he is extending another invitation this morning. Now, before we begin to suspect these are last minute unexpected invitations we must not forget, this is an invitation from God. There is nothing last minute about God and regardless of the timing, these invitations should excite us. And perhaps we are. Especially when we remember this invite is not for us to come to a place for an event or even to have someone come to our house. This is an invitation to come to a person, to a baby, the baby Jesus. He is the only one who will be our salvation, our Christ, our Messiah. This reason for the season does not surprise us. The fact that the Holy Spirit has worked up an invitation for you and me, well, that surprises us. But, do we really expect anything less from God? God often surprises us with Gods radically different way to see life. This case is no different. The Holy Spirit has promised to arrive into our lives bearing the Christ Child. Surprise! So let’s not be distracted by the world’s booming noise this time of the year. The one saying buy me, you deserve it, go ahead, it is a small price to pay for such deep and abiding pleasure. Let’s not be distracted and miss the critical call from the word in our heart, with scripture and the Holy Spirit saying, come to Jesus, get ready, be prepared, the day is nearing, stay awake, make straight the path. Vast differences are evident in how we respond to our distractions. The ones out there may draw us in to consumer consumption hell. The sort with dire consequences. For we may run out of money and have more presents to buy. To debt we will go. Unless we make Black Friday or Cyber Monday our particular savior that is. The others, in here, may draw us also into hell. Hell of another sort. The sort with equally dire consequences. For we might not pay attention to Advent and miss our savior, lose our soul, and be perpetually lost. Unless, that is, we consider a radically different way to make it through this Advent time to move our body, mind, and soul closer to God. Consider again that invitation I mentioned earlier. One of our own making. A different approach to our usual Christmas preparation, for sure. Consider we seriously were to invite Jesus to our home to share a meal, and visit, and exchange gifts. Consider you were bold enough to invite Jesus to bring you to a time freed from each day’s urgency. Or, can we not let go of our need to clean, and fix, and prepare our external world at the expense of our internal spiritual world? If Jesus were to be a guest in our lives what would it take to not run screaming into the night and instead be comfortably sitting on the couch ready, eyeing the front walk, so we can be there at the door when he knocks? If Jesus were to be a visitor where we work could we be calm, letting our past work speak for itself. If Jesus were to come to a special called family meeting, would we be at peace and celebrate our deep sense of love for one another. If Jesus called and asked if he could come by and sit with us on the porch, would we anticipate his great gift of grace in humble thankfulness and let the gentle porch swing direct the conversation. Or will we sit in our new gentleness and all of a sudden be so distracted the old panic returns and we start thinking, in the presence of God, have I been naughty or nice. It is true! We cannot help ourselves. So we look for ways out. Ways to decline the invitation to move closer to God. But wait. Advent leads to Christmas and it is the baby Jesus who is coming. Oh, thank goodness, the adult Jesus, the one who teaches the right way to live and then judges how we do on the exam is not coming to our house yet. It is the baby Jesus. Why he is still in diapers. What could he ask? “In those days, John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea proclaiming, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.’” There is a crowd of folk who come to see John. Some are there to see him because of his severe reputation. He dresses odd, eats strange things, and does the most curious ritual he calls baptism. Others have come for serious reasons. They struggle with their life. They are not happy the way the world has treated them. They are looking for change, for the hope for a better life. John’s message does not disappoint either group. It is a message for everyone, “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven has come near.” Part of his truth telling is that God is coming to lead the Jews safely home from their captivity. For that journey, they must prepare themselves. They must prepare also the way of the Lord. By God’s grace, and God’s power they were to change their minds and hearts. They were to make an easy path, not for themselves, but for God. They were to make the way easy for God to enter their lives. They were to make life straight where their living had become crooked. This is the small print on the bottom of our invitation. We begin to make a way possible for right living by first confessing our sins. Then we join John at the River. Without confession there can be no baptism. Romans teaches baptism is a visible sign and seal of God’s invisible grace. Baptism is the beginning point for a true conversion of an inward change outwardly expressed in our way of living that glorifies God and moves us closer to God. The people who came to John, there in the wilderness of their lives, were not the kind of folk who gave up on God. Why should folks with no hope of knowing God come to John? If life has no chance for such hope there really is nothing to look forward to, no reason to get close to the River Jordan. What happens there makes no difference. The people who came to John were not folk who see their life as being perfect. Folk who see their life as being perfect do not come to John for baptism either. Why should they? Life has been perfect. Why mess things up being dunked in a river. What for? John warns these brood of vipers that their comfortable little life is on the way out. A new world, a very different world, the Kingdom of God, is going to come! He is placing a critical choice before them and before us. Have we given up on hope for anything in our lives that would be good? Have we become senile and hardened our hearts and refuse to change one thing in our lives? Are we afraid to invite Jesus into our lives? Or, are we longing to make the pilgrimage to the Jordan. Are we expecting and hopeful that hearing God’s voice through John, or perhaps our favorite scripture, or perhaps our own lives, we are hearing a call for a new life, a fresh start. Be alert then this Advent time as we prepare to accept this life changing invitation to the birth of this baby, Jesus. Be alert to the hope he brings that can be seen all around us. Be alert to where you might see proof of a visible sign and seal of God’s invisible grace in yourself, your loved ones, even strangers. Be alert to see the presence of the holy in the wilderness of the neighborhood park, seeing the diversity there as part of one glorious thread of God’s good creation. Be alert to see the presence of the holy in the wilderness of a shopping trip. I cannot believe I just said that. Jesus, what have I done. Or more appropriately, what have you done. When we dare see the mass of shoppers as one continuous life force of preparation for invisible grace we may have a glimpse of baptism’s sacrament. If our hope is to prepare the way for God’s coming consider living differently in the presence of the holy at work, in school, or at home. See there not right or wrong, good or bad, joy or disappointment, fair or unfair, but a common spirit that moves in the ordinary fabric of our everyday lives. See a spirit that works at sorting out, even in the sometimes murky interior of the human heart, where and how God invites us into the fullness of our being as a Christian. Be alert, dear ones, to these movements in life as part of the way we prepare for the coming of the Christ child and our life of faithful discipleship. God is so very proud of us. God’s love for us is never tarnished. With our eyes now open to the presence of the holy and our most cherished invitation of the year, we see God’s love a little more clearly and we take up our burden and prepare the way and it does not matter much if the house looks clean or not. What matters is the impact on the lives of those around us. For there is life giving hope just a few days away, and his name is Jesus. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen 120813.gpc

01 December 07 “The Nearness of Now” Matthew 24:36-44

It is usually the title that catches my eye. This week it was, “12 Ways to Take Back Christmas, Save Money, & Stay Sane” by Roger Wolsey. This is a piece to take seriously, I thought. Taking back Christmas, saving money and staying sane. What could I lose, except possibly a little time. So, I clicked in. Wolsey began, “I’ve made my peace with seeing Christmas decorations in stores well before Thanksgiving. I’m down with the pagan influences on the holiday. I’m cool with hanging greens, decorating with holly and ivy, lighting yule logs, and setting up Christmas trees. I’m hip to honoring the winter solstice.” He pretty much covered it all and seemed sensible and pragmatic. We just as well be at peace, down with, cool with, and hip to what surrounds our sensibility and is unlikely to go away anyway. This time of the year helps. We get a little rain, it gets a bit cooler. So we are easily drawn to holidays remembered, times when tradition carried over from generation to generation. These days we do things differently, but we still have our nostalgic moments. What Wolsey does not accept or accommodate is the “stressful madness and rush to “be ready for Christmas.” It is particularly irksome to him that some insist on making it all a contest. This is not the season to brag about all the gifts being bought, wrapped, and delivered by December 25th – as if that is the reason for the season. As if that is what this Advent time of preparation is for. One of his Facebook friends posted a status update that proudly reported, “Happy to have all of my Christmas shopping completed.” The posting was on November 22. Then came a flood of comments. Folk were either in competition – noting they too have most or all of their shopping done, or they were shamed by those braggarts with their own over-reactive confession they are “nowhere near ready and need to get busy shopping to be ‘ready’ for the big day.” Anxiety and frenzy and competitive shopping. Oh, what a delight we have become. Into this torrent these strange scriptures of Advent come. They are strange because of what is happening in the incarnation. God becoming human in Jesus, is strange and new. “Salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers,” says Paul to the church at Rome. God is coming near to us, this strange “Son of Man’ who comes life a thief in the night, according to Matthew. How are we to think and react to such strange newness? Wolsey points out, it was not until several centuries into Christian history that the birth of Jesus became something for Christians to celebrate. Starting in 336 A.D. celebrating the great joy of Jesus’ resurrection at Easter had always been the big event. For the longest Christmas was a rather low-key time without much hoopla, let alone anxiety. When a holiday marking Jesus’ birth was created the focus was on Advent – the five weeks leading up to Christmas. Advent is a time of “waiting” and is sort of a “winter Lent.” Christmas was originally a time of fasting and prayer reaching its triumphant birthing in a twelve day holiday of breaking the fast and feasting that ends the day before Epiphany. In 1823 when Clement C. Moore wrote his famous poem for children, “A visit from St. Nicholas” things began to shift. You may remember the poem. “Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse . . . ” But, we should not fixate on the night before or the day of Christmas. Christmas is not a one day holiday. There are twelve days of Christmas and there is no Godly reason for any of us to have our shopping done before those twelve days have come and gone! Jesus, it seems, was probably born in the spring anyway. The coming of the Son of Man, according to Matthew, will be like the story of Noah and the flood. Those who are not awake, those who are unprepared, they will not hear the good news; they will not know Jesus is coming. We, however, are aware. We have heard the good news, we know Jesus is coming. Yet, each year, we allow ourselves to be distracted. Before all hope is lost, Jesus redirects us, again, to “keep awake.” This is critical; we are to keep awake for we do not know on what day our Lord is coming. Always be ready, Jesus says, the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour. As we are sucked in to the holiday craziness and join the chorus saying how we are nowhere near ready for Christmas we come to church and find yet another thing we have forgotten to do. How do we ever add “keep awake” to an already impossible “to do” list? How do you ever check something like that off? Once checked off, our task is usually forgotten. Keeping awake for Jesus, watching for God’s presence, is not something we should forget. It is like remembering to take a breath every moment of the day and night. We might check it off, but we do not want it to go away. What then are we to do? This is Advent and the calendar says Jesus’ birth is in 25 days. I know, we can move “keep awake” to our worry list. There is always something on that list. Some things have been there for decades. Setting “keep awake” aside from our to-do list will free us to rejoin the rush to finish whatever we must finish before Christmas. I wonder though, are our mania and our worry in any way coming from a place of faith? I think not. Perhaps a better approach to “keeping awake” is to be hard-wired for Jesus. To be hard-wired for Jesus would be strange and new and have him be as automatic in our lives as our breathing, or our need to eat and sleep. If we truly immerse ourselves in and savor Advent in this new way we would always be prepared, so when Jesus comes we will not only be awake, we will be ready. What if we top our list with an Advent reminder to take some time to go inward and think about our life and our God. Just to think about God glorifies God. This Advent time is our time to slow down, to not allow our getting ready for Christmas to replace giving life to Christ. The coming of our Messiah and the intentional celebration of the amazing gift of Jesus’ life in ours requires our participation. Jesus will not be here without us. We are necessary for God’s participation in our world. God cannot be God without us. Brother Lawrence knows of this strange and new way to be Advent ready. He suggests, “God does not lay a great burden on us, (God only asks for) a little thinking of God, a little adoration, sometimes to pray for grace, sometimes to offer God your sorrows, sometimes to thank God for the good things God does. Lift up your heart to God even at meals and when you are in company. The least little remembrance will always be acceptable to God. You do not have to be loud. God is nearer to us than we think. You do not have to be in church all the time in order to be with God. We can make a chapel in our heart, where we can withdraw from time to time and converse with God in meekness, humility, and love. Everyone has the capacity for such intimate conversation with God, some more, some less. God knows what we can do. Get started. Maybe God is just waiting for one strong resolution on your part. Have courage.” We do not stop living when we make a chapel in our heart. Remember, in Matthew’s gospel, two were in the field, working. Two were grinding meal together. Life and work did not stop for contemplation and wandering in the wilderness. We go on living, knowing God’s desire is for us to know Jesus and to love him and celebrate him as the very fabric of life. God desires we recognize his thread, Jesus, as being God’s grace and be ready with hope when God’s Kingdom comes. In the 1980’s, before Vaclav Havel became president of Czechoslovakia, when his country was ruled by the communists, he wrote: “Either we have hope within us or we don’t; it’s a dimension of the soul . . . Hope in this deep and powerful sense is . . . an ability to work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed . . . It is also this hope, above all, which gives us the strength to live and continually to try new things, even in conditions that seem as hopeless as ours do here and now.” It may be we feel our conditions are hopeless. But Havel says we are to hope for something simply because it is good. Not because it stands a chance to succeed. This is the sort of hope which gives us the strength to live and keep going and see God’s coming as an enabling of that hope. The hope from God is a hope that realizes even though time is short and times are tough, Jesus is coming. Jesus is coming into our lives to be our savior, to be our savior from the darkest of nights. That is a very good hope. It is a lifesaving hope. It is salvation nearer to us now than ever before. It is God coming near to us because God has great plans for our lives. Our duty is to be ready by realizing God is with us in the simplest of our day- to-day. To be awake is to see and feel and engage with God in those moments and receive God’s grace and peace. That, dear ones, is our Advent hope. It is not a great burden, it begins with a little prayer, a little pause for thanksgiving, a little courage, and fills us with such a profound calm we fear nothing. For what can frighten us when we are with God? Not a bad way to take back Christmas, save money, and stay sane. A twelve day party isn’t so bad either. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen 120113.gpc

25 November 07 “A Newfound Friend” Luke 23:33-43

First, let’s find our bearings this cold, wet, and dreary morning. Today is Christ the King Sunday and I wear white, representing holiness and celebration. Appropriate as we dedicate our pledge cards for the 2014 budget. Oh yes, 2014 is just around the corner. Thursday is Thanksgiving, of course, and then Black Friday. Advent begins next Sunday and we are four and one half weeks away from Christmas.

I know, I know. In finding these bearings there may be a touch of apprehension, a nudge of anxiety, a morsel leading to full on pre-holiday panic. So, we come to church for a moment’s peace, a bit of good news to stem the tide as our lists of things to do creeps, or leaps, to page two. As getting ready smothers us with more than we can possibly do.

Then the gospel is read and our shoulders droop, our countenance slumps, our peace becomes panic. Jesus is crucified. This isn’t passion week! Jesus is crucified and we are consumed with getting ready for the holidays. Our getting ready has now taken on a hopelessness we had not expected. Perhaps we should set the white stole aside.

Or, could it be that is exactly the point? Could it be there is something more important than the holidays, something more important that we need to get ready for? Should we set the list of today’s priorities aside, just set it aside for a bit, and listen again to Luke? Because this just may be the most important time of the year for us.

Might this time be the threshold to preparing ourselves for both the obvious and the not so obvious, where we might grow, strengthen and explore the boundaries of the soul.

For the obvious, it is too late if we are not in a “get ready” mode. Do you know someone who is a seasoned midnight madness shopper? Jumped through Advent to Christmas and the tree is up, perhaps more than one. The stores still have turkeys for Thursday you know. Macy’s in New York has dusted the floats for their parade, and, yes, Santa will be there. The movie, “Miracle on 34th Street” proves that!

The painfulness of the obvious is, it is too late to turn back now and hope we catch up later. The costs are adding up. Not just financially, in other ways as well.

We obviously have much to lose if, as Suzanne Guthrie has written, we skip over our “season of longing, deep chance, and dark anticipation. Without Advent, without the soul’s journey in tandem with Mary and Joseph, will we even notice the Divine interrupting our ordinary life? How will we discern that gentle star rising upon the horizon obscured by premature holiday glitter? If we do not enter deeply into Advent, how shallow will our transformation journey be toward Galilee, Jerusalem, the cross, the empty tomb, Emmaus and “the ends of the earth”?

We either prepare for God’s grace, or, like the unprepared bridesmaids, we will have lamps, lives, empty of the essential fuel needed for our eternal truth, Jesus Christ.

Could this be our calm before the storm to take that hard necessary look and do an about face, preparing ourselves for life with Jesus in ways not so obvious. Could it be something is hidden. Could it be that woven into the fabric of the costs this time of the year generates with our efforts, physical and emotional, to please the world, God has provided a balance we have missed?

We worry about getting together, but we feel God’s grace when we do. We worry about old wounds being reopened, then we find again the love that has been lost by our separation. We worry about the house being clean, the food coming out right with enough for everyone, then we find our bodies full and our souls enriched.

Then, perhaps more importantly, and this creeps in at a deeper level each year, there is the cost to our hearts. We miss more folks who are not going to be here with us. We will never be ready or prepared for that truth. How can we?

Jesus is as prepared as any human can be for this time in his life, for the place and the gathering of people where he was crucified. But he too struggled with the possibilities of separation from loved ones, even crying out that God might spare him from this time. Yet, Jesus is obedient. He is forever praising God and praying God’s will be done. Hidden there in the presences of the cross is his faithfulness balanced with love.

In our story, it was a crowd of people who crucified Jesus. His crucifixion was not the act of any one person. There were many that day. They cast lots to divide his clothing, they stood by watching, doing nothing to prevent his suffering. They scoffed at him and mocked him.

Though loved by many, Jesus was about to die. He was about to be taken forever from them. We are never ready for the raw pain of that truth. How could we ever be?

But Jesus knew the way. He knew the way to prepare for ultimate and utter despair. It is a way that may not be so obvious. By first being faithful, then living every day with love in our actions, not for ourselves, but for others, we ground ourselves in the only way possible. For Jesus is that way, that truth, that life.

But the hardness cannot be avoided. In his final human act, his death, Jesus paid a great cost. He lost everything. His life, his family, his friends, his life’s calling. Lost, gone forever. His lesson is our lesson. We will lose it all too. We will lose the “I” that is “me.” And we are weak and afraid.

“One of the criminals who hung there kept deriding Jesus and saying, “Are you not the Messiah? Save yourself and us!” But the other rebuked him, saying, “do you not fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation? And we have indeed been condemned justly, for we are getting what we deserve for our deeds, but this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

The other prayed, “Jesus, remember me.”

Holidays are filled with memories. Good and bad, joyous and sad, we remember them all. This time of the year draws those memories back from their slumber to rekindle and re-flame and stir us again. Jesus remembers them too.

He remembers the group of people, the “they” who persecuted him. He remembers his family and friends who were there that day. He even remembers the two criminals, one on his right and one on his left. Jesus remembers them all.

He remembers them all and he died for them all. And he prayed, “Father, forgive them, for they do now know what they are doing.” And miracle of all miracles, they were all forgiven. Every one of them, forgiven. How do we get ready for these amazing truths? How do we get ready for “Advent’s call to simplicity, poverty of spirit, and conversion”? We get ready by doing the one thing that will always save us from ourselves and our anxiety.

In humility and with honesty, we ask Jesus to remember us. We fall on our knees, we bare our soul and we pray, “Jesus, remember me. Though I am not worthy, remember me, and help me. Help me pledge my life to you and help me prepare my soul for your coming again into my life.”
When we ask Jesus to remember us we are assured time and time again, Jesus does remember us. And even more amazing, time and time again, Jesus loves us to forgiveness, each and every one of us, even when we do not know what we have done.
Isn’t it the truth? We do not have a clue what we are doing trying to live a relatively decent life. Trying to live faithfully what we believe God would have us do. Truly we are like those others Jesus prayed for, we do not know what we have done.
Yet, Jesus knows us, and Jesus forgives us. Again. Because Jesus remembers us. He remembers us from our being prepared in our mother’s womb to our first day on earth and until this very moment. He remembers us and he loves us warts and all.
So we do the best we can. Life will not wait for us. So, we plan for the holidays and for life. We make ready for today and tomorrow and the days to come.
In our faithful desire we carve out a moment to glorify God with what we say and do. We strengthen our soul forgiving those needing forgiveness. We push the boundaries of our soul, and emotion, remembering those needing remembering. We fill our spiritual hunger by loving those needing love.
We do these things in the fog of our existence knowing we are seen and remembered and reside in the arms of the powerful truth of who Jesus Christ is; our God.
“Jesus has no greater friend that the most desperate person who asks to be remembered, to be given one more chance at grace, at forgiveness and salvation. Jesus came into the world to save such a person, a person just like you and me.”
Perhaps Julian of Norwich said it best, God “did not say: You will not be troubled, you will not be belabored, and you will not be disquieted: but (God did say), you will not be overcome. God wants us to pay attention to these words, and always to be strong in faithful trust, in well-being and in woe, for God loves and delights in us, and so God wishes us to love God and delight in God and trust greatly in God, and (then) all will be well.”
He is our Jesus, and all is well. He is the one who replies to our plea for remembrance, “Truly, I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen 112413.gpc

17 November 13 “Newness”

  It is rare to find someone who has lived in the same place their entire life. Sure, there are those who hold on to the old place. We still own the land and small house my grandfather built before my dad was born. But often the best we can do is hold that place in our memories. Memories make it easier to go back, if just for a moment.

  Mostly we ramble and move about settling in wherever we find convenience or circumstance takes us. Even when it is not our “dream” place, we make due. We find comfort in our things, setting up house the way we do, making friends, figuring out the way to the store, and church of course. We settle in and make home, home.

 Jesus seems to flip those feelings on their head this morning. Forget about settling in; forget about being content with the familiar and comforting. No, Jesus quickly moves us away from feeling grounded in the familiar and comforting. His story creates, quite honestly, a new level of discomfort in our familiar and settled place when we admit to what Jesus is promising. No matter where our life finds us, our familiar comfort has a very short future.

 During Jesus’ time, the center of religious life in Jerusalem was around the temple. It was vast, it was beautiful, and it was a familiar and comforting space for all who came there. Quoting from Isaiah, Jesus reminded everyone the temple is first and foremost to be their house of worship. The temple was to be that bedrock place where his followers should never worry about what it was for and its place in their familiar and comforting life.

 As our reading shows, those with Jesus understood this teaching. Indeed, the Temple was their place to worship. They revered it as they admired its physical nature, its stature. They were impressed by how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God.

  But, Jesus warned them, as he warns us, about being too closely attached to physical space or adornments, be they in temples holy or secular. Jesus’ prophecy is that they will all end. He says, “As for these things that you see, the day will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”

 These first century folk understood about life and death, about how quickly the familiar can be taken away. Life for them was harsh. So, they did not argue with Jesus when he claimed that the world as they knew it would end. They accepted his teaching and asked the obvious question. When will it happen? How much longer do we have?

  Jesus’ answer was not so direct. He knew how vulnerable we can be to earthly influences and end-of-time predictions. Even in our time, we hear the prognosticators say “This is it, this is the end.” Thankfully, I suppose, we have always woken to worry another day. The truth is, the crisis in our lives have created a sense of doom about the future. All too often we have good reason to worry like we do.

  In a way, it may be easier to follow along with the doomsday prophets and their promise of a way out. If we will just listen to them, do what they say, turn our life over to them, and our money, we will be alright. They promise.

 But, Jesus warns us about short cuts. We are to beware, to not be lead astray by those who come into our lives and say, “I am the one.” I am the one with the truth about your life and future. I promise, I am the one, “The time is near.” So, come and follow me, for your time is running out.

 How often have we nodded in agreement when the futurists or political pundits predict a sure fired economic, or political, or personal end to life as we know it? Can we not count on the elections of the future to be like those of the past predicting doom and gloom if we do not vote a certain way?

 To be truthful, we are almost always disappointed with any attempts to correct the present or the future, aren’t we? Whether through our own efforts or those of others, we are left with some things that worked better and some things that were a bust. I suspect it is the unpredictable that catches us unaware. The time is near and our time is running out. We must surely do something or all heck will break loose.

 The theologian John Howard Yoder said the church needs to help people take a “minority perspective” about life. A majority perspective assumes that by power, wealth, organizing, or hard work we can get things to turn out the way we want. A minority perspective, on the other hand, never makes those assumptions.

 A minority perspective church seeks to embody and be witness to the way of Jesus, without embracing worldly powers, or wealth, or influence. A minority perspective church uses imagination and learns to survive over the long haul.

 Yoder says, “In Christendom, both optimism and despair are correlated with the direct reading of how it is going for us in the rising and falling of power structures.” But the minority perspective community learns to hope even when things seem to be going badly – “not only because we have heard promises from beyond the system, but also because we have learned that sometime our pessimistic reading for the present are shadowed too much by taking some setback too seriously.”

  There is a story about a visit a pastor had with a man as they sat on his patio looking out on a small lake surrounded by new and attractive town homes. The pastor commented about the beauty of the setting and asked the man how he had decided to move to this new place.

  He replied, “I didn’t. I was forced to move here. The highway department planned a highway that cut right through our farm, land that I inherited from my parents. Of course, he said, I never farmed the land. But I sure enjoyed living there. When he heard that the state was going to condemn the property, he was sick. He thought it was the end of everything. This land had been the only place he had lived his entire life.

 But then he and his wife moved by the lake. As he thought about it, he said, “Frankly, it was the best thing that ever happened to us. He and his wife loved it there.

 As he though a moment more, he said, “It is kind of sad that you have to be forced by the State Highway Department to do what you did not have the courage to do on your own. I thought they had just killed me. As it turns out, they gave me a whole new life.”

  Within this man’s new understanding we find the meaning of our gospel message from Luke. There is amazing grace and eternal hope for us when we have the courage to live with a new confidence about our endings and beginnings with God. We find the good news of the gospel this morning in the sure message that our God is a God alive in us and our lives. Our God is a God who brings life out of death, who creates new worlds out of old chaos, fear and trembling.

 In Luke’s truth, Jesus comforts us, “Do not be terrified, even though we will be thrust into this world where our worries may overwhelm us.” Not a hair on our head will perish. By our endurance we will gain our souls.

 A few years back I attended a symposium on the German theologian Karl Barth. One of the speakers reminded us that the word of God automatically places us in a state of crisis when we accept it. When we submit to God’s holy command, all heck breaks loose.

 It began when Jesus asked us repeatedly, “Do you love me?” Do you love me? Is it not the case that once we say yes our life is never the same, and there is no turning back. Do we love Jesus and are we prepared for the crisis that will come in our lives when we do?

 Jesus says, “As for these things that you see, the day will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”

  “Do you love me?” Jesus asks. If so, create a crisis in your life and feed my sheep.

 The depth of our experience of God’s grace will mirror the depth of the experience of our sin, our pain, our suffering, even our cries to God for help. God responds to the depth of our despair with the power of God’s grace.

 Do you love me, Jesus asks? If so, create a crisis in your life, come and follow me.

 Jesus tells us, “You will be betrayed even by relatives and friends…you will be hated by all because of my name. But, not a hair on your head will perish.” Our God, as it turns out, will lead us to a new life.

 Do you love me, Jesus asks? With our answer, our halting, and trembling, yes, God calls us to be a servant to his son, Jesus Christ, our Messiah. A full time servant, living the full cost of receiving God’s grace as we join God’s prophetic work in the world. Bringing hope and health and calm in the midst of chaos and crisis. Bringing grace through Christ’s peace and our life as God’s servant. This, dear ones, is a new and frightening life!

 Each of us has been assured, temples will fall; there will be suffering and death. Yet, God will not fall. God will bring new beginnings, a new age to come. So, we let go of our familiar comfort and give a great sigh of relief. The State Highway department does not force the end of anything.

 But, loving Jesus does. Loving Jesus forces the end of everything. Yet, loving Jesus also brings about our final move and our new life. The beginning of everything that really matters to our life and to the world. The beginning of our prophetic hope, hope in our present and eternal life in the Kingdom of God, filled with God’s grace and God’s love.

   Loving Jesus brings us to God’s kingdom, where not a hair of our heads will perish. Where by Gods goodness and our endurance, we will gain our eternal souls, as we live in the power of our living God.

 Do you love him? I don’t know. But I do know he loves you terribly and with everything he has ever lived for, he prays you love him in return.

 

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen

03 November 13 “Jesus Saves” Luke 19:1-10

03 November 13                             “Jesus Saves”      Luke 19:1-10

In Flannery O’ Conner’s first novel, “Wise Blood,” Ms. O’ Conner presents a host of characters seeking salvation. Not once do they realize they have to first let go of themselves. Hazel Motes, a man with a woman’s first name and the hero of the story, is caught up in an unending struggle against his own innate desperate faith. Naming men Hazel is just one of the ways O’Conner insures tragic events in her novels.

 Hazel falls under the spell of a “blind” street preacher names Asa Hawks and his degenerate fifteen-year-old daughter, Lilly Sabbath. In an ironic, malicious gesture of his own non-faith, and to prove himself a greater cynic than Hawks, Hazel founds “The Church of God without Christ.” Even so, he is still side tracked in his efforts to lose God

 He meets Enoch Emery, a young man with “wise blood,” who leads him to a mummified holy child, and whose crazy maneuvers become an inseparable part of Hazel’s delusion filled human struggles.

 O’Conner and her characters portray life as a constant struggle with redemption, retribution, false prophets, blindness, blinding’s, and wisdom longed for and lost. To make her point, she parodies our human obsession with seemingly important things in our desire for redemption. As one example, she pokes fun at us about our obsession with cars. Well, some of us seem obsessed with cars. Early in the book, Hazel assures himself that, “Nobody with a good car needs to be justified.” He proudly proclaims this street truth while using the hood of his car as a pulpit for his “Church Without Christ” ministry. Salvation does not come easily to the street proud.

   O’Conner is dark and her characters are dark. She reveals the rawness of the human character while exploring how precarious our life is. So precarious, we stand on the edge of the abyss of our human conditions and cannot avoid its pull.

 From Luke, Zacchaeus’ story is also about the human pull to the abyss and our desperate attempts for salvation. Unlike O’Conner, he shows us the sure way from that abyss of despair to the firmness of hope and the changed life that avoids the all too common “Church Without Christ.”

 Zacchaeus’ story contains a simple, yet powerful truth. Our salvation comes in the life changing presence of Jesus Christ. Our salvation is not rooted in our life goals, our stuff, our station in life, how we present ourselves to the worldly powers, or our self-redemption efforts. No, our salvation, our justification is not in powers or principalities. It is in a person, Jesus of Nazareth.

 Zacchaeus’ only desire is to try to see who Jesus was.  But, the crowd stands in his way. So he ran ahead, climbed a sycamore tree. He was desperate to see him. But, Jesus sees Zacchaeus first. In that instant, with desire in his heart for Jesus, with Jesus looking his way, during that surprising moment of human connection, Zacchaeus is saved. He is pulled from his dark abyss. Jesus tells him, hurry and come down, for I must stay at your house. I would have tried to rush home to at least tidy up.

 But, Zacchaeus never makes it home to straighten his life. He hurried down from his tree and was happy to just be with Jesus. He did not need to worry about worldly things. He was happy to simply, yet powerfully, welcome Jesus into his life as a friend,  and as a loved one.

 The most amazing news, Zacchaeus’ attempt to improve his human condition did not begin with Zacchaeus. It began with God. We may not realize God has been pursuing us all along. We may think we come to some place in our life and decide to follow Jesus. No, it began with God.

  It is first God’s desire that we be in relationship with God. It is Jesus’ seeking us with his gifts of grace and love that saves us. This is the good news God wants to share. Especially this All Saints morning as we remember loss and sadness.

 Our salvation comes in the loving, life changing presence of Jesus Christ. It is a presence that is with us in Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit in our baptism. It is a presence that comes to us through the nourishing and forgiving bread and cup of this communion table.

 Yet, scripture challenges us with the notion that our salvation is not yet complete. We live in a life filled with the abyss of our human condition, sin and ultimately death. We live in a world where the powers of evil invade our lives without mercy. We realize, like ourselves, Zacchaeus had not been a model citizen. Too often he had yielded to the temptations of his position. All that changes when he realizes Jesus has always been in his heart.

 The truth is, when Jesus fills our hearts with his grace and love we are forever changed.  We become more Christ like, I believe.

 Zacchaeus does more than promise to stop his evil ways. He offers to correct his past wrongs and he offers to live differently in the future. He tells Jesus how he intends to change his life.

 Notice that Zacchaeus initiates this response. He is seen by Jesus, but Jesus does not tell him what to do. Zacchaeus has a free will. But, having a free will does not give us the freedom to do whatever we want to do. No, we have a free will so we will do what is right.

 By searching our hearts, we know what to do with our life. By listening to our inner voice, we correct past wrongs. By following Christ’s voice, we  live our lives peacefully and purposefully in service to God and one another.

     There are many ways we can live this new way. Jesus modeled them for us.  One way is to see our relationship with the poor and outcast in society differently. Searching our hearts, hearts filled with God’s love and grace, it is possible for us to see all people in a new way, in a new relationship as sisters and brothers with Christ.

 Another way is to see our relationship with our family differently. Listening to the inner voice of God we recognize our family and friends as God’s chosen who are just as forgiven, just as loved, and just as needy, and nurtured as we are ourselves.

 Another  way is to see our relationship with the peoples of the world differently. Be they from another country, or culture, or religion, or point of view. Following Christ’s voice, we hear the common voice of humanity. Brothers and sisters of the same loving God, be they Democrat, Republican, Tea Party, Muslim, Jew, Gay, or straight.

 Truthfully, our seeking God may begin with a longing that is like no other. It may begin with an experience that opens our eyes in ways we had never seen before. It may begin with our surprising surrender that creates an even more surprising connection  between ourselves and God.

I recently read of such a connection with a young man named Ben Breedlove.  The article began, “Ben died three times in December 2011. The last time, on Christmas day, he did not wake up.” Ben was an 18 year old senior at Westlake High School  with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. The condition causes the heart muscle to thicken. When Ben was 4 he had a seizure. He had recently asked his mom, “How do we know if we get to go to heaven?” His mother says, “Right there in the car, Ben prayed telling God he wanted to go to heaven one day.” Ben did not die during the seizure, but it was the first time he saw a white light above him that no one else could see. He said he knew it was an angel.

 On December 6, 2011 Ben fainted at school, and his heart stopped. That is when Ben says he went to the waiting room of heaven. He knew he was dying. He later wrote it was the same bright light he had seen when he was 4. “I couldn’t stop smiling,” he said, “I then looked at myself in the mirror. I was proud of myself, of my entire life, everything I had done. It was the best feeling.” He made a video about the experience and said “I wish I never woke up.”

 Ben later talked about his experience with his sister, Ally. He said he wanted to go back to that peaceful place. He told her he thought God let him see the white room so he would not be afraid of dying. “And so I would know that heaven is worth it.”

 Ben died again December 17, but a bystander did CPR and Ben revived.  After this visit to heaven Ben prayed: “God, I pray that my family wouldn’t be sad or scared for me anymore, because I’m not sad or scared. I pray that they would have the same peace I have. And I’m okay with whatever God decides.”

 Christmas day around 4:45 p.m. Ben collapsed for the final time. The dark abyss of his human condition had become his hoped for bright abyss of heaven.

 How often in scripture do we read of Jesus telling us to surrender our lives to him? We surrender it to something, why not to him? How often are we told to leave everything in this life and come and follow Jesus to be his disciple where we will know his grace and his promise of eternal salvation? Often enough to realize his way is the true way to love more deeply, give more freely, and be grace filled with a life of unending joy. Unending joy, even when hearing about Ben and remembering our dear ones this day of remembrance.

 Like Zacchaeus, and Ben, and those faithful servants now gone, we seek a peace that is greater than this world knows. A peace where hating and hurting will no longer be. Zacchaeus sought his peace by climbing a tree, we seek ours with the mind and emotion numbing clutter of our lives. We are all seeking something greater than what the pains justify in our lives.

 Then Jesus shows up. Casually walking in our direction with eyes locked on us. He sees us, the one he has always desired, he reaches out to us, calls our name and brings us out of our tree. He comes up that tree wherever  the height or depth of our lost-ness has taken us, to save us.

  For Jesus climbed onto his own final tree, the cross. He sought us there, to speak our name to God, so we will forever be loved, forgiven and saved.

 We are to no longer be sad or scared for we have been found in a peace, a white light, a brightened abyss, where we will not stop smiling, where we will be proud of our lives.

 That peace is Jesus Christ and with him we move beyond the questions of this world and into a life greater than our own, that of the Kingdom of God. Living always to the will and glory of God.

 The poet and author Christian Wiman explains it this way:

“My God my bright abyss

into which all my longing will not go

once more I come to the edge of all I know

and I believing nothing believe in this.”

My God, my bright abyss.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen

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“Our Merciful God”

27 October 13                     “Our Merciful God”                   Luke 18:9-14

 It may have begun during my time in the Boy Scouts. There was training we were scheduled for that seemed to teach me what I did not want to learn. We were taken out into the deeper woods at Camp Strake near Conroe and left with our compass, a snack, and water and told to find our way back to camp. I am sure it was part of the requirement for a wilderness survival merit badge, or something like that. While I do not remember the details the outcome was apparently a success because here I stand.

 Next was during a weeklong hike in the San Juan Mountains in southern Colorado. Part of the experience was to be left alone away from base camp overnight. We had no compass this time and the usual food and water. We had our sleeping bag and back pack and a clear plastic tarp for rain protection. I do remember that night. It was not that I felt lost, I was just alone and it was dark and eerily quiet.

 We have all had those times of feeling lost. Even in our life in Austin, we can sense loss. Jesus must have had his moments. That end of life time in the garden, on the road to Jerusalem, and his trial, conviction, torture, crucifixion. “My God,” Jesus cried.

 From God’s word in Luke it is evident Jesus has great passion for the lost. Thank goodness, you may be thinking! Thank goodness that Jesus has passion for the lost, for I am certainly one. In the context of our sin, or in the reality of our faith life, we are there. We are lost.

 In the harsh reality of our day to day, well, loss seems to be everywhere. So we do what a good scout would do. We become prepared. We find what life has to offer that will save us from being lost, feeling lost, or losing ourselves and everything. We create securities and build our defenses against the bad times that are sure to come.

  In Jane Austin’s much beloved novel, Pride and Prejudice, the various folks in the story create securities of wealth and status and they surround themselves with an abundance to secure their security. They, of course, live with such an arrogance and sure judgment about their station in life they unknowingly limit their possibilities for really living a blessed life. They limit their possibilities to know deep love without pretense, to know marriage without manipulation, and to know happiness without false pride.

 Luke would offer that living this way as a Christian, with pride and prejudice, would limit our faith. Living without humility as a disciple of the crucified and risen Christ also limits God’ ability to bring real grace into our lives. Our pride, our prejudice limits our ability to become the people God desires us to be; doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with our God.

 We learn from Luke there is no humility in those folk who center themselves and their perceived righteous ways in “this world” sensibilities. There is no humility in their contempt for those deemed less worthy. Their pride of prejudice pretty much condemns them in God’s eyes.

 The Reverend Jay Losher rightly points out how familiar the parable is to us. Two individuals went to pray at the temple, one a Pharisee, the other, a tax collector. The Pharisee prays filled with proud self-assurance. Eyes toward heaven, he says, “God I thank you that I am not like other people; thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even this tax collector.” Knowing how God must agree with his self-assessment he then goes on telling God about how good he is.

 The tax collector is the mirror opposite in action and word. Ever looking downward, beating himself up in real emotional turmoil, he prays simply; “God, be merciful to me, a sinner. For I am lost, lost from you.”

 Jesus makes sure that we learn which of these two men goes home justified, made right with God, and who does not. It is the tax collector Jesus lifts up. It is the Pharisee Jesus ignores.

 The Pharisee looks to the past and all the good deeds he wants God to notice. The tax collector anticipates the future, a different future, where judgment brings the wrath of God for unrepentant sinners. His heart is humbled. 

The Pharisee lives with pride, disobedience, and faces lasting death. The tax collector lives with humility, obedience, and realizes the possibilities for life eternal. The Pharisee’s way to pray is actually quite dangerous. C. S. Lewis notes, “A person is never so proud as when striking an attitude of humility.”

 Martin Luther understood this point in his “Lectures on Romans.” As he explains it, there is a difference between sinners. “There are some sinners who confess that they have sinned but, they give up hope and go on sinning so that when they die they despair, and while they live, they are enslaved to the world.

 There are other sinners who confess that they sin and have sinned but they are sorry for this. They hate themselves for it. They long to be justified, make right with God and groaning, constantly pray to God for righteousness. These are the true people of God.”

 For Martin Luther, the more we think of ourselves as a saint, the more sinful in fact we are. The more we think of ourselves as a sinner, the more saintly in fact we become. There is hope for us lost sinners yet!

 The Pharisee was actually more than proud, he was prejudiced. In his book “The God Coast” Nelson Mille said about one of his characters, she “excludes any realities that upset her prejudice.” Our prejudices do indeed get us in trouble. Though we may be seldom right about our perceptions of others, we are seldom in doubt about them.

 Changing ourselves from ourselves is usually beyond ourselves. That is why we need God and God’s grace in our lives to overcome our resistance to changing ourselves. And change we must.

  As the Reverend William Malambri reminds us, God’s grace can be a tricky thing. Especially for us folks who experienced faith long ago and may have since forgotten what it is.

 Being a Christian is not new to most of us. We certainly have not perfected it, but we have learned some of the steps. We know when to come to church, how to follow along in the bulletin, sing the familiar hymns, say the familiar prayers, and receive the familiar body and blood of Christ.

 We usually do not fret too much when we stumble and sin. We know we will confess them each Sunday and be forgiven. Perhaps we secretly co-authored James Moore’s book, “Forgive me Lord for I have sinned, but I have several really good excuses!”  Or, we reason to the conclusion, I have sinned far worse than this in the past. I know God has plenty of grace to forgive me.

 From this line of thinking our pride has cheapened God’s grace and lead us to our disobedience and ultimately to our eternal death, lost and alone.

 We cheapen God’s grace when we accept it without considering it cost Jesus everything. We undermine grace when we act, in our pride and our prejudices, as if what we have done and who we have been has earned us the grace we have.

 We lose touch with the reality of God’ grace in our pride and prejudices when we are convinced that we are good Christians! Pharisees are what we are! We are not good, we are evil and sinful and for Jesus to remind us of this he has to offer grace to people we probably never would. People we would ignore or worse, hurt with our pride and our judgment and our contempt.

 Jesus shows us the true way to God’s grace by accepting the unacceptable, by showing mercy to the merciless, by welcoming the unwelcome, by loving the unlovable.

 When Jesus does that he startles us. Wait Lord, we cry, what about me? See all the good I have done. See all the good I have been. I have great potential. Saintly perhaps!

 Oh, delusional dear ones. Jesus reaches out and justifies and sanctifies us only when we humble ourselves before him. Jesus forgives us only when we tell the truth about our lives and who we are. Only in our humility and only in our obedience will we have eternal love and life.

 For his part, Jesus loves us despite ourselves and will always forgive us, always. By his surprising grace, if we will let him, he will change us, and save us, and fill us with his faith, and continue to love us for all eternity.

 In the words of the first century Rabbi Hillel, “Keep not aloof from the congregation, and trust not in thyself until the day of thy death, and judge not thy fellow person until thou art come to their place.”

 These are the simple acts of one who is humble and forgiven and not lost. Come and be with us in congregational fellowship. These are the loving acts of one being obedient and filled with God’s grace. Not trusting ourselves alone. These are the faithful acts of one receiving mercy and finding there eternal love and life. Judging no one until we have been in their shoes.

 These are the faithful acts that will bring us to eternal love and life with our savior, Jesus Christ where we are lost and alone and afraid no more.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.  

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DON’T GIVE UP by Jill Boyd

Jill Boyd                                                                               Year C, 29^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Text: Luke: 18:1-8                                                                                                  October 20, 2013

¹ Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. ² He said, "In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. ³ In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, 'Grant me justice against my opponent.' ⁴ For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, 'Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.'" ⁶ And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷ And will not God grant justice to those chosen ones who cry to God day and night? Will God delay long in helping them? ⁸ I tell you, God will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?"

DON’T GIVE UP

It doesn’t take being around me for very long to realize that I have a passion for women who are older!

My childhood was peppered with interactions with great aunts, grandmothers and elderly neighbors who touched my life in meaningful ways.  Some of them were influential in my decision to go into social work, and for more than twenty years, women – most of whom were elderly widows – were the primary population with whom I worked and served.  My husband, David, used to tease me that I was a “magnet” for these women, because for whatever reason, I am drawn to them and they are drawn to me. J

Now don’t get me wrong, I also like interacting with men, and the young as well as the old, and every age in between! – but there is something about wise and older women that speaks to my heart, and I have come to understand it as part of my calling. So when I went to the Lectionary to select a passage for this sermon, I got hooked by the persistent widow and just wanted to spend some time with her!

Unfortunately, Jesus’ parable doesn’t tell us very much about her.

Aside from the fact that she is a widow, she has a grievance, and she wants that grievance rectified, we are told nothing about her or the injustice that’s been done to her.  We don’t even really know her age.  Assuming that she is old is just me projecting my own experiences onto the text, which is something they teach us in seminary not to do, but at least be aware of it when we do!

This widow could actually be a young woman whose beloved has died an untimely death and who is now in the position of having to raise her children by herself.  Perhaps what she seeks from the judge will help her provide them with food, clothing, and a roof over their head.

Or maybe she really is an older woman -- one who has lost not only her husband, but everyone else she loves and cares about in this world.  Her health and physical abilities may be declining as well, and perhaps what she seeks will help her hold on to her independence, which is one of the few things of value she still has left.

We don’t know specifics about this woman because neither Jesus nor Luke spells it out for us and none of the other gospels include this parable. But we do know from other historical sources what life was like for a widow in biblical times, and it was an extremely vulnerable existence.

Widows lacked social status and their material needs were great.  Jewish law held that when a man died, his property and possessions went to his sons or his brothers.  His widow could remain on the land with the new owner’s consent, but she was left destitute if he refused to provide for her. 

The widow in our parable has suffered an injustice, and knowing what we know about Jewish law, it’s safe to assume that it probably relates to property or money from which she is being denied access.  She seeks to have the injustice corrected, but to add to her troubles, she has no one to help her in her quest. That’s one of the things that bothers me about this scenario.  Doesn’t anyone notice her situation? Isn’t there someone who cares about her? It appears that she is on her own and that she has no one to advocate for her.

But that doesn’t stop her from pursuing justice for herself.  Time and time again, she approaches the unjust judge -- a man whose character is revealed to neither fear God nor respect other people. That poor woman!  This is not a man in whose hands I’d want to place my well-being -- he’s a wicked magistrate who abuses his power and position without a second thought about how God wants him to live or what is right for a fellow human being.

The unjust judge initially denies the widow’s request for justice, yet still, she persists.  Her conviction for what she believes she is entitled does not waiver -- she never gives up.  Her courage and persistence are admirable, and I suspect many of us would like to have more of these traits at times. I know I would…

The judge eventually gives in to the woman’s request, not because it is the ethical and just thing to do, but because he is thinking of his own best interests. He agrees to resolve her conflict because he wants her to stop bothering him!  That actually bothers me, but that’s a whole other issue for another sermon on another day!  Our focus today is on what the widow has to teach us, for she demonstrates that even when we are at our most vulnerable, our faith and our faithfulness matters.

It seems to me this is a primary point of the parable. Luke even tells us that in the opening line when he says it’s about the need to pray always and not lose heart. But what is the connection? Why prayer and not losing hope? Why not trust? Or “hang in there?” Why not believe?

I think that it’s because prayer is one thing we can do that directly impacts the endurance of our heart. We can see this in Jesus’ life. It’s one of the things he’s been teaching his disciples throughout their journey from Galilee to Jerusalem.

While healing and eating and socializing with all manner of people, he has been telling and showing them what it takes to live as faithful disciples. While confronting the Pharisees about their interpretations of the law, Jesus has been teaching a new way of understanding and a different way of life.  He has been teaching about the importance of prayer and how to pray -- while at the same time modeling a prayer life that takes place in both solitude and community.

Jesus knows the importance of prayer, especially in difficult times. He knows what he and his disciples will face when they arrive in Jerusalem. He will be arrested and crucified, and they will flee to hide in grief and fear. The disciples will not always act in faithful ways, yet Jesus will remain in prayer with God through it all. He will rise again from the dead, and his disciples will be amazed; and he will ascend to the heavens, leaving them to live faithful lives until he comes again.

Jesus knows their wait for his return will be long. He knows they will have trials and that they will become discouraged.  He prepares them as best he can, and he encourages them not to lose heart.  Jesus knows how devastating that can be…

            This is something that is poignantly illustrated in a movie I watched recently: To Kill a Mockingbird. You know, the 1962 classic starring Gregory Peck?

It’s the story of a southern lawyer named Atticus Finch, who agrees to defend Tom Robinson -- a black man accused of raping a young white woman. The time is the Great Depression, and the place is rural Alabama.

Tom is innocent, but because of racial inequalities and tensions of the time, there is no way his high-profile trial with an all white jury is going to be a fair one.

Atticus nevertheless takes the case, and he provides a compassionate and compelling defense that exposes the truth that the victim and her father are lying about Tom. The jury still finds him guilty. Atticus assures him this was not an unexpected verdict and that he will get to work right away on an appeal, but Tom loses heart. While the marshals are transporting him back to the jail, he attempts to escape and is shot and killed.

When Atticus hears the news, he is devastated.  “The last thing I told him,” he mourns, “was not to lose heart -- I’d ask for an appeal -- we had such a good chance -- we had more than a good chance… the last thing I told Tom was not to lose heart…”

            Tom Robinson had a family who loved him, and the black community supported him in his struggles.  Atticus believed in and cared for him and wanted to pursue justice on his behalf.  Tom wasn’t alone, he had people advocating for his life and for justice; but unlike the widow in our parable, Tom lost heart, and when he did, he lost his life.

There are many tragic aspects of this story, but this is one of the greatest, for when he lost heart, there were consequences, not only for him, but for those who loved him as well.

            Like the Tom and the persistent widow, we live in a world where justice doesn’t always prevail. We hear of incidents of it in the news and we experience it in our daily lives, and it saddens and angers and wears us down at times.

And while there are differences in their stories and outcomes, the widow and Tom both illustrate what Jesus teaches: our faith and our persistence are closely connected -- our faith and our persistence matter. They keep us connected to our source of hope and life, and they affirm our relationship with the one in whom we place our trust.

            Like Tom and the widow, we too live in an unjust world: a world in which our government leaders squabble like children in a sandbox; a world in which a neighboring county boasts the highest percentage of executions in the country – some of whom have been later proven innocent. We drive on highways full of speeding drivers, yet we are the one who gets pulled over. And we worship in a place where locks have been placed on kitchen cupboards….

            The world doesn’t always work the way we feel like it should. There are voices that yearn to be heard and desires that continue to go unmet.  We all know of parents who pray every day for their child – a child who is ill… or who is bullied… or who has chosen the wrong path. We are all faced with situations and relationships throughout the course of our lives that tempt us to lose faith and give up.

            But that’s where the persistent widow has something to teach us. She reminds us that despite everything, we can keep reaching out. We can reach out to God – we can hound God and trust God – and we can know that no matter what happens, we will never be alone.

We have an advocate in Jesus Christ who has promised to be with us to the end of the age. He calls us to pray always and never give up, and he assures us that the God of creation who loves and cares will never give up on us.

            So take heart! Stay in prayer!

God is with us and for us and will be forever!

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit – one God who hears all prayers, now and forever. Amen.

13 October 13 “The Gratitude of the Foreigners” Luke 17:11 – 19

 In a community on the margins of society differences become unimportant when compared to a common purpose, that of surviving. Class distinctions evaporate, positions of influence become insignificant, education, wealth, stature no longer count. All are one and in trouble.

 The Reverend Maggi Dawn tells the story of when she worked in central London with an organization that reached out to people living on the streets. For most, all she could offer was food, clean clothes, and a listening ear. But occasionally she met someone who wanted to find a new life.

 She ran a halfway house with a simple rule allowing a few folks at a time to relearn how to live indoors. Such a change is not easy; a few who came to live with her actually managed the long, difficult process of reintegration. But more than half gave up and returned to their life on the streets.

 Living closely with people many consider untouchable she learned more than she gave. One thing she never forgot was the way living on the margins leads folks to reinvent their social values.

 In a little community under a viaduct near the famous Portobello Road market she met an aristocrat who had inherited a vast country estate and been educated at one of the finest universities. The pressure of that life lead him to abandon his fortune. Now he walked the streets with just a few possessions in a shopping cart. His high-brow accent was the only hint of his past.

His best friend on the street was a working-class man from the poorest area of Glasgow. He had dropped out of the education system in his early teens and come to London seeking his fortune.

 The likelihood of these men becoming close friends in normal society was nil. But in the community under the viaduct, the Scotsman and the English Lord found that their differences were immaterial compared to their common purpose – surviving on the streets.

   Luke tells us this morning about such a community, surviving on the streets, living on the margins. There is a leper colony on the edge of a village between Samaria and Galilee. The people who live there where cast out by the rest of society.  We can only imagine the life they came from, the new bonds they have formed.

 In the story, Jesus is approached by ten who, in their desperation, cry out to him for help.  They heard he was a healer, so they sought him out. When they found him they called to him, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”

  Jesus immediately recognized their plight and their need. He knew the relief they were asking for and he said to them, “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” They did not hesitate. They were obedient, and as they went they were made clean. The leprosy left them.

 Looking at the ten and hearing their plea, I wonder why Jesus sent them to the priests. He knew he would heal them, so why the priests?

 In first century Israel priests were given special duties. One such duty was to determine who was “clean” and who was not. Those found “not clean” were separated from the community. A skin disease like leprosy would  bring such banishment.  

  Jesus knew the priests were necessary if these ten were to be found “clean” again and have their lives restored. So he sends them, and they knew why. They must have run down the road.

  On the way, they were healed. With unimaginable joy, standing before the priest, free from their disease, they were restored to their communal relationship.

 Adding to the story, these folks with leprosy lived near a village on the border between Galilee and Samaria. Galilee and Samaria were two communities historically divided. Jews considered all Samaritans ethnically unclean, on the margin of acceptable society folk, leper or not.

  The healing from their disease then becomes something larger than life, something exceeding their wildest dreams; it wiped away their cultural divide. It restored their social value.

  All healed, outwardly of their leprosy and inwardly of their racial divide we can only imagine their excitement. They had been away from their normal lives a long time. I expect they were dancing in the streets.

 Then a surprise of sorts. One lone member of the original ten returned to Jesus to give praise to God. The others apparently rejoined society as quickly as possible. In the process they showed their true allegiance, which was to the world and not to Jesus, the one who had freed them.

 Jesus refers to this one who returned to give praise to God as a foreigner, as a Samaritan. It may be the others were Galileans, we do not know.  It was only to this Samaritan that Jesus said, “Your faith has made you well.”

  Perhaps Jesus was speaking of a different type of wellness. Perhaps Jesus meant that deeply woven prejudices and stereotypes are a much more serious malady than even leprosy – that our hearts, our souls can be far sicker than our bodies. Perhaps Jesus was more upset with a society that would accept healed lepers from Galilee, yet reject a healed Samaritan.

 Luke’s message is one that challenges our usual sense of discipleship. If we are to be faithful followers of Jesus Christ then we are to be followers on Jesus’ terms.  Jesus’ terms include his expectations of faith and belief and trust, his gifts of forgiveness, love, salvation, his call to a life of living for others. Jesus’ terms require duty, obligation, and responsibility.

 If we live our life the way everyone else does, we have missed Jesus’ point and we are like the nine who could not wait to get back to societies norms. If we desire to be like the one who returned to give thanks, we must live like no one else lives. No one else except Jesus, that is. 

 Clearly, living this way, living like Christ, has significant consequences.

 When we abandon the priestly approval of this world for approval of Jesus Christ we must love everyone. Especially when folk are not like us. When they are different.  When they belonging over there, away from us where we separate them because of fear, anger, hurt, or prejudice. None of which is the will of God.

 God’s revealed will for us is that we love our neighbor, that we live to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with our God. God’s revealed will is that we live the ten commandments where we shall have no other god before God, we shall not make for ourselves an idol, we shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord our God, we shall remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy, we shall honor our father and our mother, we shall not murder, we shall not commit adultery, we shall not steal, we shall not bear false witness against our neighbor, we shall not covet our neighbor’s house, wife, male or female slave, or donkey, or anything that belongs to our neighbor.

  When we come to him, Jesus would ask, where are our boundaries to the will of God, boundaries that we resist crossing? Do we not love as we should? Do we not seek justice for all? Do we not extend Christian kindness as we ought? Do we, in our pride, not walk humbly with our God?

 The people with leprosy were sent by Jesus to see the priest. On their way they were healed from their disease. Their affliction that separated them from society, their boundary, was taken away. They were restored to the will of God, yet only one returned to give thanks and praise. Jesus asks him, where are the other nine? He could not answer. Perhaps they returned to Galilee and were welcomed home.

 Jesus offers nothing less. He welcomes us back home and then waits for us to show our faithfulness.

 Are we to be like the foreigner, the one truly on the edge of society, the outcast, the forlorn? He alone realized his complete freedom from leprosy and from his marginalization. He alone walked away from prejudice.

 His faith in the will of God made him well. It was God’s will that he accept Jesus’ invitation and by God’s will, he came to follow. Not to his earthly home, but to God’s kingdom home.

 That is what God does for us. When we have faith in his son, Jesus, and come to follow him, he heals those who accept him in all sorts of ways. He heals us here, on the inside, in our hearts and he heals us out here, in this earthly place, in what we say or do. 

We are therefore not like those other nine who wandered aimlessly, thinking the world will make them well. Our way is different. Our way is towards Jesus Christ because our faith has made us well. And because we are made well we will always live differently, we will always have that soft place in our hearts to include all people in the good news of the gospel.

 Ours is a common purpose filled with good news that tells us about a freedom where an aristocrat can be best friends with a man from the tenements, and they can live in the holy margin as followers of Jesus Christ.

 It is to that holy margin we pray we will live forever.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.  

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