19 May 2013                “Jesus as God”                  John 14:8-17

  We who have faith in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior should never take our faith for granted.

  Rudy wasn’t a close friend. He had been my brother’s neighbor for years, so we would see Rudy and his wife Mary now and then. I knew from my brother that Rudy was a good guy. He was a successful realtor, steady family man, he had played football at Alabama, and loved to kayak.

 Suddenly and unexpectedly Rudy died. He came home from work, mowed his front yard, and was found slumped over sitting on a bench.

 Swirling in the struggle with the raw ending of his life we discovered Rudy did not have a home church. Actually, he nor Mary even knew a pastor. Mary didn’t know anyone to call to help with Rudy’s funeral. Anyone the funeral home mentioned would be a stranger. She had no one.  

 Staring at the death of her husband, Mary realized she desperately needed help with more than a pastor for a funeral. She needed God’s presence to help her make sense of this shock. As if death can be understood.

 We who have faith should never ever take our faith for granted.

 That faith we cherish recently took a turn when Jesus sat down to eat what would be his last meal on earth before he took up his cross. He knew what was coming. He knew the end meant he would never have his beloved disciples with him at table again. He knew his time had come.

 But we seldom do. We will not truly know when our last supper will be. How could we know when it is time to say all the things we will wish we had said? What will that last time be like that will be played over and over again in our memory?  Will we be like Rudy, doing what we have always done? Mowing the yard, tending to our chores, rising to do what we have always done, then searching for meaning in the most desperate of times.

  With memories flooding our every thought of those we have loved and lost it is hard not to want another get together, just one more day. Jesus must have wanted just one more day too as he offers one last bit of hope to his disciples.

Jesus began this 14^th chapter of John with words of comfort. He said, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.”

 His friends must have known something was up. They must have sensed their time with him was about to end.  Yet they did not really know. Rudy had come home after work like so many other days. He wasn’t planning on a last supper.

 We recreate Jesus’ last gathering each first Sunday. Here at this table we gather round to hear his words again in hopes that he will still be here with us.  Perhaps that is when we will want to take the opportunity that was lost, the opportunity to truly see Christ and pray to him, speak to him, say those things to Jesus we intend to say all along, yet don’t.

 We will have tomorrow, we think. My fear, my worry, my sadness, my confusion, my longing to know “what next” with my life, can wait. It can wait. It can all wait, for surely there will be time for sharing our joy and our playfulness and our thanksgiving and our love. We have all the time we will need; the world is still filled with light. Darkness is far away. Jesus is here for us, that is why we come to church; we have Sunday’s to seek him.

 Frederick Buechner has written about this light and dark world of seeking Jesus in the story of a Christmas pageant as told by the rector of an Episcopal church.

 The manger was down in front at the chancel steps. Mary was there in a blue mantle and Joseph in a cotton beard. The wise men were there with a handful of shepherds, and of course in the midst of them all the Christ child was there, lying in the straw. The nativity story was read aloud by the rector with carols sung at the appropriate places, and all went like clockwork until it came time for the arrival of the angels of the heavenly host as represented by the children of the congregation, who were robed in white and scattered throughout the pews with their parents.

At the right moment they were supposed to come forward and gather around the manger saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will among men,” and that is just what they did except there were so many of them that their was a fair amount of crowding and jockeying for position, with the result that one particular angel, a girl about nine years old who was smaller than most of them, ended up so far out on the fringes of things that not even by craning her neck and standing on tiptoe could she see what was going on. “Glory to God on the highest and on earth peace, good will among men,” they all sang on cue, and then in the momentary pause that followed, the small girl electrified the entire church by crying out in a voice shrill with irritation and frustration and enormous sadness at having her view blocked, “Let Jesus show”.

 There was a lot of service left to go, but the rector knew to end everything right there. “Let Jesus show”, the child cried out, and while the congregation was still sitting in stunned silence, he pronounced the benediction, and everybody filed out of the church with those unforgettable words ringing in their ears.

 There is so much in our lives that hides Jesus from us. Even here in church some Sundays run the risk of becoming only a performance. Only rarely does anything take our breath away like a little girls cry, “Let Jesus show”, when we realize we got lost in our life and our thoughts of other things and suddenly we lost our reason for coming to worship. To be here with God, to hear Jesus’ words and remember him, to feel his presence in the love felt in this congregation. Suddenly Jesus wasn’t here for any of us.

 In despair we cry out. “Let Jesus show, let the light to the world be present, has he gone and we will never see him again.” Are we so terribly lost?

 “Do not let your hearts be troubled,” he said in the midst of his own sadness at leaving them. I will ask my Father and my father will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever.

 This is the Spirit of truth Jesus promises. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. I am here with you, your heart will not be broken forever. “Believe in God”, he said, “Believe also in me.”

 Earlier in the gospel Peter had asked Jesus, “Lord, where are you going?” And Jesus answered, “I go to prepare a place for you…that where I am you may be also.”

 For Jesus’ disciples and for those who grieve the loss of a loved one it is not unusual to hear them say, I wish I could just hear their voice once more, just a word. To hear the sound of their voice, the sound of their laughter, to call them on the phone and know with that pick up, they are there.

 We know there won’t be anyone there to answer and yet of course we couldn’t know for sure because nothing in this world is for sure. So we hold onto that phone and let it ring and ring and ring.

 Did they answer? How wonderful to be able to say that by some miracle they did and that we heard their sweet voice.  But, of course they didn’t, and all we heard was the silence of their absence.

 Yet who knows? Who can ever know anything for sure about the mystery of things? “In my Father’s house are many rooms,” Jesus said, and I would not be the one to doubt that in one of those many rooms the phone rang and rang true and was heard. We believers in the mystery believe that in some sense our loved one’s voice was in the ringing itself, and that Jesus’ voice was in it too.

 Jesus said, “I go to prepare a place for you…that where I am you may be also . .  . The Father will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth” we know as we celebrate this Pentecost day. The day the Advocate, the Holy Spirit fills our church, abides with us and answers Philip’s plea, “Lord, show us the Father.”

 As Buechner asks, “If there is a realm of being beyond where we now are that has to do somehow with who Jesus is, and is for us, and is for all the world, then how can we know the way that will take us there?”

 “I am the way, and the truth, and the life,” is how Jesus answers. Even on this day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit comes to the church Jesus does not say the church is the way. He does not say his teachings or what others teach about him or even religion is the way. Jesus says he alone is the way.

 Jesus himself, not his words nor anyone else’s words. It is the fact of his being truly human and at the same time truly God that is the way. Jesus the person. That carpenter fellow who fixed our broken chair. He is the one. There is no other way.

 How then do we go where he is? How do we who cannot find our own car keys find the way that is Jesus’ way? We don’t know, is our response. Life is too raw, too unpredictable. Yet we search and we pray that Jesus will be shown to us. Shown to us any way he chooses.

 Jesus said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”  To this end we do our daily practice and cultivate a kind heart. We abandon impatience and instead we are content creating the causes for goodness knowing the results will come when God has them ready.

 And we keep on ringing and ringing and ringing. Calling for him, Jesus, the way, the truth, and the life, keeping that ringing in the air, creating the music of our way, our truth and our life as we draw near to Jesus and to each other any way we can. Because that is the last thing he asked of us in John 15, “that you love one another as I have loved you.”

 By believing against all odds and loving against all odds, that is how we seek him. That is how we let Jesus be shown in our own hearts and from our hearts to those with no church like Rudy, with no God like many we know, with no one to tell them the good news of hope and comfort.

 “Do not let your hearts be troubled, I go to prepare a place for you, I will take you to myself for I am the way, and the truth, and the life.

 If you aren’t sure, “Let Jesus show,” take a chance, give him a call.

 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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12 May 2013 “Whose Glory?” John 17:20-26

12 May 2013                “Whose Glory?”                     John 17:20-26

  The 1999 movie Tuesday with Morrie, based on the book by the same name, is the true story of a sports writer, Mitch Albom, and his reunion with his former college professor, Morrie Schwartz, who is dying of ALS. Mitch was a multitasking workaholic, whose life is a series of hurried appointments, rushed phone calls, and last minute sprints to catch a flight. When he discovers that Morrie was in the last stages of his disease he honors a long overdue promise to visit him.

  In these visits, Morrie teaches Mitch some important lessons about what matters in life. In one scene Morrie is very frail and is lying in a recliner in obvious pain. He grimaces and asks Mitch to rub his aching feet with salve. “When we are infants,” he says, “we need people to survive; when we are dying, we need people to survive; but here is the secret: in between we need each other even more.”

  Mitch nods and remembers a quote he has heard Morrie say many times. He says, “We must love one another or die.” Morrie loses patience with Mitch. “Yeah, but do you believe that? Does it apply to you?”

 Mitch is stunned and defensive as he confesses that he does not know what he believes. The world he lives in does not allow for thinking about spiritual things.

  Mitch’s struggle is not so different from ours.  Anxiety and passion in life are intimately connected. Writers have even spoken of John Calvin, one of our Presbyterian forefathers, as “a singularly anxious man.” One spoke of him as “viewing human existence as a perpetual crisis of indecision, echoed in the contingencies of nature itself.”   All that keeps the universe from falling apart in any instance, said Calvin, is the immediate act of God’s continual creation.

  “The glory of God, he said, [is] manifested in the stability of the earth.” Apart from this sustaining act of divine intervention, the earth would be “plunged into darkness, . . . thrown into a state of confusion and horrible disorder and misrule, for there can be no stability apart from God.”

 Were God to withdraw God’s hand in any way – were the praise of God to cease in the world, “all things would immediately dissolve into nothing.”

“We must love one another or die,” says Morrie, “It is a very simple lesson, Mitch.”

  In the scripture we have heard this morning, Jesus is praying to God for the church. Jesus is praying that the church feel the hand of God, hear God’s raise and experience the same kind of love and unity in the Spirit that Jesus himself experiences with God. “May they be one, just as I am in you and you are in me.”

 It is important we experience this unity with Jesus and God and the church because how we act says something to others about who God is. It is important because we need each other.   It is also important to remember unity is not uniformity. Jesus did not pray, “That they all may be the same.” He prayed, “That they all may be one.” Variety is valuable, and in the words of Jeremiah Wright, pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago, “different is not deficient.” It is just different.

 In the movie The Apostle, there is a wonderful scene where Robert Duvall, who plays an evangelist, the Apostle E.F., in the southern Holiness Pentecostal tradition, has just  re-baptized himself by emersion in the river. He is in a simple shirt and pants, the only clothes he has. The river is muddy. It is in Southern Louisiana.

 Then, as he is traveling he comes across a big Roman Catholic celebration, where a whole line of boats festively decorated are traveling down the river and the priest in all his finery is there sprinkling holy water on the boats as they come near the dock. It is a blessing of the fishing fleet.

 The Apostle E.F. says to himself as he watches, “you do it your way, I do it mine, but we get the job done.”

 Yet, it is, of course, precisely because we are different that our unity is sometimes our greatest struggle.   It is important to remember our differences serve a very important function:  They keep us from grievous error. They keep us fresh and alive. They keep us mentally awake and alert. Differences awaken competing viewpoints, which keeps us fresh and relevant. They keep us growing.

  Throughout the Gospel of John, Jesus speaks of glory for all. Right at the beginning Jesus and the disciples go to a wedding. You know the story. The wine gives out. Jesus turns water into wine. There was an overflowing of graciousness, a miraculous abundance. This first miracle sets the tone for others to come.

 Often it takes a moment like that to see God’s glory. We plod along in our accustomed ways, victims of the ordinary and the everyday. Allowing the small pleasure, you do it your way, I do it mine, and we both get it done.

  Then there comes some shining moment, an outbreak of glory, a blessing of self or a blessing of the fleet that takes us by surprise. The ordinary veil of the everyday is pulled back, light shines, everything is transformed into golden hues, and we see glory.

 The poet Mary Oliver writes a friend of hers, who is a monk, and a bishop often challenges her to, “Put yourself in the way of grace.”

  For ourselves, well, often we try another way. We do not think first about putting ourselves in the way of grace. No, we look instead for a light in the wilderness. We seek knowledge and understanding from the light of reason. Mary speaks of the light in another way. Not knowing what to call it, she says it may be hope, or even faith.

 Putting ourselves in the way of grace, hope, or faith begins with listening. Listening to the whispering in the recesses where one is less oneself than a part of some single indivisible community. The poet William Blake likens it to “taking dictation.”

What we seek begins and ends with the act of noticing and cherishing, and it neither begins nor ends with the human world. It is like a nudge, the prick of the instant, the flame of appreciation that shoots into our soul, the unspeakable notion.

 There is nothing so special in this and it may not prove anything in the usual sense. But living like this may be the difference between a luminous life and a ho-hum life.   Between grace and anxiety about what we believe.

 As Mary Oliver say, “My affinity is to the whimsical, the illustrative, and the suggestive – not to the actual or the useful. I walk, and I notice. I use my senses in order to be spiritual.”

 So, we are to put our self in the way of grace. To believe in grace and the soul, to believe in them exactly as much and as hardily as one believe in a mountain, say, or a fingernail, which is ever in view – imagine the consequences!  How far-reaching, and thoroughly wonderful and potentially life changing!

 For everything, by such a belief, would be charged, and changed. You wake in the morning, the soul exists, your mouth sings it, and your mind accepts it. And the perceived, tactile world is, upon the instant, only half the world! The other half is filled with amazing grace.

  Jesus has risen. He stayed with us for a while and this past week in the life of the church we remembered  the ascension of our risen Christ to heaven.  The Easter period begins to ease. We approach Pentecost and the day the Holy Spirit came to the church. And what, if anything, has been determined, selected, nailed down in our lives?

 Perhaps this is the lesson of age – events pass, things change, trauma fades, good fortune rises, fades, and rises again but different. Yet, what happened when one was twenty happens forever.  The sun rolls toward the north. Misery in the world we can do nothing about goes on.

 Along the way we have learned to live, to look, to see, to listen, to feel, to long for, to be surprised by the unexpected. To know joy, love, hope, grace even. There have been moments we thought hard to top. Then, we have.

  Mary Oliver writes, “Once I came upon two angels, they were standing quietly, keeping guard beside a car. Light streamed from them, and a splash of flames lay quietly under their feet. What is one to do with such moments, such memories, but cherish them? Who knows what is beyond the known?

 And if you think that one day the secret of light might come, grace might appear, would you not keep the house of your mind ready? Would you not cleanse your study of all that is cheap, or trivial? Would you not live in continual hope, and pleasure, and excitement?”

 Would this not be your hour to share in God’s glory?

  Jesus says, “Righteous Father, the world does not know you, but I know you. I made your name known to them, so the love with which you have loved me may be in them.”

 “It is a very simple lesson, Morrie said to Mitch.”

 “We must love one another…”

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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05 May 2013 “Room for Greater Things” John 14:23-29

05 May 2013                “Room for Greater Things”                 John 14:23-29

  A little more than 30 years ago, a teenager named Jadav “Molai” Payeng began burying seeds along a remote sandbar near his birthplace in northern India’s Assam region to grow a refuge for wildlife. Not long after, he decided to dedicate his life to this work, so he moved to the site where he could work full-time eventually creating a lush new forest ecosystem. Incredibly, the spot today hosts a sprawling 1,360 acres of jungle that Payeng planted single –handedly.

 

The Times of India recently caught up with Payeng in his remote forest home to learn more about how he came to leave such an indelible mark on the landscape.

 It all started in 1979, when floods washed a large number of snakes ashore on the sandbar. One day, after the waters receded, Payeng, only 16 then, found the place dotted with the dead reptiles. That was the turning point of his life.

 “The snakes died in the heart, without any tree cover. I sat down and wept over their lifeless forms. It was carnage. I alerted the forest department and asked them if they could grow trees there. They said nothing would grow there. Instead, they asked me to try growing bamboo. It was painful, but I did it. There was nobody to help me. Nobody was interested,” says Payeng, now 47.

 While it has taken years for Payeng’s remarkable dedication to planting to receive some well-deserved recognition internationally, it did not take long for wildlife in the region to benefit from his manufactured forest. Demonstrating a keen understanding of ecological balance, Payeng even transplanted ants to his thriving ecosystem to bolster its natural harmony. Soon the shade less sandbar was transformed into a self-functioning environment where a vast array  of creatures could dwell. The forest, called the Molai woods, now serves as a safe haven for numerous birds, deer, and even rhinos, tigers and elephants.

  It was Payeng’s turning point that made all this happen.

 I can only imagine the moments in Jesus’ life that were his turning points. When he was young and was teaching in the Temple, when he began performing miracles, when he stood up to all authority for the one true authority in his life, when we turned one last time to Jerusalem.

 Like Payeng, I do not know if Jesus knew what he was in for. He must have known something. I wonder, could he have foreseen the resurrection and his eventual turn to heaven.

We do know that along the way Jesus taught, and taught, and taught. Never giving up, Jesus knew his lessons and he knew his responsibility.

 In the beginning, before God created man and woman, God created the earth. God saw that it was good. Then God created humanity, and we know how that turned out.

But God has hope for us. Through Jesus and Jesus’ sacrifice we have a chance for our own turning point. Jesus said, “I give you a new commandment.” It is a new commandment that we love one another. Just as Jesus has loved us, we should also love one another.

How is it this commandment is new? The commandment to love our neighbors as we love ourselves first appeared in the Old Testament in Leviticus. Yet, Jesus insists this is new.

What we may discover if we look more closely is Jesus is taking the old commandment and making in new with a new power. We are not to love alone. We are not to be the sole architect of our love.

God and God’s love will become one with ours. Our heart and soul will be made new in a surprising holy union with God. In this union God will create in us a new person, a new creation. We will be different in our identity and different in the composition of our humanity and different in our intention.

 God will create in us a newness in who and what we love and how we should live. To live this new commandment we will soon realize the intricate web of relationship we have with our created world, with all people in that world, and with God.

  Jadav Payeng shows us, and the world, and God what such love can do.

 Jesus Christ shows us, and the world, and God what such love has done.

  Jesus died for us so we might live free from sin forever. This is the greatest love story the world has even known. God’s love is an unbelievable love. It is a love only God can give. It is that same love that God has infused into each of us, into our heart, and soul. God’s love is alive in each of us!

  Being this truth, God has another lesson for us this morning. In John 14 Jesus promise us that the Holy Spirit has also been sent into us by God.  Finally, we have a voice that will speak to us, teach us, and remind us how we are to live.  How we are to live for the sake of the world and everyone in it.

 The harsh and real truth is that love in this earthly realm is not a fairy tale story. The world is a dangerous place. There are storms and earthquakes and fires and draught and flood.

People are dangerous too. The good princess is not always rescued by the night in shining armor. And love for love’s sake often fades into a selfish mess. How often have we cried out from the wilderness, my mess proves God takes time off from dispensing God’s love!

A friend once told me a story about a woman named Mary. Mary dutifully cared for her loved one with Multiple Sclerosis. After carrying years of bitterness and pain, times when Mary was sure God’s love was gone, God showed Mary otherwise.

Mary found herself being a chaperone on a school field trip. Before they left school folks were asked to divide up and share in a carpool. Soon Mary found herself in a very uncomfortable position. She was left to ride with a women she did not know. The woman was not from her part of town and made Mary uncomfortable. She did not want to ride with her. But she did.

 As they drove along, this complete stranger, from the other side of the tracks, began to share her life and her pain with Mary. She learned that a loved one in her family had Multiple Sclerosis of all things and Mary learned of her despair, her fear, and her sense of being lost.

  

Mary was reliving all over again her own pain and suffering. Yet, she immediately overcame her sorrow and turned to show her love for her neighbor. She knew the right doctors and the best care givers and the necessary support systems that were needed and began to help this suffering woman with the knowledge she had only received as her life was falling apart. Mary knew and Mary shared God’s love from the darkest shadows in her life so this one she now cared for would receive Mary’s great gift of love and hope.

 Mary soon realized God had prepared her for this chance meeting. Painfully God had prepared her to meet a stranger and bring healing and hope and show the love and compassion that God placed in her heart. A love she did not recognize because of her suffering. Mary was able to show the world what a Christian does in the midst of pain and suffering. We love!

  Who in your life has brought this sort of good news to you, with love?  Or, who have you brought good news to, also with love?

 In the midst of it all, do we realize God has prepared us to see that the ultimate source for good comes solely from God’s presence in our lives, especially when times are tough. Especially when we sit down and weep. When the authorities say nothing will grow there. When we, one lonely person, have nobody to help. When we reach that turning point in our lives.

  Jesus came into this world a long time ago and now he is gone. But we are not alone. While he was still alive Jesus promised he will continue to care for us. He promised in his resurrection he will send us his shalom, his peace and wholeness.

  

The Reverend Barbara Taylor wrote about this passage, “I am a little fuzzy on the details, as John himself is, but abiding or having the Holy Spirit live in us, seems to involve becoming part of a large extended family, and a holy one at that. When God and Jesus move in with us, apparently, they make lots of keys – keys for the Holy Spirit, keys for the other disciples, keys for all kinds of indwelling cousins in Christ. Coming and going, we learn to recognize each other, and to call upon each other for everything that people who live together do.”

 These are the words that commit our ministry and mission to the health and wellbeing of our created world and one another. Loving our environment and those folk on our campus and beyond we call upon each other for everything that people who live together do.

 But, there is a price to pay for this act of love. True, God’s love is a gift and God expects no gift in return. But God does tell us to promise to keep God’s commandments. Having the character to live the commandments upholds our ability to love a Godly love.

Living with a Godly love and, like God, freely giving our love away, calling on one another for help and love, our actions then become a reflection of  God’s presence and our life becomes a reflection of Jesus’ teaching others to love.

Over and over again the dynamic of God’s love unfolds and the world becomes a holy vessel of love and ultimately knows heavenly peace.

How else will the world and all in it be saved if not by God’s love found in us? How can we expect the world to not be filled with hate and hurt and sin and suffering if we will not show the world another way?

God started this pathway to peace. God said, “Abide in my love.” 

Now it is our turn to show it to the world. We begin as Jesus did, with one person, in one desperate situation, with one love, holy and united with God, his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and our saving Holy Spirit.

 We begin as Jadav Payeng did planting one seed at a time. For more than 30 years. We begin today planting the seed  of good news through the mission and ministry God calls us to personally and as God’s church. Calling on one another and planting our love on our own barren sandbar. One seed, then another, then another.

 And at our end God will say, “Well done my faithful servant, well done. Go now in peace.”

  

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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21 April 2013              “The Voice of the Shepherd”                     John 10:22-30

   There are questions that matter. Why would someone bomb and kill and injury innocent people at the Boston Marathon? Why would a fertilizer plant in the town of West catch fire, explode, and kill and injure scores of people? Why when 90% of the American people want expanded background checks on gun sales would our elected officials act against those wishes? Why are we having life threatening illness, changes in life we did not expect  and do not understand? Where do we turn? To whom do we find comfort? We struggle to find answers.

 On the other hand, we have clear answers to some of our questions. There has been grace extended as health has been restored, as grief has received comfort, as time has healed, as blessings to family and friend have been realized.

  On the one hand we ask questions that leave us shaking our heads, dazed and confused. On the other hand answers jump out at us. This world and it’s questions defy simplicity and cry for relevancy.

 What do we do with this tension between the horror and despair and cries to God, “Why, Lord?” and the way we believe the world should rightly be, mixed with comfort and joy, hope and peace?

 Many before us have weighed in on the conundrum between our days of hell and our days of holy joy. Where might we find a wise heart to parse our fears and feelings this morning for our world is at it again. Creating worry, fear, pain, sorrow, and anger at the injustices.

 Thomas Merton, the well-known and gifted American Trappist monk, has written of his desire for such a wise heart. On a holy day in December he wrote of his effort through his rediscovery of Lady Julian of Norwich. I shared one of her best known quotes in last Sunday’s sermon.

   Julian wrote of her revelations; first experienced, then thought, then lived simply as she explains being saturated in the light she had received all at once.

  One of her central convictions is what she calls her  hidden dynamic progress which is at work already and by which she could say, “all manner of things shall be well.” This “secret,” this act which the Lord keeps hidden, is really the full fruit of the Parousia, a term used for the coming of Christ, most usually focused on the second coming or future advent as indicated in the Nicene Creed: “he . . . will come again.”

 For Julian, It is not just that Jesus comes, but Jesus comes with a secret to reveal. He comes with his final answer to all the world’s anguish, his answer which is already decided, but which we cannot discover (and which, since we think we have reasoned it all out anyway) we have stopped trying to discover.

 Julian’s life was lived in the belief in this “secret,” the  “great deed” that the Lord will do on the Last Day. Not a deed of destruction and revenge, but of mercy and of life. All partial expectations will be exploded and everything will be made right. It is the great deed of “the end,” which is still secret, but already fully at work in the world, in spite of all its sorrow, the great deed “ordained by Our Lord from without beginning.”

 So our tension between the way the world is and the way we wish the world to be, whether in Boston or the town of West, or the quiet of our own home: is settled in the “wise heart” that beats strong in times of hope and in times of contradiction, in sorrow and in joy, fixed on the secret and the “great deed” which alone gives Christian life its true scope and dimensions! The wise heart lives in Christ. The great deed is God’s son made man. Jesus Christ our Messiah.

 The wise heart, Jesus, lives in the tension between what we cannot understand and the grace evident in our lives. We live him, there in between the horror and the hope. This truth, as David Johnson points out, is primarily an honest and sober self-analysis as a response to grace, made in the assurance that there is healing and hope.

 Jesus came into our world with a secret to reveal. He spent his life teaching and performing miracles that we might learn his secret. But we are slow and suspicious learners.

 The Jews, for their part, asked Jesus in the midst of his obedient life, “How long will you keep us in suspense?” Like us, they want to know, “If you are the Messiah, tell us plainly.”

Jesus’ answers like the exasperated parent, “I have told you, and I have told you and still you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me; but you do not believe, because you do not belong to my sheep.”

  In Palestine today, Bedouin shepherds bring their flocks to the same watering hole their forefathers used. There is a certainty about this scene – the sheep know when and where to go when their shepherd calls them. Once there they look for him, find him, take comfort, and settle into their life. Safe and reassured.

 This is the image Jesus uses as he is walking in the portico of Solomon, the oldest and most sacred part of the Temple of the Jews. They ask Jesus the question burning in their hearts. Who are you? They were not confused, they had heard about his life, they knew of his teachings and his miracles, they simply did not believe his answer!

   Jesus knew their question was loaded. He knew they were really trying to pick a fight, to argue with him and accuse him of lying. They believed the Jewish King to come would be a warrior king, a political messiah. Jesus did not meet their expectation.

   So, Jesus answers their question by speaking the truth about who they are. He tells them they do not believe because they have no real relationship with God.

   So how will Jesus answer our questions this morning? Does he sense our questions too are loaded. We know who Jesus is, this is 2013 and we have been believers for a long time. But we want to know about Boston, and exploding fertilizer plants, and political decisions that leave us angry.

 For our part, we do firmly believe Jesus to be the world’s Christ, the firm and final Messiah. We do believe. But the world blows up and people die. The world is filled with disease and hate and hurt between people. We do believe, but “Why, Lord?”

  We belong to this human race and today it seems the hand of God is someplace else. We feel like we are the lost sheep with no shepherd to guide us home. We feel like we are just another number in the mixed up flocks this world offers.

   The world offers so many flocks to choose from. Many flocks with very appealing things to offer. Ways to make us look healthy and well-tended to. Flocks for the better bred where we might be in better company with better surroundings. All sorts of different flocks looking like they belong and they are not confused or mixed up about to whom they belong. They belong to this world. With safe and satisfying appearances. Join them and we will be safe for all times.

   Then comes the time to go home and the shepherds of sin and greed and selfishness and envy and power call their sheep. And we stand unmoving. We wait for the moment when we might recognize our shepherd.  For surely our life is not dependent on one of these other shepherds. But on days like today we do not see our shepherd. We see fear and hurt and pain. Yet we cry, “Which one is mine? Where do I belong? What do I believe?”

   Jesus said, “You do not believe  because you do not belong to my sheep.” Do we not belong to God? Is it our doubt, our sticking points, our questions which seem to have no answers that separate us from the Good Shepherd? Who keeps us out? Is it God, or do we do it all by ourselves?

   Christian literature is filled with all sorts of claims about what it means to believe. Some say that believers are never at a loss for words. We know what we believe and why and do not struggle to profess our faith. We say that believers are in constant touch with God. So, we are seldom in doubt or afraid and we live with the confidence that we are in God’s hands.

 We say that we worship God in all sorts of places and all sorts of ways and find worship a meaningful experience. We say that we live like Jesus lived and show the world our faith every moment of every day in the words we say, the way we treat one another, the certainty we have about how and where and what it is God wants our lives to be like.

  Are these really your beliefs? Is this what you think it takes to belong to the flock of the Good Shepherd? If so, please stop!

 Please stop exiling yourself because beliefs like this are so unrealistic. If we believe our separation from God is because we do not pray enough, or witness enough, or read enough theology, or visit the sick, or even come to church often enough. If so, please stop!

 We must stop exiling ourselves from God and allow ourselves to belong simply because God says we do.

   This truth is here in this morning’s Gospel. Jesus does not say that we are in or out of the flock because of anything we do or do not do. Or because our world seems to be falling apart. Our presence in the life of Christ has not one thing to do with our ability alone to believe or belong based on whatever moves us this morning or not.

 In fact, Jesus says that our ability to believe depends, not on us, but on whether we are already chosen, by God alone, to be in God’s kingdom as children of the flock of the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ.

  There is every reason this morning to believe that we are such chosen children, if only because we are sitting right here.

  And let it be said, there are no perfect sheep here this morning. There are no perfect sheep anywhere. That is why we need Jesus as our good shepherd.

   With this truth before us we should add another answer to our questions about believers; We can say this morning, as many before us have said, that the way true believers believe is the way most of us believe; valiantly on some days and pitifully on others, moving mountains some days and not moving enough on others to even get out of bed.    Most of the time the best we can do is to live “as if” it were true and when we do, it all becomes truer somehow.

   God does know what is in our hearts, sometimes even before we know what is there. You see, that is what a relationship is like. About matters of the heart and where the heart is so goes our lives.

   Our true belief, our wise heart tends to show up in our actions more than in our words. How we live our lives and with whom and where, doing some things and not doing others, who we include and which choices we make matter.

   Yet life is life and some days we feel firm about our faith and some days we are like lost sheep. Some day’s sadness stops everything but our tears. But God is certain of us all the time and there is nothing on earth we can do to change that.

  So, let us be patient with ourselves, and with those around us too. Above all, understand that you belong here, as part of this flock. For whatever reason, God has brought us to live in the life of this good shepherd, Jesus Christ.

 Because we believe in him or want to believe in him, because there is something about this good news that he brings to the world that has attracted us to him there is evidence that each of us belong to God’s flock of dependent sheep.

 And we hear his voice on occasion, and he knows us, and we follow him, and he protects us, and guides us, and keeps us out of lasting harm’s way, and offers us eternal life, and we shall never perish, and no one will ever snatch us out of his hands.

  And all things will be well.

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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14 April 2013 “The World Upset By Easter” John 21:1-19

14 April 2013 “The World Upset By Easter” John 21:1-19

“After these things Jesus showed himself again.” John’s gospel ends this way, with Jesus showing himself to his disciples. They had seen him early on that first day of the week following his death and burial. They had seen him when it was evening on that same day, there at the house where the disciples were gathered. They had seen him a week later in that same house when Thomas, who doubted they had seen the Lord, was with them. Now Jesus has shown himself again. He was there at the Sea of Tiberias.

I cannot imagine how exhausted the disciples must have felt. Their emotions had to be raw from the events that had taken place with Jesus, the one whom they loved. Their emotional swings from fear to horror to shock, imagining the pain of Jesus’ suffering and his horrible death had to have taken its toll. Then the breath taking resurrection and the extreme opposite swing in emotion to ecstatic joy and remarkable belief that Jesus, once dead, was now alive.

It is no wonder they jumped at the offer to calm things down and return to their normal life. They were, at their core, fishermen. Simon Peter led the way saying, “I am going fishing.” I am going back to work, where life is predictable and under my control.

The disciples have peacefully returned to what they knew how to do. Jesus had worn them out with his ministry. As life giving as it was, they were ready to get back to their regular, normal, familiar, breathable way of life. But would they ever?

I have never been to a Chrysalis event or an Emmaus walk. They are those long weekend events meant to help you get closer to God. Those who have been report the most powerful and amazingly spirit filled experiences. Most notable being a feeling of the presence of God. Folk say they come away having an new or renewed awareness of God and they feel saved. But exhausted.

Many of us have felt a time of peace and presence and spiritual connectedness. Many of us have had those moments that left us certain that God was present in a life event, or a special moment. That the world around us was filled to the brim with God and we were so focused and so in love that we pledged we were going to change our life forever. Just as sure, it seems those feelings and commitments do not last. How long has our enthusiasm, our energy, our passion, our love for Jesus stayed with us?

Perhaps the same thing was happening to the disciples. They had seen Jesus’ powerful healing touch, they had heard his amazing teaching, they had known his presence and received his blessings. What should they do now?

In their uncertainty life pulled them back to the mundane and the familiar where they knew what to do and who they were. They were being drawn back to their labor.

But Jesus would show up again. You see Jesus follows us around. He will not leave us alone. Jesus is out to change our life and he will not stop until he does. Yet, at some point we all seem to break down and return to the familiar. At some point we become blind to the miracle before us.

“Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.” They recalled they had seen him outside the tomb, twice in the house and here he was again by the Sea of Tiberias. Yet they have begun to break down and do not recognize him.

We may have the same problem recalling God’s grace and recognizing God’s presence in our lives. It becomes painfully evident in our sin and unbelief, in the ways we avoid living as true disciples of Christ – focusing on our own kingdom building instead of God’s. Perhaps like the first disciples, we too need another miracle before we will recapture our passion for the living Christ.

That miracle came just this Easter. Jesus was resurrected from his death and so where we. We were resurrected from life as we knew it before our sins were forgiven and we were saved. It was the miracle at Easter where Jesus showed himself to us as chosen, forgiven, saved disciples and we were given the clear command to follow Jesus’ life example. How could we forget this? Our new life, as followers of Jesus, began with the clear command to be filled with love for all of God’s creation and with the clear command to a life of loving and living as Jesus lived. This should be an exciting time! We are disciples of Jesus Christ! But of course our prayers of confession are true. We have sinned. We have not lived up to our part of the bargain. Too many Mondays have come and gone and we have gone back to fishing for a living right along with the other disciples and we have abandoned our true vocation. Our failure is ever before us.

Peter failed in the same way. Failed to recognize Jesus. But Jesus never left Peter and Jesus never leaves us. Jesus brought a miracle and God’s love reappeared, hope returned. God’s grace for Peter and for us and God’s ever present son, Jesus Christ, entered our lives again and , like Peter, we are saved. Again and again and again.

God, you see, is giving us all another chance. Not because of anything we have initiated. Not because we have come to church. It is all God’s doing. After these things, Jesus shows himself again. Jesus sees our labor and says, ”So, you have caught nothing at all, have you?” How quickly you forget, he tells us. Without me you can do nothing. And he begs us. Please learn that lesson once and for all.

Having gently, or not so gently, guided our return, Jesus promises us he will show us where we should cast our net in order to catch fish. He recognizes we have nothing to eat. So he prepares his meal for us. His body, his blood.

It was all a miracle. Jesus life was a miracle to open the eyes of each of us here this morning. A miracle that will help us see that by ourselves we can accomplish nothing. A miracle that will strengthen our faith in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Peter’s restoration you see is our restoration.

Our question this morning is the question found in verses 15-17, “When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?’ He said to him, ‘Yes, Lord you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs.’ A second time he said to him, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me?’ He said to him, ‘Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Tend my sheep.’ He said to him the third time, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me?’ Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, ‘Do you love me?’ And he said to him, ‘Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my sheep.’”

This is our real vocation, tending the flock as Jesus did. Seeing all God’s people as needing our love for we are all weak and immature and in need of being shepherded and strengthened by God’s love.

In this morning’s gospel, fishing time is over, for good. We have neglected the work among the flock. It is time to return to our authentic selves. Being believers in Jesus Christ. Being disciples, shepherds, following Jesus in service, in suffering and in death.

Sometimes we adults are not so smart about being our authentic selves, being Christ’s disciples on earth. Children actually do a much better job of living authentically.

You may remember me telling you about how my grandson, Grant, taught me this truth one weekend. It was his second birthday and he spent the night with us. He woke up the next morning blissfully honest about who he was.

First, he found with his eyes and then his hands two of his favorite cars, next he moved over to where one of his favorite puzzles lay unfinished and moved a piece into its place. Then he gently picked up just one M&M from the candy jar on the table and found his mouth. And finally, pure heaven, the ultimate finger food breakfast for a two year old – Fruit Loops. What a way to start life. M&M’s and Fruit Loops and being authentic to who we are. The good news this morning is there is equally joy to be found in our lives too. We are reminded to wake up each morning and blissfully recognize the miracle of Jesus Christ in our lives. To see with our eyes the beauty of this world and our many blessings and to accept Jesus’ restoration of our lives so we may care lovingly for his flock.

The 14th century mystic, Julian of Norwich, saw just this truth. She wrote, “In spite of our poor choices and spiritual blindness in this life, our courteous Lord continues to love us. We will bring him the most pleasure if we rejoice with him and in him.

When the end comes and we are taken for judgment above, we will then understand in God the mysteries that puzzle us now. Not one of us will think to say, ‘Lord, if it had been some other way, all would be well.’ We shall all say in unison, “Lord, bless you because it is all the way it is. It is well. Now we can honestly see that everything is done as you intended: you planned it before anything was ever made.’

What is the meaning of all this, she asks. Listen carefully. Love is the Lord’s meaning. Who reveals it? Love. Why does he reveal it? For love. This is the only lesson there is. We will never learn another. Never. We begin in love, and we shall see all of this in God forever.” And all will be well.

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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07 April 2013 “Seeing is Believing” John 20:19-31

07 April 2013 “Seeing is Believing” John 20:19-31 We are, by nature, curious people. My good friend Daniel Everly taught me about our curious nature when he created such an interest in me I went with him a number of years ago on a field expedition with the Rock Art Foundation of Texas. The Foundation is dedicated to the rock art and historic sites throughout the lower Pecos region of West Texas. Over five millennia, aboriginal artists recorded elaborate scenes on the limestone canvas of canyons and rock shelters in an area defined by the lower courses of the Pecos and Devil’s rivers and their confluences with the Rio Grande River. That day we drove and drove and then hiked to the Pecos River and a remote rock overhang where I saw in vivid color the painted images of snakes, bear, deer, human like figures, panthers, and the coolest of all, shamans. I had seen pictures of these images in books. But I was so curious to see them first hand in their natural setting and to hear the stories of how and why folk would record such striking images of life long past that I had to see them for myself. They were spectacular. In today’s gospel, Thomas was faithful to his nature too. He was faithful to his personal drive to know the truth about his life, his world, the experiences he was living and seeing unfold before him as a follower of Jesus. Given the recent turn of events, Thomas was not about to change from his curious ways. He had to see things for himself. That Jesus had died, he was certain. What his friends were now telling him, he was not so sure. He struggled to believe that Jesus was no longer dead. That he was alive and had actually appeared to them and even spoken to them was beyond belief. He had to see for himself what common sense told him was impossible. When I taught at Blinn College it was always a struggle to help my students understand the basis for knowing what was indeed true and real in life and what might be suspect. Often, I found, we confuse our own view of what we think is true for what everyone else actually knows to be otherwise. Often, our personal view is just that, our personal view. Just as often, that view is not what right reasoning knows to be true. Being able to know the difference is a huge accomplishment and for some, why, we spend a lifetime searching for clarity and certainty. Thomas shows us the right way to approach this dilemma. Ask, “Where is your proof?” Say, “Show me,” which is exactly what he did. At some point in our lives we all have asked for more proof about God. At some point in our lives we all have realized that just because people we know, people we respect, or even people we love believe certain things about Jesus, they may be wrong. Their faith claims stops being sufficient proof for us. So we do what Thomas did, we strike out on our own, we study, we read, we pray, we engage in discussion, we expose ourselves to new and different ideas. We begin to define limits for ourselves. We first discover what we absolutely do not accept as the truth. The wacky sounding claims, the rhetorical clichés, the mainstream ideas. They help us turn to scripture, to respected teachers, to the church even and we discover bits of truth here and there. Bits we file away in our believe system. Then we discover truths we hold to be absolute and foundational and solid as a rock. These solid truths become strongly held faith and belief certainties that define our Christian way of living. When it was evening on that day, the disciples were huddled in the upper room. They were afraid of the religious authorities, afraid of the religious folk who resist the message of the Gospel and its light preferring instead to hide in the old ways of holy habit. Even with our rock solid beliefs we Christians can be like this some times. It is easier to hide in our old ways, our comfortable clothing of holy habit. Jesus comes not to rebuke us or the disciples but, with a word of peace, spoken twice. Jesus has atoned for our sins, died on the cross to ensure our salvation, spoken first to Mary, calling her name, then calling ours. We cannot avoid this relationship with Jesus. He has done too much for us to take him lightly. He has come back into the life of the living. He returned from the grave to be with his disciples again and he has returned from the grave to be with us, each of us. And like his disciples, we too are being sent out into the world, we too have been breathed upon, we too received the Holy Spirit at our baptism, we too have therefore become his apostles. Thomas was not there when Jesus came, neither were we. He doesn’t believe until he sees the marks, neither do we – not because we lack faith, remember, we are curious by nature and our skepticism keeps us safe from foolish decisions. Thomas was like us, he wasn’t different from the others, he wants to see the same thing they saw, he wants to see the same things we want to see, “show me the marks” he says. “Show me the marks,” we also say. In the same room with the same group, in church, Jesus comes to Thomas and shows him the marks. Then, like John who had entered the tomb and believed, Thomas believes, he says, “My Lord and my God”. This phrase becomes the later church’s confession and it becomes ours, “My Lord and my God.” This story, we realize, is not only about Thomas it is about us, the church. This is clear from Jesus’ insistence on blessing those who have not seen and yet believe – Jesus embraces us here, the church. Our society has many like Thomas and they want evidence before they believe. They cannot see the marks of the body of Jesus, but they can see the marks on the body of Christ, on us, the church. Society and non-believers and those from non-Christian faiths are quick to point this out. We see you church people! We see what you are doing! Sadly, the marks of today’s Christians do not always convince the many like Thomas in society who want evidence before they believe. Mahatma Ghandi famously said, “I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Unless I see the marks, I will not believe. In the history of Christianity there are marks that would help doubting folk like Thomas believe. The marks we have to show them are the historical stories we tell of our Christian witness. There are many we can tell, stories of people like John Calvin or John Knox or others responsible for the Presbyterian tradition finding its way to America. But, what about ordinary people? We need look no further than this church to find ordinary people who are heroes in the faith. We need look no further than the marks left by the real life stories of people in our own church. We need look no further than the founding families and the ministers of Trinity and Wilshire Presbyterian Churches. We need look no further than the transformative folk that brought life to Genesis Presbyterian Church. These are the marks those who doubt long to see, our history, our tradition, our ministries. Once they see us, then they will believe. People come into our church on a daily basis and we show a great deal to them, and much of what we show is good. Before they can believe, they want to see what it is that marks us as the body of Christ, they want to see what marks us as Christians who are like Christ, they want to see that we not only believe in a redeemer, that we act redeemed. People come into our church on a daily basis and we act like Christ when help them by listening, giving them our love through a kind word or a helping hand. People come into our church on a daily basis and they call our name. They tell us, “Unless I see his mark on you, I will not believe!” They come to worship, we greet them during the passing of the peace, we invite them to our table to take communion with us, we invite them to break bread with us in fellowship at our congregational luncheons, we let them see Jesus’ mark on us when we open our church to them to give them a place of comfort and love when they grieve the loss of a loved one like we did yesterday when we filled this space with folks coming to celebrate the life of the Reverend Clarence Bassett. These are a few of our marks, there are others, you know about them, you know about the wonderful ministry network we have for taking care of one another, for keeping up with one another, for visiting with one another, for loving one another. You know about our Christian marks. Can we then feel good enough about these marks that we will open our arms to folk like Thomas, folks looking for what is true and real about God. Folks who come to see our marks so they may believe. I believe we can and it is obvious we have because those who ask to be shown the marks of Jesus in us want to see the marks in a church, an ordinary church, a safe place, this church. And the greatest truth we show them is the boldly lived claim, “See how they love one another”. See how they love one another and us too. May we bring them to this church? I think so, for through thick and thin, we love our savior and we love one another. Jesus said, “Do not doubt, but believe” that through believing all who come this way may have life in his name and have it abundantly. For they will believe and come this way, to this church, knowing Jesus by our love. What greater gift might we give than to give our love, that others may live. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen 040713.gpc

17 March 2013 “Jesus Makes a Home Visit” John 12:1-8

17 March 2013 “Jesus Makes a Home Visit” John 12:1-8

The day before he entered Jerusalem for the last time, Jesus stopped in to see his old friends Mary, Martha, and Lazarus in the suburb of Bethany. They were a family dear to his heart, two sisters and a brother who seemed to think of him as a brother, too. He loved them, John tells us, although he does not tell us why.

Maybe there is never a “why” to love. They called him Lord, so they knew who he was, and yet they were not his disciples, or at least not in the formal sense. They were his friends, the three people in whose presence he could be a man as well as a messiah.

Just a short time ago Jesus had worked a miracle at their house. “Lord, he whom you love is ill.” The sisters had sent him word, and he had crossed the Jordan to come to them, knowing full well it was too late. Then, after Jesus the man had wept in front of his friend’s tomb, Jesus the messiah shouted him out of it and restored Lazarus to life.

Now he has returned to them with the chief priests hot on his trail. Chatting with Samaritan women is one thing and healing the blind on the Sabbath is another, but reviving corpses is something else altogether. By raising Lazarus from the dead, Jesus has made it to the top of the “most wanted” list.

His days are numbered and he knows it. When he arrives at this friends’ house in Bethany with his disciples, they can see it on his face. So they take Jesus in and they care for him, shutting the world out for this one night at least. They make him supper.

They make him a supper to comfort and give him a chance to relax but it turns sour. It turns sour like much that has happened in Jesus’ life. It will not be long before someone criticizes something about this gathering too, this gathering around a meal, this gathering where someone will complain about excessive giving.

Last Sunday when the herdsmen in our story lived their lives to the fullest they too were criticized. Excessive giving seemed the order of the day. It was the story of the return of the prodigal son. The younger son was given his excessive inheritance, which he lost, and was criticized. The father was excessive ordering the killing of the fatted calf and ordering a meal for which he is criticized by the older son. The older son was excessive in his response and is criticized for his selfishness.

The message we took from the story was it just may be necessary we give from our stuff, our little and our excess, to those we feel least deserving for all to be saved. But some criticize such giving saying look out for number one, don’t give to those too selfish or lazy to work for what you have earned. Forget them! Hold on to what is rightfully yours!

This Sunday in the scripture the criticism continues. Mary, and Martha, and Lazarus take Jesus in and they make him supper. And true to form, criticism soon follows; criticism for excessive giving on Mary’s part.

The dinner is at Lazarus’ place. One sister, Martha served her guests. The other sister, Mary, is criticized, by of all people Judas, for using an expensive perfume to anoint Jesus. Judas, the one who betrays Jesus, criticizes Mary for what he thinks is an unwise and extravagant gift. In his view, Mary is squandering her gift.

Judas says the money spent on the perfume could have been better spent on the poor. He is saying the poor are more deserving than Jesus. The truth of course is he wanted some of the money spent for himself. His reputation was as one who skimmed a bit for his own pocket. He is angry his profit is being wasted on Jesus.

Jesus, for his part is giving in to Mary’s wishes and her gift. From what we learned in the story of the prodigal son, and like Mary, we are to make available to God all that God needs from us.

At the dinner at Lazarus’ Mary shows us what we have that God needs. God needs the most expensive of our possessions. God needs all of us. God needs our body, our mind, and our spirit. Oh yes, and God needs all of our stuff too.

The dinner at Lazarus’ is also a foreshadowing of the last supper where there was another meal, criticism that led to controversy among the disciples, and the exchange of another extravagant gift.

Jesus served at that dinner. Jesus even serves Judas who will enter into the controversy of betrayal and criticize him to the authorities who will take his life. Jesus is at odds with Judas again. Be it Jesus’ comfort or his life, Judas criticizes and the result is excessive.

Mary is holding a slender clay jar in her hands. Without a word she kneels at Jesus’ feet and breaks the neck of the jar, so that the smell of the perfume fills the room. As everyone is watching she loosens her hair, pours balm on Jesus’ feet, touches him, then wipes the salve off again with her hair.

Mary gives the extravagant gift of her lifelong love for Jesus. And Jesus? Why he will ultimately give the extravagant gift of himself.

The Son of God, given to each of us for the forgiveness of our sin gives his life that we may know a life filled with grace and blessings and joy. That we may know a love lasting for life eternal, for life in God’s kingdom. But there is more. There is something else afoot in these dinners of criticism and excess. There is embedded here a radical new form of worship. There were many forms of worship in Jesus’ day as there are in ours. Some however, may surprise us.

Sunday Worship is worship, of course. Participating in the sacraments, Baptism and The Lord’s Supper, is another form of worship. Living in the faithful covenant of marriage is a life changing form of worship. As is obeying the ten commandments, studying God’s word, prayer, and ministry and service to the church and to one another. All are forms of worship.

But our lives, giving the most extravagant gift we have, our lives, is perhaps the most powerful form of worship in our worship options. We show our love for God in how we live our lives. How we choose to live our lives is our ultimate act of worship to God. It is in the giving of our lives to God that God sees the depth of our love and our gift giving intentions.

Yet criticism comes to us if we do it the right way. If we give gifts from what is ours to those least deserving, our selfless extravagant gifts, criticism will come. Criticism will come when we live our lives, giving our love and more to our neighbor. The ones across the street and the ones across town. Friend and foe alike. Criticism comes to us when we give our time, our talent, and our possessions in ways the world sees as unwise and extravagant.

Oh yes, we will be criticized by people who hold this world secular values. But, Jesus will say to them as he said to Judas, Leave her alone. Leave her alone. She will always have me with her. See how she worship me. See how she loves me.

If we enter into a life of worship in these ways, the power of God’s love, grace, blessing and covenant promises will be revealed to us. Though we were lost, we will be found, and we will always have God with us. Our hearts will be opened to God’s and we will forever be at table with him receiving the extravagant gift of his love and his life for each of us.

So Mary proceeded to rub his feet with ointment so precious that its sale might have fed a poor family for a year, an act so lavish that it suggest more about her excess. Dear ones, there will be more excess to come. There will be nothing simple about the death of this man, just as there has been nothing simple about his life. In Jesus, the extravagance of God’s love is made flesh. In him, the excessiveness of God’s mercy is made alive.

Mary understood this and acted on it. While some of those standing by thought her mad, or wasteful at least, she and the one whose feet she rubbed suspected the truth.

Where God is concerned, there is no need to fear running out of nard or of life, either one. Where God is concerned, there is always more – more than we can either ask or imagine - gifts from our lavish, lavish Lord who in his extravagance holds back not one iota of his love.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen. 031213.gpc