"Promises, promises..."-- Matthew 22:15-22-- Oct. 19, 2014

 

We’ve done it again. We have promised. We have committed "ourselves to live our faith in such a manner that our lives and our words may draw children towards the love we know in God. We [have] reaffirmed our commitment to the life of Christ in our midst, as together we advocate for the nurture, safety and protection of this child and all children, and strive for righteousness, justice, and peace for all people." That’s what we said. What were we thinking?!

According to the Children’s Defense Fund, "Each day in America, 4 children are killed by abuse or neglect, 5 children or teens commit suicide...Each day in America 7 children or teens are killed by guns, 24 children or teens die from accidents....Each day in America 847 babies are born to teen mothers, 1241 babies are born without healthcare, 1392 babies are born into extreme poverty...Each day in America 1837 children are confirmed as abused or neglected, 4028 children are arrested..." Vermont was ranked 10^th in all 50 states in the percentage of children who were poor, 14^th in the percentage of children who live in food insecure households. (CDF Website) What was that we committed our lives to?

The theme for this year’s Children’s Sabbath is "Precious in God’s Sight: Answering the Call to Cherish and Protect Every Child." Perfect! We just committed ourselves to advocate for the nurture, safety and protection of Lindyn and all children, so we are with the program. Now, if we only knew what that meant and how to do it, let alone if we only had the courage, wisdom, and faith to do it.

There is a story in the Jewish tradition that says:

While the sage Choni was walking along a road, he saw a man planting a carob tree. Choni asked him: "How long will it take for this tree to bear fruit?" "Seventy years," replied the man. Choni then asked, "Are you so healthy a man that you expect to live that length of time and eat its fruit?" The man answered, "I found a fruitful world because my ancestors planted it for me. Likewise, I am planting for my children."

It is just such a faithful, longterm perspective that is required for us to begin to discern how we will live out the promises we’ve made this morning, and a couple weeks ago when we baptized Emma Bishop. This story is part of a larger passage in which the rabbis are discussing Psalm 126, which says that when God returns the captives to Zion, "They will be like those who dream." So the story goes on--"Can one dream for 70 years?" Choni wondered. So after his encounter with man on the road, Choni fell asleep for 70 years and awoke from his decades of dreaming to find the tree grown to fullness, bearing fruit for the generations that followed him." (Told by Marian Wright Edelman in the Welcome to 2014 Children’s Sabbath)

Can you even begin to imagine what fruit our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will be presented with in 2084, 70 years from now? What trees are we planting now? Lindyn, God willing, will be almost 72. Will there be a Second Congregational Church in Bennington? If there is, maybe it will have a different name. Surely it will look very different and will do things very differently from the way we’re doing them. A number of us had the opportunity to dream and listen to Mike Piazza this week, hearing what a church for the 21^st century might look like. I’m afraid that we are primarily a church for the 20^th century, but we got a glimpse at the fruit tree seed catalogue this week, and are excited about some of the seeds we might plant that will bear fruit.

You may (or may not) be wondering what any of this has to do with our gospel reading for this morning, where Jesus is confronted by the Herodians and Pharisees and asked whether it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. "Money, politics, and religion, oh my!" is the way one commentator reacts to this passage. (David Lose, inthemeantime, 10/13/14) Well, money, politics, and religion are all involved in living out those baptismal vows as well, but let’s first try to understand what Jesus’ response to the question might tell us.

"The enemy of my enemy is my friend," it is said, which also describes the current situation we find ourselves in in the Middle East, especially in regard to the coalition against ISIS. In the passage in Matthew, Jesus has already made his entry into Jerusalem and cleansed the Temple, so he has made some powerful enemies. There is no other reason why the Pharisees and the Herodians would have come together, other than to entrap Jesus, and after a little fauning, they ask him a question designed to get him into trouble with one or the other groups. "Teacher,...tell us then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?"

This tax was the Imperial tax, one of many taxes that the Jews of Palestine were required to pay. There were Temple taxes, land taxes, custom taxes, and this Imperial tax, paid as a tribute to Rome to support its occupation of their country. Each Palestinian had to pay a denarius, about a full day’s wage, to the Emperor, and it had to be paid with a coin that bore Caesar’s image on it, as well as the words "Son of the Divine Augustus." To the Pharisaic or observant Jew, that meant you broke the first 2 commandments in one shot– using an idol and proclaiming another god’s name.

"Teacher, ...so sincere, so impartial, tell us, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?" Jesus knows their game and plays it skillfully. "Show me the coin used for the tax," he says, and when they produce a denarius, it is no doubt from a Herodian’s pocket. A Pharisee would never carry one, but Herodians, like their name implies, were complicit with Rome’s rule. Jesus forces their hand. Then he challenges them both–"Whose image or ikon is this, and whose title?" They answered, "The Emperor’s." "Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s." Both groups of Jews would have affirmed that all things are God’s, and also would have understood immediately Jesus’ reference to "image," that formative verse in the first chapter of Genesis which says that God created human beings, male and female, in the divine image, in God’s own image. Whose image do you bear? Jesus is asking.

As usual, Jesus does not offer pat answers. And the way this passage has been used to justify all sorts of approaches to church and state questions is often way too blunt and cut and dried to really be true to what Jesus was saying. Religion, politics, and money do mix and challenge and inform one another. If we believe that all things belong to God, and that every child is precious in God’s sight, how do we provide quality education, health care, and security for the children we have promised to care for? If politics comes from the word "polis" or community, how can we as a community do what we need to do for the common good?

We know that 80% of a child’s brain is developed in the first 3 years of life. 700 new neural connections are formed every second, through the interaction of genes, environment and experiences. "Children who are given quality early experiences have better relationships with classmates and friends, and develop better language, math, and social skills. They score higher on school-readiness tests, are 40% less likely to need special education, and 70% less likely to commit violent crimes." (Let’s Grow Kids website) An investment in early childhood services and education has a much greater return than paying for incarceration, or prolonged special remedial services, or various other social implications. Is that politics? Or religion?

"Whose image is on the coin?" Whose image is on you? If we agree that everything is God’s, then everything we do and have is God’s as well. One church passed out markers during the service, and folks were asked to put a cross on their credit cards. Then every time for the next couple of weeks they used their credit cards, they were reminded that this purchase, too, belonged to God.

(You may be interested to know that one characteristic of a 21^st century church will no doubt be the availability of direct deposit giving, as well as payment through credit cards. People are carrying less and less cash and do almost all their financial transactions online or with credit cards.)

So where might we invest our time, talents, and resources now, so that they will bear fruit in the future? If what we know about early childhood development is true, and I have no reason to believe it isn’t, then investing in early childhood programs is essential. Our relationship with Headstart in North Bennington, supporting them with Boots on the Ground, is a start. I can imagine all sorts of other ways we could directly connect with those children and their families. Volunteering in classrooms, setting up reading programs–just reading with kids, or singing with kids–volunteering with the Seedlings Program–a joint venture of Community College of Vermont and Retired Senior Volunteer Program–which connects a "pod" of 7 first-graders with 5 or 6 adult tutors and mentors who follow them through 5^th grade. Walking, hopping, or sponsoring in the CROP Walk provides funds for hunger and development programs that benefit children. Joining in the work of Eaarth Advocates to address climate change and the earth we are leaving to our children and gradchildren. Signing up to be in the Godly Play classroom – we really do want to have 2 adults each Sunday. The list of immediately available possibilities could go on and on.

And we need to invest in making ours a 21^st Century church, so that the children and parents of this and future generations will find a welcome in our church family that communicates to them. The language we use, the technology we use, the music we worship with, the activities we engage in–all need to be looked at through the eyes of those who haven’t heard much good news coming from the church and who aren’t sure what we’re talking about when we do communicate.

We commit ourselves to live our faith in such a manner that our lives and our words may draw children towards the love we know in God. We reaffirm our commitment to the life of Christ in our midst, as together we advocate for the nurture, safety and protection of this child and all children, and strive for righteousness, justice and peace, for all people.

May God help us to keep our promises. Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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Crop Walk 2014

CROP WALK 2014 - click on image to view video

About 25 walkers and 2 hoppers raised just over $4,000 for the CROP Walk last Sunday while enjoying a dry, cool fall afternoon. Thank you to all who donated!

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"Celebrate!"-- Matthew 22:1-14, Philippians 4: 1-9-- Oct. 12, 2014

 

I am sometimes asked about the process I go through in writing sermons. How do you know what to preach on every week? Where do you get your ideas? How long does it take? Where do you get your title? I imagine that the process is different for every preacher, and for any one of us, the process isn’t exactly the same every week.

As you may know, I do generally follow the Common Lectionary–the set of Scripture texts assigned for each week by an ecumenical committee so that on any given week, a good portion of the Church is dealing with the same texts. The exceptions to that practice are when it’s a special occasion–like last week’s World Communion Sunday, or a baptism, or an event that’s happened during the week that begs to be addressed–or the occasional sermon series, like a Lenten series on earthcare or spiritual disciplines or various other topics.

This week I read and discussed the lectionary texts with fellow members of my Clergy Support group, which meets once a month. Our church settings are all quite different, and we often approach the texts very differently. Still, our discussions are almost always rich and stimulating.

When we read this week’s gospel lesson–Matthew’s parable of the Wedding Banquet– we all looked at each other and said, "Yikes!" It’s not the Wedding Banquet parable from Luke that we may have expected and which, while challenging in its own right, doesn’t leave you with a pit in your stomach like Matthew’s. You remember Luke’s version?

Someone gave a great dinner and invited many to it. But when the slaves went out to issue the invitations, one person excused himself saying, "I’ve just bought some land..." Another said, "I’ve just bought a new pair of oxen, I have to go try them out." and still another said, "I’ve just gotten married, and,...well, you know..." So the owner became angry and said, "go out at once into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame." And when that was done, there was still room in the hall, so the owner told his servants, "Go out into the streets and lanes and compel people to come in, so that the house may be filled; for I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner."

The Gospel of Thomas has a similar version of this parable, and when the invited guests all give excuses, with various things to sell or trade, the owner tells the servants to "go out to the roads and bring those whom you find, that they may dine. Traders and merchants [shall] not [enter] the place of my Father."

Both of those versions have their own "zing," but not quite the violence and ruthlessness of Matthew’s version.

At any rate, I had a few ideas of where I might go with the text, having to do with the nature of wedding feasts (After all, wasn’t George Clooney’s wedding on our Joys list just a couple weeks ago?) As well as a few ideas about what it might mean to be dressed appropriately. So, when the time came, all too soon, on Wednesday morning to give a sermon title to the Banner, I non-committally came up with "Celebrate!"

Then I began to dig into the commentaries, the blogs, and websites. "There are seventeen parables in the Gospel of Matthew," one commentator began. "If you had to choose one that was the hardest to interpret, this week’s Parable of the Wedding Banquet is a good candidate." (Dan Clendenin, Journey with Jesus) Another one asked,"Why would anyone choose to preach on Matthew’s version of the Great Banquet parable?" (Deborah Krause, in weekly seeds, 10/12/14) It began to feel like that journey of Dorothy and her 3 friends in The Wizard of Oz when they walked into the enchanted forest around the wicked witch’s castle. "I’d turn back if I wuz you," the sign read. "Either deal with the distinct and unattractive particularity of this text," a third writer advised, "or choose one of the other three more attractive and far more edifying passages appointed for this day." (David Lose, inthemeantime, 10/6/14) Well, as they say, fools rush in where angels fear to tread, and I had already put the title in the newspaper. I decided to deal with it, just as any of us might have to deal with the strange, often unattractive passages that are in our Bible, and someone might challenge us to tell them what we think about that.

So, let’s make sure we know what this parable says, not what we vaguely may remember about "some wedding parable" we heard once. It’s basically, as one writer puts it, the old "‘That’s good! That’s bad!’ schtick-

A wedding banquet–good!

No, that’s bad; the invited guests didn’t come!

But the king sent people to look for them! That’s good!

No, that’s bad; they killed them and burned their city!

But then they went into the streets and invited everyone they found! That’s good!

But then the king saw a guy who wasn’t wearing a wedding robe, and he had his attendants throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!

Oh, that’s bad. Definitely very bad." [Jan Richardson, painted prayerbook]

This is different from Luke’s and Thomas’ versions–this part about killing and burning cities and binding up the poor schmuck off the street who wasn’t wearing a wedding robe and throwing him into the outer darkness. What is Matthew doing here? Why would he add these details, although it must be noted that the seizing and killing of servants is a familiar pattern in many of Matthew’s parables.

"It’s as if Matthew’s version of the story got taken hostage in the Jewish War with Rome," one writer says. "All the joy has been wrung out of the party, and in its place Matthew builds in anger, violence, destruction, dread, and eternal damnation...It seems to bear the trauma of Matthew’s context," which is after the utter and brutal destruction of Jerusalem by the armies of Rome and the siege and final suicide of the Jewish remnant at Massada. (Deborah Krause, ibid.)

Scripture may be "God-breathed," as someone has described it, but it is transmitted through human hands and mouths, which are never isolated from their human context. When a passage sounds particularly "un-God-like," you might want to check the human context and see what’s going on in the writer’s world.

This is a tough story for tough times, when the systems and structures seem to be set up with hierarchy and brutality in mind. The residents of Ferguson, MO, and African-American citizens in many other places, know something about systems and structures of violence. Walter Brueggemann, the great Biblical scholar who used to teach at Eden Seminary in St. Louis, was interviewed recently and was asked, in light of the recent events in Ferguson, to talk about the prophets of Israel. The language of the prophets, he said, "has an honesty that can challenge contemporary North American interpreters out of their ‘bourgeois cocoon of niceness.’" (Krause)

Ouch. I don’t know about you, but I confess that much of the time I’d just as soon curl up in my "bourgeois cocoon of niceness." Most of the people in the world don’t have that option.

Jesus stood in that line of prophets, whose speech was often brutally honest. "Rome didn’t execute Jesus for telling feel good stories," one writer says. "We shouldn’t be shocked by a parable that shocks." (Dan Clendenin, op cit.) We might even view this parable as a mirror for the violence of our own society, with structures that are inherently violent to those without power or money or the right color skin or gender or sexual orientation. Most of us benefit from those structures, and so when the invitation comes to a banquet, it may appear as just one more invitation to an appealing event, but honestly, we’ve got plenty of things to do, many of which are quite appealing. "That’s nice," we say, "but no thanks." Who of us feels so passionate about the reign of God that we’re willing to dedicate our whole selves, our whole lives to bringing it about? That, by the way, is what "jihad" means–total dedication to the will of God.

The kingdom of God, though, which Jesus talked about over and over, is for everyone. Everyone in this story receives an invitation. Some try to enter on their own conditions–when it’s convenient, when I’m ready, when I’ve taken care of everything else, when I can fit it in–but the consequences of refusing the invitation are disastrous. The king has them killed and burns their city. The consequences of refusing the invitation into God’s love –outside the parable--are equally disastrous. People who refuse to be loved–by the God known by any name, people who maybe believe they aren’t worthy of love, people who have never experienced love from fellow human beings–people who refuse love live lives that are miserable, and often act out in terrible ways. I know that my life feels pretty miserable when I’m feeling unloved or can’t recognize love or refuse to love. We are all invited to the banquet.

On the other hand, by adding on the parable of the poorly dressed wedding guest, Matthew shows that he "knew how easily grace can melt into permissiveness," a wise preacher said. [Fred Craddock, cited by Stan Duncan in If You Lived Here...] "We mustn’t lose the distinction between accepting all persons from condoning all behavior." While it seems cruel that a poor man picked off the streets to attend the king’s wedding banquet should be thrown out and punished because he wasn’t dressed properly, one commentator does note that wedding robes were usually provided at the door, so that, for some reason, he had refused to take one. (Janet Hunt, Dancing with the Word, 10/5/14)

I’m pretty sure this isn’t advocating a stricter dress code for church, but it did get me thinking about what our choice of clothes–if we have a choice–means. I remember reading that one teacher chooses what she will wear so that poor people will not feel humiliated in her presence. People sometimes ask me if I wear a robe on Sundays, and I do–not because of what it might say to other people, but because of what it says to me. This is your role for now, it says to me. Put aside your concerns about what you’re wearing or how you appear. "Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience," we read in Colossians. Through-out the biblical story, clothes are symbols of relationship with God–be clothed with righteous-ness, put on Christ. Clothing is about intention. How do you intend to be? We "put on" the words of our commission as we go from this place each Sunday. If you don’t have the right clothes on, you can’t be fully present to the celebration.

Grace-- which the invitation to the banquet is about-- grace is free but not cheap. One writer says that Matthew’s parable of the wedding banquet "demands a loss of innocence of the Reign of God as a table that is passively set for us."[Krause] It might challenge us to be about the work of dismantling those structures of violence and rebuilding a society where there truly is dignity and justice for all. Matthew’s parable reminds us of the free nature of the invitation but demands that we recognize the significance, the awesome opportunity, of this banquet. Do not underestimate its power, its beauty, its joy, its depth. "Eye has not seen nor ear heard nor human imagination envisioned what you have prepared for those who love you," Paul writes. We may not really believe that, and so we consider the invitation just one of a number of attractive invitations in our lives.

So, is "Celebrate!" an appropriate title for this sermon? Maybe not in the way I was thinking of it on Wednesday, but today, this morning, with all its sharp edges and warnings included, Matthew’s parable still reminds me that this is an invitation worth taking seriously. The celebration is bigger, more challenging, more multi-layered than just a first reading reveals. The world is still a violent, often brutal place, but we mustn’t let its violence and brutality seduce us into believing that’s all there is. So it is that we would do well to also turn to that other, "more attractive and edifying passage appointed for the day," Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi, not as a place of permanent escape, but as a reminder and source of strength.

8Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.

May it be so.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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Next Level Congregation process

Mike Piazza from the Center for Progressive Renewal is our consultant in the Next Level Congregation process, through the Vermont Conference, helping us discern and move our congregation to an even more vital level.  You are invited to meet with Mike on Wed October 15 either over a brown lunch at noon in Webster hall or join us for dinner or hors d'oeuvres at Madison's Brew Pub at 6pm.  Please sign up on the sheet in Webster Hall or call the office by Tues morning if you plan to join us at Madison's so we can be sure to reserve enough space.

 

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"Come to the Table"-- Matthew 26:26-30-- Oct. 5, 2014

 

Some of you remember the dark times at the beginning of the 1930's. Fascism, communism, economic depression. In 1933 the folks at Shadyside Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh launched a proposal that eventually became Worldwide Communion Sunday, now celebrated each year on the first Sunday in October, an expression of unity among Christians amidst all the forces that would tear the world apart.

The case could be made that we are living today in no less dark times–do I need to list the forces tearing at us today? The rise of Islamism, climate change that seems to be moving us inexorably toward a very different planet, the spread of ebola, the growing chasm between the world’s wealthiest minute percent and the majority of the poor and diminishing middle class, a U.S. congress riddled and paralyzed by blind partisanship, persistent racism that imprisons and kills African American youth, the list goes on, you know the drill... This year’s Worldwide Communion celebration lifts up the plight of Christians throughout the world who are persecuted and killed, in greater numbers now than ever before, in Africa, in the Middle East, in Asia.

For the first followers of Jesus, sharing the bread and wine was a way of gathering together, in times as dark as ours. "Join us for the meal," they would say to one another or to strangers who asked about their fellowship. It was the meal of sharing that set them apart, that defined their reality and their relationship to one another and with Jesus. [Richard Rohr, "The Living Body of Christ" blog, 9/22/14]

Later, as the persecutions increased, communion "became the secret ritual by which the community defined itself and held itself together in its essential message." [Rohr, op cit.] "The Lord Jesus gave us this meal," they said. "We become his body and blood when we share it. He is present with us and present in us." "We are who we eat!" St. Augustine wrote in the 3^rd. C.

So today, in many different traditions, in many different places and settings with many different kinds of bread and drink, we remember who we are. We are one; we are broken; we are to be poured out and offered for others. God is incarnate, enfleshed, present in earthly things like human bodies, bread, wine, juice, creation. Over the centuries, the church has debated what "actually happens" in this ritual–do the molecules of the bread and wine become actual molecules of flesh and blood? How is Christ "really present"? Does it matter if the celebrant–the minister or the priest–is flawed and sinful? [Thankfully, the church decided it didn’t, otherwise we could never celebrate communion!] Who can take communion? Only "believers"? Only adults who understand what’s going on? You can see how these kinds of discussions have a tendency to go in circles.

But the power of this sacrament–these ordinary things made extraordinary–goes way beyond chemical or intellectual reactions. Its effect is deeper than data. Not only do we, in some way, "re-enact" what Jesus shared with his disciples, — he blessed, he broke, he gave – but we also become–in all our many different parts and expressions–we become one body–His body–one loaf, one cup. And around this table, there is always room for another...and another...ad infinitum... All are welcome.

A young widow writes that mealtimes are among the times she misses her husband most–"his empty space at the table is too stark and too raw just now," she writes. "In this long and sorrowing season, I am thankful for the solace of other tables, for those spaces of welcome where there is always room for me." (Jan Richardson, paintedprayerbook, "The Solace of Other Tables," 9/30/14)

How many others–how many of us–long for a place at the table, a place of welcome, a place of nourishment, where they–where we–belong? The fictional Boston bar Cheers knew this–"you wanna go where everybody knows your name." When too many churches exclude and condemn, is it any wonder there are more regulars to neighborhood bars and pubs than there are to neighborhood churches?

Nadia Bolz-Weber, 6-foot tall, tattooed Lutheran pastor of House for Sinners and Saints in Denver, tells the story of a young woman who had found a welcome, a place at the table, at ). When you walk into the meeting place of All Sinners and Saints, even for the first time, you may choose to be assigned a part in the service–a reading, taking up the offering, greeting people, even helping with communion, which is celebrated in the Lutheran tradition every Sunday. So this young woman came to treasure the weekly gathering around the table where she was welcome. And just as she had become accustomed to looking forward to that weekly celebration, she had to travel home for some family obligation. It happened to be on World Communion Sunday, so she looked forward to celebrating the sacrament in her home church, knowing that her friends and church family at Sinners and Saints would also be celebrating.

But Nadia reports that she received a desperate text message that Sunday from the young woman, saying that she had been refused communion in her home church. She wasn’t one of the them, it seemed, she had gone too far astray, she had joined an "unwashed" denomination, maybe she was gay, I can’t remember now what the reason was that she was refused the bread and the cup. But it had literally torn her apart. When Nadia shared the news with her congregation, they immediately responded. "We have to go to the airport with communion tonight," they agreed. "We have to let Rachel know that she is part of the Body."

And so that evening, at the Denver area, a group of tattooed, pierced, motley folks from House met their sister Rachel with some of the communion bread and wine from their service. And they all wept and embraced.

Come to the table. Take and eat. Take and drink. You are welcome here. What more gracious and welcome invitation than the offer of "abundance to give solace to our sorrow and to stir our joy"? [Richardson, ibid.] We are not to linger here forever, but are to be sent out to offer this welcome, this nourishment, to those we meet. People are hungry for hope, hungry for meaning, hungry to be known and accepted, hungry to be helped to become all that they are meant to be. Hungry for blessing.

So come "as children who trust there is enough." Come "unhindered and free," where your "aching will be met with bread...and your sorrow met with drink. Let us open our hands to the feast without shame...and turn towards each other without fear. Let us give up our appetite for despair. Let us taste and know of delight. Let us become bread for a hungry world and drink for those who thirst. So may we be blessed. So may we become a blessing. May the feast be everywhere. [from Jan Richardson’s "A Blessing for World Communion Sunday"–And the Table Will Be Wide] Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

 

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"Emptying Out, Filling from the Well"-- Exodus 17:1-7, Philippians 2:1-13--Sept. 28, 2014

 

This morning as we baptized Emma, we affirmed that she is beloved, a precious child of God, beautiful to behold–as are each one of us. The watermark is on her and our foreheads–or all over us, if we were baptized by immersion–and this is who we are, signed and sealed by God.

The problem is that much of the time, like any other child of a parent, we do a lot of complaining and rebelling against this God by whom we are beloved and of whom we are precious children. The reading from Exodus last week told the story of the Israelites’ complaining against God that they didn’t have any food to eat in the wilderness, and Bruce’s sermon was entitled "The Joy of Complaining?"

In this morning’s reading, there’s still a whole lotta complaining going on, this time about the lack of water. This God, it seems, by whom we are beloved and of whom we are precious children, just doesn’t seem to provide what we want when we want it. Life is so much harder than we think it should be, especially if, as we hear, "God is in charge." Even a quick glance through the newspaper or one cycle of tv news is enough to make us question the truth of that statement. If this is what happens when "God is in charge," maybe it’s time for new management.

And lest we think it’s just the God of the Old Testament that we have a problem with, remember where being the beloved son of God got Jesus–crucified on a cross. Someone has observed that we may be anxious for the Second Coming of Christ because, honestly, we aren’t that crazy about his first coming. Look where it got him–and most of his early followers. You call that success? If we really are to follow him, can we expect any better treatment?

Episcopal priest and scholar Cynthia Bourgeault writes, "My hunch is that a good many of the difficulties we sometimes run into trying to make our Christianity work stem from the fact that right from the start people missed how different Jesus’ approach really was." (Wisdom Jesus, p. 63) When people began to call Jesus "the Son of God," it was a direct contradiction of what the Empire was telling everyone–that Caesar was the Son of God. Caesar ruled by fear and domination. People bowed to Caesar in order to escape punishment and death. That is the nature of power as the world recognizes it. That is what the gods are like, the Empire taught. How many of us still think of God that way–with fear of punishment? Who was–who is–this God that Jesus is the Son of?

There was a hymn, however, in early Christianity, that talked about a different kind of power, a different image of God, which Paul quotes in his letter to the Philippians–

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God [or, had equal status with God], did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death–even death on a cross. Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

This power is not unilateral, not top down, but rather relational, flowing into the other. "He emptied himself, becoming human...he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." This is a whole different kind of power than Caesar’s power, than the world recognized. "Jesus rules by relationship and empathy," Bruce Epperly writes. Rather than being jealous and competitive, he "wants us to grow in creativity, freedom, and agency...The more creative agency we embody, the greater opportunity for God’s vision to be achieved in the world..[This is] the obedience of love, not fear," (Adventurous Lectionary, 9/28/14) so "every knee shall bend" in love, not fear.

This passage from Philippians makes some profound affirmations about God, Christ, and us. "Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus," Paul wrote. We can have the mind of Christ, Paul says! Remember that "mind" was not thought of as something that simply goes on in the brain, but rather was a whole body perception and will and decision-making. In fact, Jesus often talked about metanoia, transformation, literally meaning "going into the larger mind." Jesus’ teaching and personal style were all about abundance, generosity, extravagance. He taught about a God who had a spacious vision for the world. Jesus’ followers–mostly peasants, folks at the margins, people who had to struggle just to stay alive–saw only scarcity, as do many of us. And yet, in his presence, they experienced abundance. Who is this one preaching abundance, generosity, extravagance? If Jesus is the Son of God–if we are the sons and daughters of God-- what kind of God is this?

Further, Paul said, when we are "open to and guided by the mind of Christ, we experience solidarity with all creation and have a sense of unity with our brothers and sisters in faith."(Epperly, op cit.)–"Be of one mind." -- Instead of separating ourselves from "the other," we see that we are actually one. We’re all in this together, more alike than we are different.

"Therefore, my beloved, [Paul writes,] work out your salvation with fear and trembling..." The word "your" is plural–our salvation is for all of us, and instead of the words "fear and trembling," think "awe and energy." [Epperly] Our collective salvation that we are to work together on with awe and energy is for here and now, not just some later time after we die.

And not only are we in this with each other, God is in this with us. When we are able to "have the mind of Christ," we discover "the divine-human synergy" [Bruce Epperly, op cit.]–God working alongside and within us. This is the God we are beloved by. This is the God whose precious children we are. This is not a Santa Claus God who knows when we’ve been naughty or nice, but a God who longs for us all to have the mind of Christ, open to God’s love and abundance, not grasping onto anything, but allowing God’s power to flow through us. We are to become "like God," as Jesus was, not lording it over others, but rather as clear vessels for divine love and abundance to flow through and into the world, even through our deaths–our final death and all those little deaths and losses we experience in the course of a lifetime, like the end of a relationship, the loss of our health or vitality, the loss of a job or dream. Even through those losses and deaths, God’s love and abundance can flow into us and through us, bringing something new to life.

How different from the "winner takes all" god our culture holds up to be worshipped, the kind of god who annihilates and crushes all opponents, the god for whom being #1 is the only goal worth pursuing!

Not grasping, emptying, receiving all that comes to us in life, being present to it, and allowing it to flow through us is a very different practice from the usual response in our culture to things that are painful. Most people in our culture do whatever they can to avoid feeling the pain–by numbing their emotions with substances or exercise or work or shopping or eating. They avoid their underlying fear by expressing anger, often inappropriately. Putting on the mind of Christ means allowing all experiences, all emotions, to come but not clinging to any of them. Rather, releasing them. Obviously, easier said than done, and not without a lot of practice. But it is not only for saints and holy people. It is available to and possible for all of us.

Jan Richardson is an artist and retreat leader whose husband Gary died last year at the beginning of Lent. I’m guessing Gary was in his 40's or 50's. A year and a half later, Jan was able to write–

The hollowing began the moment Gary died. In the weeks that followed, it came as a physical sensation: in the center of my chest, an emptying nearly tangible, a hollowing out of the heart and of the life I had known.

Last week I visited with a friend of mine whose husband died a year and a half before Gary. We spoke of the hollowing. We talked about how there is nothing that will fix the emptiness. And we spoke, too, of how the emptiness can become a space that, in one of the mysteries of grief, leaves us more and more open to the receiving of joy. The hollowing happens. Life will empty us out, whether we will it or not. Yet Paul reminds us...that we belong to the Christ who freely chose to empty himself: who gave himself completely in a way that, paradoxically, did not diminish him but helped to reveal the fullness of who he was, and is. Encompassed by the Christ who enfolds our emptiness in his own, we become free to choose how we will respond to the emptying. In [that] emptying...how will we allow the hollowing to open our hearts to the world we are called to serve in joy and in love? [Painted Prayerbook, 9/28/14]

This baptism into the Body of Christ, this claiming of our identity as beloved, precious children of the God of Christ Jesus, is more radical than we usually acknowledge. This God of emptying, this God whose love and abundance and generosity overflow and dance in that trinitarian dance between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, this is the God who claims us and flows within us–not the dominating, fear-mongering god of Caesar or Empire or terrorists or plague. "Nothing in all creation [Paul writes to another church]–neither death nor life, nor things present nor things to come, –nothing can separate us from the love of God whom we know in Christ Jesus." Nothing can separate us from the God we need, even if it may not be the God we want.

Ellen and Todd–and we all–have made promises to teach Emma about this God and to live our lives, as best as we are able, so that she and all children might grow up in a world of justice and peace and, we might add, on a planet that can still sustain life as we know it. At its best, the church is where we learn to trust in that God. "We need places," Stephanie Paulsen writes, "to pray as if someone were listening, to study as if we might learn something worth writing on our hearts, to join with others in service as if the world might be transformed. Churches are places to learn to practice, with others, a continual conversion of life, a permanent openness to change." (The Christian Century, Oct. 1, 2014, p. 2)

Emptiness, being hollowed out, allowing, welcoming, letting go, opening to God, these deepen that watermark on our brows. Unless we become empty, we can’t be filled with God. It’s the only way we will be able to move into this time of profound change on our planet, as we let go of "business as usual" which will only lead to the end of life on this planet as we know it. This is the world Emma will grow up in. Emptiness, being hollowed out, not grasping, not ac-cumulating, not using up. As Jan Richardson writes, "As you attend to the empty spaces–in your life and in the world–may those spaces open wide to the joy that comes." So here, finally, a blessing--

Blessing That Becomes Empty As It Goes

This blessing
keeps nothing
for itself.
You can find it
by following the path
of what it has let go,
of what it has learned
it can live without.

Say this blessing out loud
a few times
and you will hear
the hollow places
within it,
how it echoes
in a way
that gives your voice
back to you
as if you had never
heard it before.

Yet this blessing
would not be mistaken
for any other,
as if,
in its emptying,
it had lost
what makes it
most itself.

It simply desires
to have room enough
to welcome
what comes.

Today,
it’s you.

So come and sit
in this place
made holy
by its hollows.
You think you have
too much to do,
too little time,
too great a weight
of responsibility
that none but you
can carry.

I tell you,
lay it down.
Just for a moment,
if that’s what you
can manage at first.
Five minutes.
Lift up your voice—
in laughter,
in weeping,
it does not matter—
and let it ring against
these spacious walls.

Do this
until you can hear
the spaces within
your own breathing.
Do this
until you can feel
the hollow in your heart
where something
is letting go,
where something
is making way. [Jan Richardson, op cit.]

So may we be blessed. Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

 

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The People's Climate March, Sunday Sept. 21 in NYC

This march was the largest march calling for action on the climate. There were over 2,000 folks from Vermont to make the March. Grace Winslow, Barbara True-Weber, Kathy Shaw, and Mike Weber were 4 folks from our congregation to go. Thanks to them for representing us and helping to voice our concern for the environment!

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Crop Walk, Sunday October 19th at 1pm

End hunger one step at a time. Signup at the web link below or at on Sundays at Second Congregational Church.

 
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Rally Sunday, September 14, 2014

Following worship, the whole church family was invited to “rally” in exploring a number of different service and mission opportunities for the coming year. Tables with ongoing projects were staffed by folks involved in different ministries, and a “None of the Above” inspiration table was available to help connect folks with resources and others who wish to initiate new projects and ministries. This was just the beginning of our year of inspiration and empowerment.  Seated here are Maggie Briggs and Scott Winslow at the Bennington Free Clinic Table.  See photo album of events on our Facebook page.  Click the link "Find us on Facebook " at the bottom of this page.

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"Letting Go...over and over..."-- Matthew 18:21-35-- Sept. 14, 2014

 

This has been a week of remembrance of the events of September 11, 2001. A friend of mine from my Positive Psychology course remembered her dad this week and her last phone conversation with him, shortly before he was killed in the Twin Towers attack. She was able to give thanks for him and all that he was to her; to "re-member" him, affirm her connection with him and the ways he is still a part of her. That is the very best kind of "re-membering."

It has been said that we are a nation that "never forgets, never forgives." (Walter Brueggemann, Journal for Preachers, Pent. 2014, p. 2) So how timely that today’s gospel reading from Matthew should be about Peter’s question about how many times we are to forgive and Jesus’ teaching about forgiveness.

The image on the top of one of the websites I turned to this week was of that familiar way of counting–4 vertical lines side by side and then one line drawn diagonally across them, each little clump a group of 5. "Then Peter came and said to Jesus, ‘Lord, if my brother or sister sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?" One clump of 5 plus 2 more lines. "Jesus said to him, ‘Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times." In other words, off the page, forever, over and over.

Peter had thought he was being pretty generous, offering to forgive an offender 7 times, but Jesus said, "Forget about seven. Forget about keeping count." Really? "Ask a child to apologize," someone has suggested, "to admit his or her wrong-doing, and you will discover the early limits of our empathy." [Eric Barreto, workingpreacher.org, 9/14/14] This whole forgiveness business is hard work, for children and adults. "Being corrected is painful, asking for forgiveness requires humility, and granting forgiveness is challenging." (Barreto, op cit.) And at what point do you have to say, "Enough!"? Does forgiving mean letting the abuse continue, allowing the serial killer back on the streets, the terrorist to try blowing that plane up again?

"Forgiveness," writes Bruce Epperly, "...doesn’t mean forgoing justice or putting an end to the legal system. Crimes need to be addressed and serious criminals need to be taken off the streets. But, even the serious criminal is kindred: the culture that supports us economically and in terms of privilege may also have influenced her or his poor decision-making. There is no one completely innocent or guilty..." [Epperly, adventurouslectionary.org, 9/14/14]

"How often should I forgive? As many as seven times?" Jesus said to him, "Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times." It’s not about keeping score. It’s about staying open to the endless reservoir of grace, much bigger than our imagination or even our notions of justice, though imagination and justice are within that reservoir. "Do not despair," St. Augustine said, "one of the thieves was saved." He then observed, "Do not presume, one of the thieves was damned." [cited by Dan Clendenin, Journey with Jesus, 9/14/14] Just keep forgiving.

Aristotle said, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit." Forgiveness, we could say, is not an act but a habit. "Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times."

In the 1950's 6 year-old Ruby Bridges was the only African-American child in an all-white school in New Orleans, LA. She single-handedly integrated that school. Ruby walked to and from school every day with 2 federal escorts in front of her and 2 behind her, "while an angry crowd of white adults heaped abuses on her little head," as one woman describes it. "Child psychiatrist Robert Coles noticed her lips were moving as she walked, and asked her, in her home, what she was saying. She said she was praying, ‘Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.’ Her parents hoped, by giving her this prayer, she could shield her mind and heart, and walk unscathed through her daily hell." "We are what we repeatedly do. Forgiveness is not an act but a habit." [Nancy Rockwell] First we shape our habits, then our habits shape us. It takes about 30 days to shape a habit, positive psychology tells us. Give it a try.

"Russell Banks, in [his book] The Sweet Hereafter, has school-bus driver Dolores Driscoll confide to us how she waits everyday for the same three siblings, who are always late. Time and again she had chided them, but when nothing changed in them she changed herself, turning those extra minutes into a meditative time for sipping coffee and thinking about her life. And so she forgave them, and set herself free." [Nancy Rockwell, the bite in the apple, 9/6/14]

Because, you see, that’s what forgiveness does. It’s not so much what it does to the offender, it’s what it does to us–it frees us. It frees us from the past, so that we can live spaciously into the future. "Forgiveness [writes David Lose]...is ultimately a decision about the past–the decision to accept both that you cannot change the past and also that the past does not have to hold you captive." [inthemeantime, 9/7/14]

South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, headed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, is one of the most powerful examples of forgiveness. It named the truth of the many unspeakable wrongs committed mostly by white South Africans against black South Africans. They were not to be forgotten. But the incredible wisdom of this commission was its recognition that South Africa would have no future if it couldn’t move beyond its past.

Now retired, Bishop Tutu has written a book with his daughter Mpho on forgiving, and includes in it not only lessons about forgiving others but also about forgiving oneself, sometimes just as hard, if not harder, than forgiving others.

Learning from the past [the Tutus write] is not the same as being held hostage by what we have done [or by what someone else has done to us]. At some stage we must let go of the past and begin again. We have said repeatedly that no one is undeserving of forgiveness, and this includes you...I know it can still be difficult to offer ourselves the forgiveness we can so freely give to others. Perhaps we hold ourselves to a higher standard than the standard to which we hold other people. (If we think carefully, we recognize this double standard as a small piece of arrogance: I am a better person than he or she is, so I should behave better.) [cited by Anna macdonald Dobbs, ekklesiaproject.org, 9/10/14]

The servant in the parable Jesus told Peter about forgiveness also seemed to hold himself to a different standard than he held others. After being forgiven by the king for a debt equivalent to around 15 years of labor, worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in today’s money, –a debt he could never repay--he turned around and "put the screws," as Peterson puts it, on another slave who owed more like 100 days worth of labor. After being forgiven from a deep reservoir of grace, this servant goes back to the ledger, counting offenses. The harshness of his punishment at the end–being "tortured until he would pay his entire debt"–is more a description of the world created by such offense-counting and returning than it is a prescription for those who don’t forgive.

"Forgiveness is grounded in interdependence and holy relativity," Bruce Epperly writes. (Ibid.) We must decide how we will be related to one another–tied up in knots, or connected by strands that stretch and weave–for we are connected. "Forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us," Jesus us taught us to pray. "Untangle the knots within so that we can mend our hearts’ simple ties to each other," is how Neil Douglas-Kloz prefers to translate the Aramaic. Or "Detach the fetters of faults that bind us, like we let go the guilt of others." We are all inter-related, interdependent. How do we make those connections life-giving instead of strangling and death-dealing?

So we pray not only for forgiveness but also for the ability to forgive, because sometimes it seems beyond our ability. The creeds and testimony of the truest parts of our tradition attest that forgiveness is the work of the Spirit. "In a society that ‘never forgets, never forgives,’ [writes Walter Brueuggemann] the work of the Spirit is to interrupt the cycles of hate and fear and vengeance and violence with forgiveness. The urgency of forgiveness–in families, in congregations, between haves and have-nots, among nations–is certain. It is the Spirit who breaks such cycles of deathliness. It is that Spirit who makes new ways possible. Forgiveness is hard, steady, demanding work." [Brueggemann, op. cit.]

What more important work is there, than to be part of the Spirit’s work of making new, breaking the cycles of deathliness and violence, not simply by pronouncing forgiveness, but going deep into the places of alienation, woundedness, and delusion that feed those acts that offend and sometimes inflict so much pain.

Hear one final testimony of the power of forgiveness to set free, this from the mother of a yet another teen-age African-American boy named Jordan Davis, who was shot and killed by a middle-aged white man named Michael Dunn. Dunn was acquitted of the murder. After the verdict, Lucia McBath, the young boy’s mom, was interviewed, and the reporter marveled at her grace and generosity–

Don’t think that we aren’t angry. [Ms. McBath said] Don’t’ think that I’m not angry. Forgiving Michael Dunn doesn’t negate what I’m feeling and my anger. And I am allowed to feel that way. But more than that I have a responsibility to God to walk the path He’s laid. In spite of my anger, and my fear that we won’t get the verdict that we want, I am still called by the God I serve to walk this out.

In another article, this same journalist reported Jordan’s mom telling him–

I am praying for him [Dunn] and my church is praying for him. I forgave him a long time ago. I had to. It’s not just about Jordan. And I would not stand and wait for him to apologize. I don’t need his apology. I had forgiven him pretty much in the first 30 days. I just knew that was what I was supposed to do...I remember one of the first interviews we did...And after, I was walking past St. Patrick’s Cathedral with my friend Lisa and I said, ‘Lisa, I have to go in there.’ And I went in and I was just sobbing for 2 hours. And the Lord helped me forgive [Dunn] right there. In those 2 hours, I came out and felt like, ‘OK, I’m done." [Anna Macdonald Dobs, op cit.]

We may not want to think of forgiveness as simply obeying the law of God, unless we trust God’s ways enough to know that living in that Way is ultimately the way to Life, and Joy, Freedom and Wholeness. So let us pray for those who have sinned against us, those who have offended or harmed us. Let us pray that we ourselves might be forgiven the ways we have offended or wronged others, even for the harm we have done to ourselves. Let us re-member. The web that connects us all is living and full of Light and Life. Don’t keep score. Just throw yourself into the game. Give thanks to the One whose reservoir of grace and mercy is deep and wide. May it be so.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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"The Way of the Wicked"-- Ezekiel 33:7-11, Matthew 18:15-20-- Sept 7, 2014

 

I knew it wasn’t just me when on the Tuesday night after Labor Day Weekend, Brian Williams opened his Nightly News broadcast with, "If any of your conversations around barbeques or tables this weekend turned serious, you may have noticed that our world seems to be falling apart." A world map was then displayed with all the "hotspots" highlighted, mostly where radical Islamists had attacked or raged, though there was also Ukraine and western Africa and Ferguson, MO. It was a week marked by the release of a gruesome videotape showing the beheading of a second American journalist, Scott Sotloff. "The world seems to be falling apart." The way of the wicked seems to be everywhere.

So, I’ve been wondering–What are we to do with this? How shall we respond? Not in the sense of foreign policy recommendations, as important as that level of response is, and for now not advocating any particular legislation or action by Congress, [if such a thing were even possible], but rather, how are we to deal with the relentless barage of violence and bad news? What kind of conversations do we have around our kitchen tables? How do we talk to our children and one another about this? How do we live our lives, day by day, in such a time?

One option is to try to avoid the news–don’t read the papers, don’t watch tv, don’t listen to the radio, set the picture of your homepage to a photo of cats or puppies or flowers. And, actually, sometimes we do need to fast from the news–it really can become almost an obsession, an onslaught of horror and depravity that threatens to overwhelm us. Some times we do need to just step away–for a little while.

But even if we can avoid the news media, human conflict and tragedy has a way of finding us. Difficult encounters with loved ones or friends arise. Someone at work does something that hurts you or infuriates you. Somebody cuts you off in traffic or is obnoxious in the grocery line. Your credit card information gets hacked at Home Depot. "You know what" happens.

It’s nothing new.

"If another member of the church sins against you," [imagine that!] Jesus says in Matthew’s gospel, "go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one. But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector."

There’s no mention of parking lots here, as in "talk about the person behind their back in the parking lot." It’s a very pro-active, engaged, courageous prescription. Do what you can to restore your relationship. And, oh, by the way, the last resort? – "If they won’t listen to the congregation, let them be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector"? Lest you think this gives permission for shunning or excluding, consider who the author of this gospel is, according to tradition–Matthew, a tax collector. How did Jesus treat Gentiles and tax collectors? He sat at table with them, he drew the circle wide.

Even in the Hebrew Scriptures, what we Christians tend to call "the Old Testament," which was, of course, the only testament Jesus knew, the sweeping generalization about the God of Hebrew Scriptures is that "He" merely orders Israel to wipe out their enemies or does it Himself, as in the story of the Passover, which some communities are reading today, about the angel of death passing over the houses of the Israelites whose lintels are smeared with lamb’s blood and killing all the firstborn of the Egyptians. That is how the Israelites understood their exodus from slavery in Egypt, writing the story down hundreds of years later, but in a violent world of competing gods, how else could they understand their impossible escape?

That’s not the only way they thought of God. The story of Jonah, with his commission by God to go preach to the Ninevites and warn them of the consequences of their evil ways, shows God with quite a sense of humor as the whale swallows Jonah up when he tries to shirk his assignment, and then, after being vomited up on shore, and reluctantly preaching to Ninevah, Jonah hides out under a tree and pouts. God presses him saying, "You don’t think I can desire the repentance of the wicked?"

God gives Ezekiel a similar command.

So you, mortal, I have made a sentinel for the house of Israel: whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me. If I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked ones, you shall surely die,’ and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from their ways, the wicked shall die in their iniquity, but their blood I will require at your hand. But if you warn the wicked to turn from their ways, and they do not turn from their ways, the wicked shall die in their iniquity, but you will have saved your life.

Here God seems to be saying, "your life is wrapped up with the life of the wicked. If what they’re doing has disastrous consequences for their souls or for others, then you are obligated to warn them. If they don’t listen to you and don’t change, you have done what you can and they get what is coming to them. If you don’t engage them at all, however, and they continue in their wicked ways, you bear part of the blame.

I confess I have never watched the show, but a friend commented that the patriarch of the Duck Dynasty has declared his recommendation for dealing with Muslims: "Convert ‘em or kill ‘em." I’m pretty sure that’s not the kind of engagement God had in mind when speaking to Jonah or Ezekiel. And how would that make us any better than ISIL or the Taliban or Al Qaeda?

In his letter to the Romans, in the section suggested as preparation for worship today, Paul writes, "Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light." This is a call to a pro-active, engaged response to the presence of evil, just as Jesus recommended in that well-known but often misinterpreted passage about turning the other cheek or giving one’s cloak or walking the second mile, not resisting evil with evil but with creative, engaged response. "You cannot drive out darkness with darkness," Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote; "only light can do that. You cannot drive out hate with hate; only love can do that."

Listen to part of this letter written by a teacher at Richboro Middle School in Bucks County, PA, to the students there who were reeling from the tragic death of three of their schoolmates–

You, I love you, and I believe in you [Mr. Cunningham wrote]...These are tough times. You need to know that these tough times did not come to stay, they have come to pass. You need to know it, and you need to believe it. They will pass and you will be left to decide your future...

When I say, "these tough times will pass" I do not mean that we will forget the boys. What I am saying is that eventually the sadness you have inside of you will subside. When it subsides it will leave a void. You may already feel a void inside of you. An emptiness that you feel can seemingly never be filled. However, it will be filled, and we must decide with what. Unfortunately, some of you may choose to fill it with substances. Some with anger and frustration. I am challenging you to make sure that everyone around you fills this void with empowerment. A sense of purpose and clarity that you cannot even imagine. Purpose to look despair in the face and say, ‘You can’t stop me.’ Purpose to wake up everyday with an overwhelming sense of ‘I can do it!’...

... You can, you will, and you must be empowered. The very nature of our survival is dependent on it. The way to honor the boys is to walk out of the dark corner that we are all sitting in, step out into the light, and be stronger than ever before. Finding your way out of the dark corner is a process. A process that may take weeks but eventually you will walk out. And when you walk out, you can, will, and must reach into the darkness and pull others out as well...

(--posted on Facebook)

What wise words to speak to middle-schoolers! Or middle-agers...or anyone in the midst of life.

What will you choose to fill the void with? Will you let Love and Light come in, or block it with substances or numbing or rage or fear?

And of course there’s always the wise words of Mr. Rogers to children experiencing tragedies – "Look for the helpers," his mother told him. "There are always helpers in the midst of these situations. What will you look for? What will you focus on?

Or what about our response to the horrendous killings of Scott Sotloff and James Foley? Maren Tirabassi, the UCC pastor in Portsmouth, NH, near where James Foley lived, wrote this prayer in response to this death–

God shelter his soul under the wings of your presence.

God hold Scott Sotloff as a life to be known and remembered in honor

not for the violence of his death, but for the beauty of his life, for the kindness of his care for children, for the honesty and imagination of his journalism, for the love of those who loved him and for the courage in his death.

God, shelter his soul under the wings of your presence.

God hold Scott Sotloff as a life to be known and remembered in honor

not for the responses to his death to be played out on the international stage, nor for the Rachel-chorus weeping for this child of us all, but for the man he was. Amen.

How do we fill the void? Where do we put our energies?

"Truly I tell you," Jesus said, "if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them." No wonder Annie Dillard warned that we have no idea what we’re doing when we come together for worship! We’re like kids playing with a chemistry set–we ought to have crash helmits and kevlar vests. What incredible power is available to those who come together not just in the "name" of Jesus, like some kind of magic word, but in the spirit and power of Jesus. "If two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by God in heaven"! This isn’t like Janice Joplin singing, "O Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz?" Jesus is saying that if we come together in the Christ-energy, adding our energies together, and direct those energies toward someone or something, God will fulfill that request! That request may be fulfilled by filling us with the courage and power to act or it may change us and direct our energies toward continuing to send Love and Light into those dark corners or places of wickedness. If we put on the armor of Light, or a cloak of Light, we may avoid getting seduced or sucked into all the negative energies and evil that seem to be everywhere around us, and so free us up to direct our energies toward making a positive difference, being part of the Light.

...These tough times did not come to stay, they have come to pass. You need to know it, and you need to believe it. They will pass and you will be left to decide your future..."The night is far gone, the day is near," Paul wrote. "Let us then lay aside the works of darkness and put on the armor of light...Put on Christ,"; and take in Christ, in this bread and this cup. May these words be hope and strength and courage for us, for the living of these days. Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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"Breaking Our Hearts"-- Ex. 3:1-15, Matthew 16: 21-28-- Aug. 31,2014

 

A wise old preacher said to a young one, just beginning his ministry, "Take both praise and criticism with a grain of salt." Wise words that have come back to me many times. You’re probably not as great as somebody would lead you to believe, and you’re probably not as bad as somebody else–or maybe the same somebody–would have you believe. "Take both praise and criticism with a grain of salt."

So I think about Peter in last week’s and today’s readings from Matthew. Remember last week when Jesus asked the disciples, "But who do you say that I am?" And when Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the Living God," Jesus praised him saying, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock, I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

Wow! Kind of hard to remember salt at a time like that!

So, imagine the bitter, salty taste in his mouth, when Jesus began to explain to them just what it meant that he was the Christ, the Son of the Living God, "that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes , and be killed,..." Imagine Peter’s heart breaking at each one of those phrases–"suffer many things, and be killed..." I imagine that his blood was pounding so loudly in his ears that he probably didn’t even listen all the way to the end, when Jesus said, "and on the third day be raised."

Peter thought that what had been revealed to him, not by flesh and blood but by Jesus’ own Father was that Jesus was going to save them and all of Israel, that being the Christ, the Messiah was a good thing, not something you suffer for, that the God whom Jesus was the Son of was powerful and just and righteous.

So Peter took Jesus aside and said, "God forbid, Lord! This shall never happen to you!" But he turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance, a stumbling block to me; for you are not on the side of God, but of men." More than a grain of salt stung Peter’s eyes with tears and humiliation. "Satan!" he had called him. The Tempter. Now, apparently, the voice in his head was Satan’s, not God’s.

"If anyone would come after me," Jesus went on, "let them deny themselves [‘they must

leave self behind,’as another translation puts it] and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever would save their life [or cares for their own safety] will lose it, or [is lost]; and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it. [or, lets themselves be lost for my sake, they will find their true self]. For what will it profit a person , if they gain the whole world and forfeit their life? [What will a person gain by winning the whole world, at the cost of their true self?’] Or what shall a person give in return for their life [ or their true self]?"

Boy, these are tough words to contemplate in the middle of the final long weekend of summer! (Or anytime, for that matter.) The closest thing to salt we want to taste is a bag full of chips and a cold drink.

But here it is, the crux of the gospel in the middle of a fading summer weekend. No wonder people aren’t standing in the aisles and forming lines out to the street. "Sign up here to suffer!" we might as well advertize. "Lessons in dying here." "We’ll break your heart."

A clergy friend of mine posted an image on Facebook this week of a semitic looking

man–broad nose, piercing dark eyes, dark hair sticking up–and over the face were these words:

"Things Jesus Wasn’t" and then scattered across the page, the words–"White, American, Indifferent, Christian, Middle-class, Blonde, Homeowner, Nice, Tame, Overly Pious, Legal Citizen, Humorless, Polite, Exclusive, Violent, Obsessed with Sex, English-speaker, Mild"–Things Jesus wasn’t.

When Peter told Jesus that bad things must never happen to him, the salt that he was had already lost its flavor. His inspired imagination about God had already been domesticated, just like ours is most of the time, especially if we listen to our culture. God is all-powerful, God never lets bad things happen to really good people, God will rescue us from the mess we’ve made, God will punish the bad people and reward the good. Really? That’s all you’ve got? Nothing more than a relatively competent military dictator? The "I am who I am"/ "I will be who I will be" who spoke from the burning bush is way beyond that.

"The coopted imagination," one commentator observed, " assumes that there is a way to gain life other than by losing it.’ (Texts for Preaching, Year A, p. 469)

"Whoever cares for their own safety is lost; but if you let yourself be lost for my sake, you will find your true self. What will you gain by winning the whole world, at the cost of your true self? Or what can you give that will buy that self back?" The self that you need to lose is your small s self, the one that stops at your own boundaries, that refers only back to yourself, that’s all about you. But what you gain when you lose this small s self is your true Self, capital S, the beloved, precious Self that lives and moves and has its being in the Great Self, in God. That is a life worth living for. And dying for.

A nurse who works in palliative care, with people who are nearing the end of their lives, compiled a list of the top 5 regrets that dying people expressed. The number one regret was, "I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me." "Whoever would follow me must leave the "little" self behind, must take up their cross and follow me." Notice Jesus didn’t say, "Must take up my cross" or "your neighbor’s cross." Make sure the cross you’re picking up is yours to carry, not one that someone else says you should bear. As Mother Elizabeth Ann Seton said, "Bear your share." "I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me." If you lose your self in me, you’ll find your true Self.

By the way, the other top 4 regrets of the dying? "I wish I hadn’t worked so hard." Every male patient said this, thinking of all the moments in their children’s and loved ones’ lives they’d missed. "I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings," instead of always trying to keep the peace and settling for a mediocre life. "I wish I’d stayed in touch with my friends." and finally, "I wish I had let myself be happier." "This was surprisingly common," the nurse wrote. So many didn’t realize that happiness is a choice, and instead stayed stuck in familiarity, old habits. (Huff Post, 8/3/13) No need to wait until you’re dying to make adjustments. Regrets belong to the past, not to the present.

"Get behind me, Satan!" Jesus said to Peter. The rock that you are has become a stumbling block for me. It couldn’t be more blunt. But one translator says that the Greek word for "get behind" is the same as the word used a little earlier when Jesus was talking about "binding things" in heaven and on earth. Perhaps Jesus is telling Peter to "bind himself" to Jesus. [Mark Davis, Left Behind..., 8/31/14) "Stick with me," in other words. "Yes, it’s going to get nasty." The Messiah, the Christ, the Fully One must suffer at the hands of the powers that be because the majority of human beings suffer at the hands of the Powers That Be. Yes, your heart will break, your knees will get weak, you’ll be blind with fear, but I’ve got your back. You will never be alone. That’s what the cross is about. There is nothing you can go through, no place you can go, that I haven’t gone and that I won’t be with you. Get behind me. I’ll go ahead of you. Bind yourself to me. When you make the sign of the cross on yourself, you’re taking it into you, not on you. I always thought that was "a Catholic thing," but really, what a good reminder!

Peter’s heart broke not only when he was rebuked by Jesus but when he heard what following Jesus really meant. It wasn’t what Peter wanted it to be. And honestly, it’s probably not what we want it to be...comfortable, exciting, respectable, easy. But, as David Lose notes, "Even though our hearts may break when we discover we’re not getting the God we want, we will come alive again as we realize we’re getting the God we need." (Lose, inthemeantime, 8/31/14) ...the God we need when we’ve wandered too far away from what we know is right, from our true Selves, the God we need when it feels like we’re being crucified, the God we need when the diagnosis or the pink slip or the eviction or that phone call comes, the God who will stick with us through thick and thin, on a summer Sunday or a bleak Tuesday afternoon in winter.

"If you let your self get lost for my sake, you’ll find your true Self." "Jesus didn’t come here to die," a wise man said, "but to love." (Peter Woods, I am listening, 8/31/14) Dying isn’t really an option–we all will–but loving is a choice, the choice that makes life worth living. So let us choose love–and life. Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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"Identity Crisis"-- Romans 12:1-8, Matthew 16:13-20-- August 24, 2014

 

Identity theft is a real problem in these days of digital information exchange and storage. If someone with less than scrupulous intentions gets a hold of your social security number or credit card information, they can wreck all sorts of havoc on your life. If that’s ever happened to you, it’s hard to maintain perspective about your "identity"–it can feel like it’s a set of numbers, rather than anything much more resilient, much more complex, much more important.

"Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" Jesus asked his disciples, clearly not asking to be reminded of his social security number, and then the much more pointed question, "But who do you say that I am?" John Pilch, a scholar of the cultural world of Jesus, points out that "Americans are the most individualistic people who have ever lived on the face of this planet." (Pilch, The Cultural World of Jesus, Yr. A, p. 127) Each person is viewed as being distinct, unique–right?–We each have a number. We fashion our identities. We create profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace. We want to be special, unique.

The Mediterranean view of identity, on the other hand, the view in Jesus’ culture, was just the opposite. It was–and still is–what might be called "dyadic," that is, "paired," other-oriented. They have, says Pilch, "no sense of their individuality but depend rather on the opinions of others to help them know who they are." (Ibid.) They are so bound up in social and familial structures that define them that acting outside of that, as an individual, was viewed with suspicion.

Each of these views–individualistic and dyadic–have their own advantages and disadvantages. But they are different. We need to be reminded that ours isn’t the only way of looking at the world.

So, these questions of Jesus to the disciples were not a "theological quiz," Pilch contends, but rather "reflect a normal, Mediterranean curiosity by Jesus." Who do people say that I am? Who do you say that I am?

The normal cultural definitions of who he was weren’t working. When people identified him as "Jesus of Nazareth," it was supposed to tell them that he was like everyone else from Nazareth. "Can anything good come from Nazareth?"– Remember Nathaniel’s question to Philip in John’s gospel when he told him Jesus was from Nazareth? Where you came from was supposed to describe who you were. We still have a bit of that--Oh, you’re from Bennington? Or Pownal? Or Woodford? Or North Bennington? Or Manchester? We do form different pictures in our minds, don’t we, depending on the answer?

Who your parents were described you, and usually boys took on their fathers’ occupation. Which is why Jesus’ identity was a problem–"Where did this man get this wisdom and these deeds of power?" people asked. "Isn’t he the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? And are not all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all this?" (Mt. 13:55-57)

"Who are people saying the Son of Man is?" Jesus asked his disciples, as it seems that this is the one title Jesus may have claimed for himself–the Son of Man, the Fully Human One. "And they said, ‘Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’ He said to them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’"

Who do you say that I am? Who do you say that Jesus is? Jesus Is the Question is the title of a new book by Martin Copenhaver, the new president of Andover Newton Seminary. Jesus asks far more questions than he does give answers. And Jesus is himself the question, isn’t he? Who do you say that I am? And what difference does that make in your life?

How would you answer that? It’s a question worth spending some time with. I was thinking that maybe just as we shared with each other our take on "the gospel in 7 words or less," it might be fun to hear how we would answer, Who do you say that Jesus is? There’s a sheet of paper up on the bulletin board to the left as you go out Webster Hall on which you are welcome to write your answer, or answers, ...or maybe your questions...

He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter answered, "You are the Messiah, the Christ, the Son of the living God!"

Scott Colglazier, senior pastor of the First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, has a wonderful image that really speaks to me. When Peter answered "the Christ," he wasn’t giving him a last name. "‘The Christ’ is not a person but an energy," Colglazier says, "the divine energy that was released into the world through the life of Jesus." [Day1.org, 8/24/14] It is an energy that is still changing people. "This is nothing less than the energy or presence of God," Colglazier says–expressed as compassion, unconditional love, inexhaustible grace, creative, transforming and inspiring goodness. He calls it a "Christ-burst" of energy, so that "sharing Christ" is not so much a telling as it is a sharing of an energy. "Every time we treat another person with dignity and respect and every time we bring compassion to another human being, especially a human being that is hurting and broken, and every time we offer love as a way of life, we bring Christ to others, and the great Christ-burst that started centuries ago continues in our time and in our place." [Ibid.]

"Who do you say that I am?"

Another pastor and preacher, Lutheran David Lose, writes that for him, Jesus is the one who reveals the heart of God, as he weeps over Jerusalem, for example. [Lose, inthemeantime. org, 8/24/14] Surely God is still weeping over Jerusalem, and Gaza, and Urbil, and Ferguson, and Kabul, and Bagdhad, and Washington, and Bennington, and the whole sad and hurting world. Jesus reveals the heart of God, as he has compassion for the hungry, the poor, the sick, the outcast. That’s who Jesus is–the revealer of the heart of God.

And Jesus reveals what is possible in a human being, whose life is open to God. That’s what Paul had in mind when he wrote, "I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship." Or, as Peterson imagines it, "So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life–your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life–and place it before God as an offering." Offer it up to God, so that God can transform it into just what is needed to make the world more just, more beautiful, more healing, as Jesus’ life was transformed.

"Don’t be conformed to this world," Paul wrote, "but be transformed by the renewing of your mind"–your whole perspective changed by this Christ lens through which you now view the world and your life. Who you are is unique–you are a unique product of experiences, gifts and graces, environment, family configuration and ancestors, time in history, DNA, place where you were born, dumb luck, choices you’ve made. But each of us is but one part of a greater body– "so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another," Paul said. We are each but one gem at the intersection of an infinite number of threads in a net of creation, as the Hindu myth of Indra’s net describes it. The African notion of ubuntu says "I am because you are." A person is a person through other people.

"Who do you say that I am?" It is not a catchism question. It is a life question. How do you live your life because I am? How do you live your life because Jesus was and Christ is? What energy pattern are you manifesting? Are you so drawn into your culture and the mold it prescribes for you that you are not open to being transformed by God’s energy, God’s compassion, God’s justice, God’s unconditional love? And what are you doing to open up the possibilities of that transformation–is there space in your life for silence and noticing the world around you, including how your thoughts jump around and chase each other? Do you take time to give thanks for any number of blessings? Do you put yourself in situations where you can be reminded of the connections you have with people you don’t think are "like you"? Do you take time to connect with nature and all the creatures of which you also are a part? Do you direct "Christ energy" toward people and situations in need of healing and justice and hope? "Who do you say that I am?"

"So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life–your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life–and place it before God as an offering." "By the mercies of God, present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God..." Share Christ-energy with everyone you meet and live with. Send it out to the whole world. So may you know who you are and Whose you are. Amen, and amen.

 

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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“The Other”-- Matthew 15:21-28-- Aug. 17, 2014

 

If we are to look to Jesus as a model of what a fully alive human being looks like, then surely this story of his encounter with the Canaanite woman must be included. Contrary to what some commentators suggest, I don’t think Jesus was all-knowing, all-compassionate at every moment and so here he was merely testing this woman’s faith. That seems petty and manipulative to me, and for all the human things Jesus might have been, I don’t think he was either of those things. I think Jesus was a product of his time and place, just like the rest of us are, and at certain times, maybe especially when he was trying to get away for a break, as he was here, maybe even Jesus fell back on the definitions and parameters that his culture proscribed for him. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,” he says in response to this “foreign” woman’s plea for her daughter. But luckily she wouldn’t leave it at that.

The Canaanite woman was “the other” for Jesus. Not only was she outside the nation of Israel, she was a woman. Laws of purity and honor gave Jesus perfect permission to say what he did. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel....It isn’t fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs...” It was what she said that ultimately got through to him and reminded him of a higher law.

Jan Richardson imagines this woman’s plea to Jesus as a “stubborn blessing”--

“Don’t tell me no.
I have seen you
feed the thousands,
seen miracles spill
from your hands
like water, like wine,
seen you with circles
and circles of crowds
pressed around you
and not one soul
turned away.

Don’t start with me.

I am saying
you can close the door
but I will keep knocking.
You can go silent
but I will keep shouting.
You can tighten the circle
but I will trace a bigger one
around you,
around the life of my child
who will tell you
no one surpasses a mother
for stubbornness.

I am saying
I know what you
can do with crumbs
and I am claiming mine,
every morsel and scrap
you have up your sleeve.
Unclench your hand,
your heart.
Let the scraps fall
like manna,
like mercy
for the life
of my child,
the life of
the world.

Don’t you tell me no. [Jan Richardson, Painted Prayerbook for Year A, Pent. + 10]

It is the cry of Michael Brown’s mother in Ferguson, MO, and mothers of African American boys throughout our country. It is the cry of Palestinian mothers and Israeli mothers, amidst the bombs and rockets. “Have mercy on us,” cry the Yazidis fleeing to the mountains in Iraq. “Unclench your hand, your heart,” cry the parents and partners and children and friends of those whose loved ones battle with depression. “I am not – we are not – the other. You and I, we are not so different. Deeply, truly, we are one.

People looking for adequate, decent housing in our community are not The Other. The children who need federally-funded lunches and families and individuals who cannot find decent housing without assistance are not The Other. The permitting process for the Shires Housing Project just up the road from us on Silver St. has revealed a real rift in our community. The “dirty little secret” is not about the number of children in our schools who qualify for subsidized meals–“The poor you will always have with you,” Jesus said a couple thousand years ago–that’s not a secret. The “secret” is that we’d rather not live near them. It’s not just that our schools are labeled “failing” because we have poor children in them–every school in Vermont except those who opted out of the “No Child Left Behind” standards was deemed “failing.” It is a failure of that program, of the system, not of the kids or teachers.

Nicholas Kristof, columnist for the New York Times, wrote an op-ed piece last Sunday entitled, “Is a Hard Life Inherited?” In it, he tells of returning to his hometown of Yamhill, OR.
“I love this little town, [he wrote] but the news is somber...A neighbor here just died of a heroin overdose; a friend was beaten up last night by her boyfriend; another friend got into a fistfight with his dad; a few more young men have disappeared into the maw of prison.” [NYT, 8/10/14] It sounds an awful lot like our town, doesn’t it? and a whole lot of other towns in Vermont.

One delusion common among America’s successful people [Kristof writes] is that they triumphed just because of hard work and intelligence. In fact, their big break came when they were conceived in middle-class American families who loved them, read them stories, and nurtured them with Little League sports, library cards, and music lessons...

...Too often wealthy people born on third base blithely criticize the poor for failing to make homeruns. The advantaged sometimes perceive empathy as a sign of muddle-headed weakness, rather than as a marker of civilization.

Too often “poverty” is not just an economic description it’s a moral judgment. Why can’t those people get their act together? We sometimes ask. Where are the parents? Why don’t they put more energy into looking for a job instead of looking for a hand-out?

“‘Almost a third of the 153.6 million Americans with a job at any time in 2012 made less than $15,000, averaging just $6,100,’ writes David Cay Johnston in Divided: The Perils of Our Growing Inequality.” Less than $15,000. Can you imagine feeding your family or finding a place to live for that? “Nearly all of the income growth in our economy has been in jobs paying more than $75,000 a year [cites another source]–about one in eight jobs.” [Julie Polter, “The Rich Get Richer,” Sojourners, Aug. 2014] There aren’t all that many jobs paying more than $75,000 in Bennington, are there?

“Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David,” she said. “My daughter is tormented by a demon.” Robin Williams’ death by suicide, due to depression, this week has echoed deeply into many people’s lives. Mental illness and addiction are equal opportunity employers, striking the poor and wealthy alike. There is no “other” to the demon of depression. Yet the resources for those battling mental illness, including depression, in our community are woefully inadequate.

“She came and knelt before him, saying, ‘Lord, help me.” He answered, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” She said, ‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, great is your faith! [Greater than mine, at the moment apparently.(I imagine him realizing) Forgive me.] Let it be done for you as you wish.’ And her daughter was healed instantly.”

Police walking alongside protestors instead of confronting them in riot gear produced a very different result in Ferguson this week. That’s when the healing began, though it has a long way to go there and throughout our country.

“There are steps that could help [in the crisis of working-class America],” Nicholas Kristof wrote, “including a higher minimum wage, early childhood programs, and a focus on education as an escalator to opportunity. [I would argue that the better index of disadvantage for a child is not family income, but how often the child is read to, Kristof said earlier] But the essential starting point is empathy.”

“I am not the other,” the Canaanite woman said to Jesus, and the truth of that resonated in his soul. She is identified as the Syro-Phoenician woman in other gospels, but here Matthew says she is Canaanite. In fact, Matthew begins his gospel with a genealogy of Jesus that includes a number of Canaanite foremothers–Ruth, Tamar, Rahab. “I am not the other,” she said.

If we are to become fully human, as Jesus was, we too, like Jesus, must learn to let go of those definitions and stereotypes of “the other.” It is the final prejudice and it is fueled by fear. In her blog this week [8/15/14], sociologist Brene Brown writes about fear and courage–

When confronted with news of a stranger’s unimaginable pain – a suicide, an overdose, a protest for justice and basic dignity – we have two choices: We can choose to respond from fear or we can choose courage.

We can choose to believe that we are somehow insulated from the realities of these traumas and that our willpower or our strength of character makes us better than these displays of desperation and woundedness. When we seek shelter in the ‘better than – safer than – different than’ thinking, we are actually choosing fear and that requires us to self-protect and arm ourselves with judgment and self-righteousness.

Our only other option is to choose courage. Rather than deny our vulnerability, we lean into both the beauty and agony of our shared humanity. Choosing courage does not mean that we’re unafraid, it means that we are brave enough to love despite the fear and uncertainty. Courage is my friend Karen standing up and saying, “I am affected.”

The courageous choice also does not mean abandoning accountability – it simply means holding ourselves accountable first. If we are people of faith, we hold ourselves accountable for living that faith by practicing grace and bringing healing. If we consider ourselves to be smart and curious, it means seeking greater understanding. If we consider ourselves to be loving, it means acting with compassion.

It’s difficult to respond to the tragedies of strangers – even those we think we know – because we will never have access to the whole truth. In the absence of information, we make up stories, stories that often turn out to be our own biographies, not theirs.

Our choices have consequences: They make the world a more dangerous place or they cultivate peace. Fear and judgment deepen our collective wounds. That rare mix of courage and compassion is the balm that brings global healing.

We have two choices. Let’s choose courage. Let’s choose to love despite the fear.

“Woman, great is your faith!” Jesus finally said to the Canaanite woman.“Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter was healed instantly. May our faith be as courageous and as full of grace. So may the healing begin. Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

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"Come on in!"-- Matthew 14:22-33-- Aug. 10, 2014

 

Last week we heard the story of the feeding of over 5000 people, beginning with just five loaves of bread and two fish. The disciples had thought there was nothing there in that deserted place to feed all those people with, and they told Jesus to send the people away into the villages to buy something to eat. But Jesus said that wasn’t necessary. "You give them something to eat," he said. The disciples looked around and saw only scarcity. "There’s nothing here but these few loaves of bread and couple of fish," they said. So Jesus made everyone sit down on the grass and blessed the offering of food. "The place of abundance is here," he said. In your midst, when you stop to notice it, when you stop and give thanks, the place of abundance–the God of abundance– is here. Ultimately the disciples had to figure out what to do with all the leftovers–12 baskets full.

"We often confuse safety and stability with abundant life," one commentator suggests (David Lose, in the meantime, 8/4/14), and so we work hard to build a safe, stable, and secure life for ourselves and our loved ones. Which is not a bad thing. We know that children thrive in a stable environment, and surely human flourishing is what God intends for all of us. The problem is that we can get too settled, too satisfied, too smug, thinking that we’ve got it all under control and don’t really need anybody else, let alone God. We start defending our comfort zone.

But have you noticed that it’s when the going gets tough–really tough–that that’s when people start invoking either the first or second members of the Trinity– " O God!" or "Jesus Christ!" I think I might have been uttering one or the other if I had been in that boat on the Sea of Tiberius with the disciples that dark and stormy night. And I have no idea what I would have said had I seen Jesus walking across the waves toward us. "A ‘behold’ or ‘shazam!’ or something like it would be nice here," suggests one translator, "to signify that people (even Jesus) don’t come walking across water everyday." (Mark Davis, left behind..., 8/10/14)

"This is the most ‘useless’ miracle in all of the gospels," Mark Davis writes. Unlike feeding hungry people or healing someone’s sight or long-term physical condition, Davis wonders if Jesus walked upon the water just to prove he could do it, just to show who he was. (Ibid.) I’m guessing that the disciples, who, in Matthew’s gospel, had already experienced Jesus’ stilling the storm after they’d woken him up from sleeping in the stern, may have found it quite useful for Jesus to walk across the water to them.

But it’s not even Jesus’ walking across the water that grabs me so much in this story. After all, he’s spent all night praying and being filled up with God’s Spirit of power, which, by the way, is what the first hearers of this story would have thought–This man is more powerful than the wind and waves–more powerful than the other spirits or people who claim to have power. A human being who is utterly empty of his or her own agenda and who opens themselves up to be filled with God can do amazing things.

Which is what Peter did, and THAT’s the part of this story that strikes me. "What in THE world," as Mark Davis asks, "would compel someone in a boat in a storm in the sea to say to Jesus at this point, ‘Command me to come to you’?" And then when Jesus says, "Come on in," jumps out of the boat onto the waves! ...and walks! Now, see, that’s the miracle in this story for me. Not that Jesus could walk on the water, but that Peter could. He doesn’t do it on his own power–he knows that Jesus has to be in on this–but for those few seconds that he can keep focused on Jesus, he can do what Jesus can do. It’s when he loses that single-point focus, when he "doubts," or waivers, or "stands in 2 ways" that he begins to sink, and cries out, "Lord, save me!" Jesus doesn’t say to him, "Sink or swim, buddy–you got yourself into this" – but rather "Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him... And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased."

All four of the gospels tell the story of Jesus having power over the wind and the waves–either by walking on the water or calming the storm from the boat. It’s only Matthew’s gospel that includes this part about Peter walking – however briefly – upon the water as well. This Jesus is full of the power of God who has power over the wind and the waves, because, by the way, God created them; but for Matthew’s community, living probably some 50 years after the death of Jesus, it was important for them to know that this power that was in Jesus was beside them, in the storm of persecution and struggle with them, even inside them.

This story of Peter stepping out of the boat onto the waves was much more powerful than any theological statement about the power of God. "You can’t get to God through your head," says Seane Corne, yoga teacher and activist. "I’ve only been able to get to God through experience, through my heart, through surrender," she told Krista Tippett, host of the public radio show onBeing. In fact, as this morning’s guest on onBeing, neuroscientist Adele Diamond has found, we learn with our whole bodies. Our brains develop through movement, dance, music, doing, stepping out. We’re all "kinetic learners." When Peter started to rely on his head–like Wiley Coyote noticing the air below him after running off the cliff in pursuit of RoadRunner– when Peter looked down and noticed the waves beneath his feet, he immediately began to sink. The world told him walking on the water is impossible. The God embodied in Jesus told him to come on out. "Fear not," Jesus had told them. "I am–it is I." "I am"–the name of God–God is here.

This is not an advertisement for merely being impetuous, for abandoning your mind and intellect before acting; but it is a story about focus, about how to enter into the chaos of our lives, which, if you haven’t noticed, is all around us. Multi-tasking does not serve us well in these situations. What is needed is focus on the essential. Jesus was called "the One" –ihidaya--not only referring to his uniqueness but more importantly describing his ability to be at one, with himself, with God, to empty himself of distractions, of 2-sidedness, of duality, and to focus the power then available to him for healing, for multiplying, for bringing life and hope. Those verses tucked in the midst of these stories–"when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself..." ..."And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray"–these times apart in prayer and meditation allowed Jesus to be "the One"–Ihidaya. It takes practice in times of stillness and focus, so that in times of chaos, that ability is available.

That is a practice still available to us. Meditation has been shown to literally rewire the brain; we can work on strengthening our ability to focus, which in this incredibly distracting and over-stimulated world, is more and more important. Faith is less an act of will or intellectual assent than it is an opening, a physical, emotional, wholebeing practice. It is the whole-hearted living that social scientist Brene Brown talks about, the "daring greatly" by being in the arena or out on the waves, being one’s true self, knowing that we are worthy of being loved by this One who is beside us in calm and in chaos.

When Jesus and Peter got into the boat, the wind ceased. "And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, ‘Truly you are the Son of God." The thing is, though, there’s no definite article here in the Greek–it’s not, "Truly you are the Son of God," but a Son of God. Jesus was certainly a Son of God in a unique, Jesus-sort of way, but so was Peter a son of God, in a unique Peter-sort of way, and so are you a son or daughter of God, in a unique, you-sort of way. We may not all be called to walk on water, but we are all called to offer ourselves up to be filled and used by this power of Love and Healing and Compassion and Justice, stepping out though we may be afraid, yet focused on the One who calls us.

So as we head out into the storms of our lives, may this blessing over the waves by Jan Richardson go with us–

Blessing on the Waves

I cannot promise

that this blessing

will keep you afloat

as if by lashing these words

to your arms,

your ankles,

you could stop yourself

from going under.

The most this blessing

can do, perhaps,

is to stand beside you

in the boat,

place its hand

in the small of your back,

and push.

Be assured that

though this blessing

is eager to set you

in motion,

it will not

leave you forsaken,

will not compel you

to leap

where it has not already

stepped out.

These words

will go with you

across the waves.

These words

will accompany you

across the waters.

And if you

find yourself

flailing,

this blessing

will breathe itself

into you,

will breathe itself

through you

until you are

borne up

by the hands

that reach toward you,

the voice that

calls your name. (Jan Richardson, Painted Prayerbook, 2011)

May it be so. Amen, and amen.

 

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

 

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