Second Congregational Church

Wed., Feb. 27, 2013--For "Speaking of Religion," Bennington Banner, March 2, 2013 — This I (Don’t) Believe

A while back, National Public Radio sponsored a series of reflections entitled, "This I Believe," in which people from a variety of walks of life spoke and wrote about what they trust in, "what they know for sure," as Oprah puts it, what they have concluded is true from their experience of living. These reflections were less a series of statements like, "I believe that...the world is round,...Pluto should be called a ‘planet,’...blondes have more fun...." but rather, "I believe in...the power of kindness to transform ... the necessity of expanding our notion of ‘family,’....the importance of immersing children in nature... " In other words, "belief" less as an assent to a list of facts or declarations or propositions, and more as "trust in" conclusions drawn from experiences, a deeply-held sense or knowledge or intuition that seems to hold true.

Many people seem to think that Christianity is a set of "beliefs"–that it is a matter of saying "yes" to a series of statements of doctrine–"I believe this, this, and this... and if I believe this, this, and this, I am guaranteed to go to heaven." THIS I DON’T BELIEVE. While creeds and doctrines can be useful to teach about and try to put into words that which is essentially beyond words, I do not believe that they are the end or purpose of faith. If people’s lives are not tranformed by their faith, if their "beliefs" do not make a difference in how they live, then the words may be beautiful but inadequate. The United Church of Christ, of which Second Congregational Church is a member church, proclaims that, while we affirm the historic creeds, it is the task of every generation to articulate its own "statement of faith" that has meaning and power for its day and age. "God is still speaking," we say. "Preach the gospel always. If necessary, use words."

Christianity, from its very beginnings, has been a diverse and multi-voiced religion–that’s why there are four gospels instead of one. That is as true today as it ever was, despite what many people think when they hear the word "Christian." Frankly, I do not even recognize some of what gets labeled "Christian" as anything I know about what it means to be a follower of Jesus the Christ. When Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist folk from Kansas demonstrate at funerals of soldiers or gunned-down Newtown children with signs saying, "God hates [homosexuals]," "This is punishment for America’s sins," "Burn in hell," it’s all I can do not to want to return their evil with evil. But that, of course, would not be following the Way of Jesus. When, as was reported in this paper a couple weeks ago, the Newtown, CT Missouri Synod Lutheran pastor offered the benediction at the interfaith service for the slain children and teachers there, he was reprimanded by his church leaders for appearing to condone the doctrinal differences between the participating faith communities, and he apologized. That is at the opposite end of the spectrum from my United Church of Christ–and many other mainline Christian denominations–who seek whenever possible to work and witness together for justice and compassion with other people of faith. Our local Greater Bennington Interfaith Council and the Greater Bennington Interfaith Community Services are examples of people of faith working together to make our little part of the world a better place.

I do not believe that Jesus was only interested in the kingdom of heaven as a future, after-death, reality, but rather in the kingdom of heaven, or the kingdom of God, that he said "is in your midst," "it’s coming and now is." I do not believe that science threatens faith; rather, it is a different language seeking to understand the mystery. As Rabbi Harold Kushner said, "I take the Bible too seriously to take it literally." I believe the Bible is a collection of writings by inspired human beings, that speak of truths better spoken of in story, metaphor, poetry, and whose light and truth shine through the filter of particular contexts of time and place. We as a community of faith need to wrestle with what is light and truth and what is filter. Some people may conclude that because I do not believe these things (or because I do), that I am not a "real" Christian.

Many people assume that a Christian is "someone who believes that faith is primarily a belief system mediated by an infallible Bible. The reward for believing the right things is forgiveness of sins and certain knowledge of eternal life." Rev. Robin Meyers (a UCC pastor), in his book The Underground Church, explains that that may describe a "religious conservative," but there are also "religious liberals, [and many folks in between] who believe that faith is primarily about the transformation of self and society through the wisdom of spiritual truth. Liberals emphasize inclusion, social justice, and transformation over individual salvation, and resist all exclusive religious claims." I would simply beg to let that word "Christian" breathe and be embodied in lives rather only in words. It means–and has always meant–more than one "party line."

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

Pastor, Second Congregational Church, UCC, Bennington

"I’m going on anyway..." --Gen. 15:1-12,17-18, Luke 13:31-35-- Feb. 24, 2013

There is a small chapel on one of the hills overlooking Jerusalem which, tradition says, is on the spot where Jesus wept over the city. The wall behind the altar is made of glass, and so there is a beautiful view of the city. On the front of the altar, one observer writes, is the image of a rooster, "a bright, fierce-looking bird made out of colored tiles with a flock of little chicks under his wings." (Barbara Brown Taylor, Bread of Angels, "Chicken and Foxes," P. 124)

Now, a rooster has spikes and talons–you do not want to get in a fight with a rooster–though some people apparently love to watch cock fights. Hens can be pretty fierce too–that’s where we get the term "henpecked," after all–but a hen’s main defense is fluffing herself up, pecking, and getting in the way of a fox who is after her chicks. By literally offering her body to the attacker, she can hope to satisfy his hunger with her large body so that he will leave her chicks alone.

"Get away from here," some Pharisees warned Jesus as he headed toward Jerusalem, "for Herod wants to kill you." "Go and tell that fox for me," Jesus replied, "...that I must be on my way, because it is impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem. Jerusalem, Jerusalem," he cried, "the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing!" "How do you like that image of God?" one preacher asks. "If you are like me [she says] it is fine in terms of comfort, but in terms of protection, it leaves something to be desired." (BBT, Ibid., p. 125)

"I’d turn back if I wuz you," the Cowardly Lion reads on the sign as he, Dorothy, Scarecrow & Tin Man enter the enchanted forest surrounding the Wicked Witch of the West’s castle. Sounds like a good idea to him, to all of them, really, but they lock arms and press forward. "Get away from here," some Pharisees warned Jesus as he headed toward Jerusalem, "for Herod wants to kill you." Wings outstretched, breast exposed, is the most vulnerable position, but Mother Hen Jesus presses on toward Herod the Fox.

Like the prophets before him, Jesus takes the path of most resistance, telling us not what we want to hear, but what we need to hear. (Robin Meyers, The Underground Church, p. 113) Courage and commitment are our only defenses, but love is a fierce defensive weapon, stronger than death, as it turns out, though it never looks it at the time. Who would draw that conclusion from the cross? Who would draw that conclusion from the bodies piled up before the lines of British soldiers in Gandhi’s famous salt march? Who would draw that conclusion from the bullet-riddled bodies of children and teachers lying on classroom and hallway floors in Newtown, CT? Who would draw that conclusion as the fox licks his lips and picks a feather out of his paws? Love is stronger than death?

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it?" Don’t you think Jesus is still weeping over Jerusalem, and Washington, and Baghdad, and Kabul? "How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing?"

"Most of our churches are friendly, comfortable, and well appointed," writes Rev. Robin Meyers, author of the book a number of us are reading this Lent–The Underground Church. "But who goes there expecting to be ‘undone’? Who expects to weep at recognizing the world as it really is, or to shudder at the certain knowledge that until we start taking risks it is likely to stay that way?" (P. 4) We are warned not to mix religion and politics, but who does not weep at the deadly foolishness that is being engineered in Washington? We’re all madly driving off a cliff, indiscriminately taking everyone we can with us–men, women, and children, young, old, everybody’s in this Sequester Bus–giving new meaning to the wisdom that an eye for an eye eventually makes the whole world blind. "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Washington, Washington, city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to you!" Who wouldn’t weep?

What’s a would-be follower of Jesus to do? If "I’d turn back if I wuz you" isn’t an option, what is? At the very least, it seems to me, every one of us can pray for our leaders in Washington and in Montpelier. While that may sound like something of a cop-out, a religious trifle, you may not have allowed yourself to be immersed in prayer enough. When we lift someone up into the powerful, even searing, presence of God and simply turn them over to God’s care and attention, praying that they be open to divine wisdom and direction and healing rather than directing God to have them vote "yay" or "nay" on some particular piece of legislation, we unleash a power that is far beyond our imagination or manipulation. And, by the way, this is not an entirely "safe" option–we may find ourselves caught up in the force of this power, and might even find that we need to contact our legislator, to express our views and opinions. And then we might find that we want to join with others working toward a new vision of the common good, either here in our community or maybe on a national or even international level. You just never know where a little prayer is going to lead you, so watch out for this second "Practice for the Way" whose candle we lit this morning. Courage and commitment may be our only defenses but daring greatly for Love is mighty armor indeed, as Paul referred to the "whole armor of God."

"Get away from here, for Herod wants to kill you." "I’d turn back if I wuz you." We may wish that Jesus had chosen a mother lion or bear instead of a mother hen to describe God’s love and protection. We may wish that God hadn’t chosen a cross as a symbol of the extent to which God would go to save us and stay in solidarity with us through every evil and heartache and struggle and suffering life throws at us. But we know that sometimes love requires that we keep going on anyway.

What fox are you facing? Is it a relationship that you know will kill you–or at least sap all the life out of you? Is it illness or anxiety? Is it a person at work who makes your life miserable? Is it your own self-image that is eating you away from the inside? "I may be knocked down now," the southern expression goes, " but I’m goin’ on anyway. I may be scared out of my mind, but I’m goin’ on anyway... I’m goin’ on, because there is One who goes on with me. Jesus may have had to walk that lonesome valley all by himself, but we don’t have to. God has walked every valley we’ve been through and is with us now. Tears may be in both our eyes, but I feel his elbow locked in mine, I feel her strong wing gathering me in. The cross is not the end of the story. That’s just the first day. But the cross can give us courage and strength nonetheless. Hear this poem by Roger Courtney, entitled, "I am standing before the cross"--

I am standing before the cross in all its brutality

and feel overwhelmed by the enormity of it all.

Why could the church not have a nice

life-affirming symbol instead of a cross?

Something to remind us to love each other and

that love will always triumph in the end.

But perhaps that would be just too easy.

Perhaps we need reminding

that to love unconditionally often comes at a cost

when we cross the barriers of prejudice and exclusion

that society puts up to separate us from the poor and despised,

from our traditional enemies;

when we truly stand up for what is right

we too may be rejected and ridiculed.

The cross reminds us that love has no boundaries, no limitations.

We must keep loving, regardless of the consequences.

The cross is not a symbol of defeat

but a symbol of the victory of unconditional selfless love

which should support and inspire us to follow in Jesus’ footsteps.

(Roger Courtney, on progressivechristianity.org)

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it?...How often have I desired to gather your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing?" It gives a whole new meaning to the word "chicken," doesn’t it? Let us be on our way, or rather, "the Way." Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

"Wandering in the Wilderness" --Deut. 26:1-11, Luke 4:1-13-- Feb. 17, 2013

As Bruce and I both have turned 61 in these couple of weeks, we are obviously firmly in the midst of the generation called "Baby Boomers"–the largest though, arguably not the greatest, of currently living generations. You have us to thank for the impending onslaught on Social Security and Medicare resources, but I learned in the last couple of weeks that we are also responsible for giving the travel industry the demand for "glamping" vacations. Glamping is the marriage of camping and glamour. "Luxury camping" is another way of putting it.

Boomers, it seems, want to get back to nature as we did back in the ‘60's–backpacking, camping, hitchhiking,...but now that we’re older, we don’t want to give up any of the amenities that have come to define our lives. We want to have wireless connections in the Serengeti, so we can keep in touch with our family and business associates. We want to have hot tubs in our "tents," which, by the way, are not your father’s–or your–old pup tents. These are platform constructions with queen-sized beds and indoor plumbing. We want to travel in Airstream campers that cushion the ride and have surround-sound stereo systems. (NY Times, Feb. 3, 2013, Travel, "We’re All Boomers Now") Ah, the wilderness experience....

That may be the kind of journey through Lent we’d also prefer–not your parents’ or even your Lenten experience, of eating fish on Fridays, wearing ashes on your forehead, endless confession and sackcloth, the whole thing fairly morose and depressing. Amen to giving up the morose and depressing part, but can we give up anything? Can we clear out any space in our lives and in our days to simply be with ourselves and God? Is it possible to pack and carry what is essential on our backs, without having a whole van and entourage following along behind? Can we spend any time considering who we’ve become and who we are becoming? Is there any way we could allow the wilderness to just be, well, the wilderness?

"In many cultures, there is an ancient custom of giving one-tenth of each year’s income to some holy use" (frederickbuechner.com, First Sunday in Lent)–in other words, a tithe. Our reading from Deuteronomy this morning describes one such offering of "first fruits," to be offered to the priest; and when the priest takes the basket of the offering and sets it down at the altar of God, the Israelite was to say, "A wandering Aramean was my father [or ancestor]," referring to Jacob, who went down into Egypt to escape the famine in his own land. These are instructions for when the Israelites have settled in the Promised Land, a "land flowing with milk and honey," "which [the text says]the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance to possess." The tension, of course, comes between claiming the land as their own, despite all the people who already lived there– AND being reminded that "a wandering Aramean was my father," utterly at the mercy of God and strangers, and receiving this new land as a gift from God whose land it actually is. This tension vibrates today in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"40 years" wandering in the wilderness is the time it took the Hebrews to figure out who they were, where their strength came from, and where they were going. Jesus spent "40 days" in the wilderness figuring out who he was, what it meant to be the Beloved Child of God, as the voice at his baptism had told him, what it meant to be Jesus. "The church [writes Samuel Wells] marks Lent to discover in Whose strength it stands." (Journal for Preachers, Lent 2013, p. 12) 40 days is approximately a tenth of the days of the year, so we offer it for "some holy use," a tithe, if you will, given to the Source of our being.

The readings for this first Sunday in Lent are a "meditation (Walter Brueggemann tells us) on the primal human question: Who will make us safe?" (Sojourners, Feb. 2010) Deuteronomy talks about how God rescued the Hebrew people from slavery and oppression in Egypt; Psalm 91(the psalm for the day) proclaims, "Because you had made the Lord your refuge, the Most High your dwelling place, no evil shall befall you, no scourge come near your tent..." And then the verses that we hear in Jesus’ conversation with Satan–"For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone." The Epistle lesson from Romans 10 says that "if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." I am certain that Paul was not thinking of this confession as a kind of magical formula, but again, it goes to the heart of that primal human question, Who will make us safe? Who will "save" us? So, 1)God provides for us, says Deuteronomy, 2)God protects us on our journey, the psalmist declares, 3)God saves us, confesses Paul. Those are the three tests put to Jesus in the wilderness. "Lent," Brueggemann writes, "is a time to sort out and refuse the other offers [for security] and to embrace the only reliable gift of well-being. Imagine choosing God or Jesus rather than money, control, or power–the usual seductions in our society." (Ibid.)

Beyond the giving up of chocolate, or eating fish on Fridays, and burying the Alleluias, these 40 days of Lent are an opportunity to ask ourselves, "What does it mean to be you?" Frederick Buechner offers some helpful suggestions for questions to ponder during these 6 weeks, one for each week, if you choose–

1. "If you had to bet everything you have on whether there is a God or whether there isn’t, which side would get your money and why?

2. "When you look at your face in the mirro, what do you see in it that you most like and what do you see in it that you most deplore?

3. "If you had only one last message to leave to the handful of people who are most important to you, what would it be in 25 words or less? [Remember our imagining of the gospel in 7 words?]

4. "Of all the things you have done in your life, which is the one you would most like to undo? Which is the one that makes you happiest to remember?

5. "Is there any person in the world, or any cause, that if circumstances called for it, you would be willing to die for?

6. "If this were the last day of your life, what would you do with it?

Buechner suggests that in the process of contemplating these questions, you might come to a clearer sense of who you are, who you are becoming, and who you are failing to become. (Whistling in the Dark, cited on frederickbuechner.com, op cit.)

The pattern of Lent–this paring down, this self-examination and deeper self-knowledge, this giving up and pondering what is worth giving ourselves to, even dying for–is the image of God’s giving up of everything to "have" us, if you will, to let us know how much we are loved, to show us the depth of the Ground of our Being, to use Paul Tillich’s phrase. "Lent is a time for setting things aside, (Sam Wells writes), even good things, to desire only God." (Wells, JP, pp. 10-11) I sometimes think that’s the ultimate lesson of our lives–to come to set things aside, even good things, like our possessions, our accomplishments, finally even our loved ones and our bodies, to desire only God, and then God folds us into that Great Love. Lent lets us practice letting go.

Belden C. Lane has written a book with a remarkable title–The Solace of Fierce Landscapes–Exploring Desert and Mountain Spirituality. I confess that I am intrigued and terrified by it. But listen to this passage in which Lane talks about the true gift–the true "solace," if you will–of "fierce landscapes"--

...Ever distrustful of grace, I assent more readily to being destroyed than to being loved. It’s too much to presume that I might be the object of God’s deepest longing, profoundly loved by that which frightens me most. Why am I drawn to desert and mountain fierceness? What impels me to its unmitigated honesty, its dreadful capacity to strip bare, its long, compelling silence? It’s the frail hope that in finding myself brought to the edge–to the macabre, stone-silent edge of death itself–I may hear a word whispered in its loneliness. The word is ‘love,’ spoken pointedly and undeniably to me. It may have been uttered many times in the past, but I’m fully able to hear it only in that silence. (Cited in

An Almanac for the Soul, Marv and Nancy Hiles, p. 47)

40 days–or 40 years–seems like such a long time. Have you ever tried praying for 40 minutes? It seems like an eternity. It could be longer, it could be shorter, it means "as long as it takes"–as long as it takes for us as a church to figure out what we are here for and who we are here for; as long as it takes for us to shape our lives into some Christ-shaped vessel so that divinity may become flesh in our humanity; as long as it takes for us to figure out who we are and Whose we are. As long as it takes. Let us begin the journey together.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

Transfigured–for real or Real?"-- Exodus 34:29-35, Luke 9:28-36-- Feb. 10, 2013

"Dr. Eben Alexander was a highly accomplished and widely published neurosurgeon who didn’t consider himself religious. He attended church on Christmas and Easter, but his real religion was empirical science. He describes himself as a "friendly skeptic."

In Nov. 2008, Alexander was admitted to a Lynchburg, VA hospital with "excruciating back pain," and slipped into a coma, which lasted for 7 days.

At the end of those 7 days, he opened his eyes and thrashed around in bed. After the doctor removed his ventilator, Alexander took his first unassisted breath in a week, calmed down, and then said, ‘thank you.’ Looking around the room at his family and doctors, he smiled and said, ‘All is well. Don’t worry, all is well.’"(Dan Clendenin, Journey with Jesus, 2/3/13)

Alexander had had an extremely rare form of meningitis, and during his coma "his brain’s neocortex had shut down. He describes it as ‘inoperative.’ It wasn’t that his brain was working improperly or poorly, he says, but that it wasn’t working at all." In a book published in 2011, Alexander describes "the profound spiritual experience he had when he was ‘completely free of the limitations of my physical brain.’" (Ibid.) Without going into the particulars of his very clear memories of that experience, it is Dr. Alexander’s conclusion that is particularly significant, which is that "whether you feel it or not, nothing can separate you from the Perfect Love that exists at the heart of the universe. [Clendenin] ‘This is the reality of realities, [he writes] the incomprehensibly glorious truth of truths that lives and breathes at the core of everything that exists or ever will exist.’" (ibid.)

For Eben Alexander, the veil which is the normal functioning of his brain, was lifted, and he got a glimpse of the Reality of realities that lies at the heart of the universe. He had an experience of transfiguration. Fortunately, one doesn’t have to have a near-death experience to catch a glimpse of what lies at the heart of the universe, but it may involve a letting go of the death grip we have on what we’re convinced is "reality."

Jesus took Peter, James and John with him up on the mountain to pray. Moses went up on the mountain to meet with God. "Up on the mountain" is Biblical shorthand for "meeting with God." And up on the mountain, while he was praying, Jesus’ appearance was transfigured– his face and his clothes became dazzlingly, radiantly white, and two figures appeared with him, whom the disciples took to be Moses and Elijah. "They appeared in glory and were speaking of his departure, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem." It was a timeless moment, and Peter, half-asleep, or in a kind of trance himself, sought to preserve it. "Master, it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah." That idea was quickly brought to a close as a cloud of "dazzling darkness," as Barbara Brown Taylor describes it, came over them, and a voice from the cloud spoke. "This is my Son, my Chosen [or my Beloved]: listen to him." And then the cloud and the figures were gone, leaving only Jesus. The next day they returned to the valley, where a boy possessed by a demon awaited healing by Jesus.

Jesus’ face and clothing were transfigured in dazzling radiance. Moses’ face was shining so brightly that he had to wear a veil to shield its brightness from the others. These two men, the only two people who are described in the Bible with the word "meek," meaning not milquetoast but rather "utterly transparent" to God, both transfigured, changed, by their encounters with God, the Source of the Radiance. Abwun, Jesus addressed God. Father, Source of the Radiance, Creative Breath–all meanings of that Aramaic word, abba. Jesus went up on the mountain to pray.

Now, I don’t know about you, but my experiences of prayer are not normally accompanied by figures of light and dazzling clouds with voices. And yet, and yet, if prayer is, as one writer puts it, "a way of attuning ourselves to God" (David Lose, Working Preacher.com, 2/10/13) in those moments when I’ve let go of trying to do it "right" or been so attached to one particular outcome, when I’ve been able to let go of all the other things I think are so important and actually pointed my self in a direction that maybe, possibly, was "attuned to God," sometimes I’ve gotten a new perspective, a new way of seeing, a new way of experiencing a situation.

It’s not easy in our society which, one novelist describes as one of "Total Noise." (David Foster Wallace, cited in Clendenin, op cit.) To pull yourself away from the internet, turn off the television, the radio, the "shoulda-woulda-coulda" tapes that run non-stop in our brains and just try to "attune yourself to God" is no simple task. It is a practice. To set aside 5, 10, even 20 min. minutes a day, even, imagine! twice a day, to "attune ourselves" to the Perfect Love that exists at the heart of the universe, the Reality of realities, the truth of truths that lives and breathes at the core of everything that exists or ever will exist. That takes intention, practice, if you will. The upcoming season of Lent may be just the excuse we need to make a daily routine of this.

During our second "commercial interruption" in a few minutes, Ernie Lafontaine will be talking about moving from hope to reality, about "getting real" about our hopes and dreams for this congregation as we move into God’s future for us. This process cannot just be about us, not even our best thoughts and ideas and plans. It has to be attuned to God. We need to take ourselves "up on the mountain" of whatever place or state of mind helps us to "attune with God," even to encounter God, which is an awesome, even terrifying, place to be. "Imagine an entire congregation begin transfigured," one writer says, "into a powerful and bright witness, a beacon of light and warmth for a weary, cynical world." (Sharron R. Blezard, Stewardship of Life, 2/6/13)

"Transfiguration is living by vision [wrote Walter Wink]: standing foursquare in the midst of a broken, tortured, oppressed, starving, dehumanizing reality, yet seeing the invisible, calling to it to come, behaving as if it is on the way, sustained by elements of it that have come already, within and among us. In those moments when people are healed, transformed, freed from addictions, obsessions, destructiveness, self worship or when groups or communities or even, rarely, whole nations glimpse the light of the transcendent in their midst, there the New Creation has come upon us. The world for one brief moment is transfigured. The beyond shines in our midst—on the way to the cross." [Walter Wink, Interpretation, in Imaging the Word, vol. 1, p. 142)

That is a vision worth living into. Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

"What’s Love got to do with it?" --1 Corinthians 13:1-13, Luke 4:21-30-- Feb. 3, 2013

You could hear the sharp intake of breath as the tattooed and multiply-pierced young man walked forward to the chancel with the guitar under his arm. Stepping up next to him was a young woman in tight jeans and a streak of blue in her hair. They took a moment to plug the guitar into the speaker and adjust the microphones near their lips. Then with a chord that got everyone’s attention, their anthem began. "Woe to you hypocrites," they sang, directly quoting Jesus, but somehow sounding very "un-Christian." They listed the evident sins of the society they saw around them–the number of hungry and homeless people, violence in the streets and schools, drug and alcohol abuse, young people being judged for the way they looked.

It made even the woman who devoted much of her time volunteering in the soup kitchen feel uncomfortable. It certainly made the man who owned a business on Main St. angry. It confused the first-grader sitting with her parents.

When the minister stood up to deliver the sermon, you could see folks relax in their pews. The women and some of the men smiled and unconsciously touched their hair. The handsome young man standing in the pulpit made them feel sexy. He spoke so passionately and beautifully–he didn’t even use notes. The time during his sermon flew by, and if you’d asked anyone about it later, they most likely would have commented on how they loved to hear Rev. Jones speak, though they’d have been hard-pressed to tell you what he spoke about.

At coffee hour, a group of folks who were adamantly for gun control, upset about the growing violence in their own little town, glared across the room at a group of hunters and NRA members. The kids sat at separate tables, hurling cheetos at one another, while their doting parents looked on, reluctant to make a fuss. Older folks seethed with disapproval.

To everyone’s surprise, coffee hour was interrupted when a woman tapped on the microphone of the social hall’s sound system. "Excuse me," she said, waiting for everyone to settle down and give her their attention. "Thank you," she said when the room had quieted down. "I have a letter from our founding pastor, and it’s important that we all hear it. I received it yesterday in the mail, and when I first read it, I was almost insulted. Then I read it again, and, I’m sorry to say, I think we need to hear this.

"Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,"

the letter began. "I give thanks to God for you everyday for the incredible gifts that have been poured out upon you. It is one of the real privileges and joys of my ministry that I was a part of bringing you together and getting you started as a community.

But I have to say, I’m distressed at what I’ve been hearing about you. You’ve got all sorts of causes you’re trumpeting–that’s good. You’ve got musicians and artists coming out of your ears–that’s great. Rev. Jones is the talk of the town, and your prayer chain’s got a reputation for performing miracles–all wonderful.

BUT, what I don’t hear anything about is the Love you have for one another or for any of the people you’re supposed to be helping. In fact, I’ve heard that coffee hour is toxic, your worship service is just a fan club, and people feel like they should be kissing the rings on the hands that serve them food.

Listen--If I speak in the tongues of angels or celebrities, but don’t have love, I might just as well be feedback from a microphone. If I am engaged in all the right social justice causes and stir people up to act and demonstrate, but don’t have love, I am nothing.

If I contribute to the NRA, the ACLU, the Sierra Club, the 5 All-Church Offerings of the United Church of Christ, but don’t have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends.

"I could be wrong," should be added at the end of any one of your pronouncements, maybe even at the end of Rev. Jones’ sermons. "I don’t know. I could listen more deeply" should be part of all your coffee hour or parking lot conversations. We just don’t know everything. Only God does. Love is what matters.

Coffee hour at the First Church of Corinth would never be the same, as you can imagine.

I’ll leave it to you to decide whether they took the letter’s words to heart or filed a complaint against their former pastor. But that’s the setting of this passage on Love that we are more likely to have heard read at weddings, when everyone looks beautiful and beaming, when all seems right with the world. What’s not to love about Love? In fact, love is most important in times of struggle and confusion, when life is complicated and difficult.

The congregation in Nazareth couldn’t have told you that Jesus’ little sermon had anything to do with Love, but that was precisely what Jesus was pushing them to understand. Love isn’t confined to your little circle of family and friends, he was saying. I’m not here just to bring honor and fame to this little Galilean village. God’s healing and justice and mercy–all of which are part of God’s Love–aren’t limited to certain geographical or ethnic or religious categories. You are loved, but not just you.

There is a saying attributed to St. Augustine that says, "God loves everyone as if he or she is the only one." That’s the scandal of God, isn’t it, and the scandal of Love? Where’s the integrity? Where are the standards? Where is the judgment? "Now we see in a mirror dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I now only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known."

"Now we see in a mirror dimly." "That should be the motto of every theologian and lover," Bruce Epperly writes (Adventurous Lectionary, 2/3/13) The love of God is bigger than we can get our minds wrapped around. The love of God includes each and all of us, yet is willing to struggle–even die–to teach us what that means. Love doesn’t mean the absence of conflict–in fact, conflict may be a way to teach us about love. Conflict is a given in human relationships–we are all different, have different experiences, different aptitudes and inclinations. Hiding or denying conflict is a recipe for failure. In healthy relationships, research has found, there is a 5 to 1 ratio between positive and negative interactions. While we need to accentuate the positive (as the song says), we really shouldn’t eliminate the negative. Working through conflict actually immunizes our relationships from the really big times of stress. Just like a wound that heals with a scar that is stronger than the original tissue, so acknowledging and working through conflict makes our relationships stronger. Conflict is actually necessary for the long-term success of committed relationships. (Tal Ben Shahar)

"This is my body, broken...this is my blood, poured out." What we consider "perfect"– the perfect relationship, the perfect church, the perfect loaf or cup–cannot grow and become available and nourishing to others until it is broken open, until it is tested. Perfect Love willingly opened itself up to suffering and death–foolishness to mortals, the wisdom of God.

So we come to break the bread and pour out the cup, so that we might be nourished and made new, and so that we might become bread and drink for a hungry and thirsty world. What’s Love got to do with it? Only everything.

Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

“Home Again”-- Nehemiah 8:1-3,5-6,8-10, Luke 4:14-21 -- Jan. 27, 2013

The lesson from Hebrew scripture and the Gospel lesson that have been paired together today describe what has become a familiar scene for us–the reading of Scripture to a gathered community and an interpretation or teaching of it. Ezra the priest reads the law of Moses to the people of Israel, recently returned from exile, who have gathered in the square facing the Water Gate. Jesus returns to his home synagogue, after being baptized and tested in the wilderness, and is handed the scroll with the prophet Isaiah on it, a portion of which he reads to them, concluding with “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

It’s what we do every Sunday morning here–someone reads a portion of our tradition’s Scriptures–usually one from our Hebrew tradition and one from the Christian testament–and they often conclude that reading by saying, “May God add understanding to the hearing of this word” or “This is the gospel of Jesus Christ, and this is good news!” or “Listen to what the Spirit is saying to the church.” Our more liturgical brothers and sisters say, “This is the word of the Lord.” And the response is,   “Thanks be to God!” and, after the gospel reading, “This is the Gospel of Jesus Christ,” with the response, “Praise be to you, Lord Jesus Christ.”

For Jews, Christians, and Muslims, there are certain written words that are considered sacred, or scripture–the Torah, the Bible, the Koran. Other traditions have texts and sacred writings which illustrate eternal truths, but for the Abrahamic faiths, God is somehow present in the words on the page. We differ across and within traditions as to how we understand that Presence-- Is it word for word, dictated by God, or are the words “God-breathed,” as Eugene Peterson says, through their human authors in their very concrete human contexts? Did “God say it, we believe it, that settles it”? Or, as we say in the United Church of Christ, is God “still speaking”?

Wrestling with the texts is a time-honored Jewish tradition. In fact, Israel’s name means “one who has wrestled with God.” (You may recall the story of Jacob wrestling with the angel.) Students of the Torah sit across from one another and literally go back and forth, debating, arguing, examining all sides of the text. The Talmud is a collection of stories and commentaries of the rabbis who have imaginatively expanded the text. Faithful Muslims memorize the Koran–
the whole thing–so one must immerse oneself in that text, understand what you’re saying, if you are to be able to hold such a body of work in your heart and mind.

We Christians, on the other hand, especially those of us in the more “liberal” traditions, are more likely to regard our bibles as holy but prefer to keep them at arm’s length. We may know or recognize a few passages–we recognize the shepherds and angels in the Christmas story, for example, or the creation story in Genesis, but do we know that there are two different creation stories there? How many of us can really find our way around our Bibles, and when we happen upon one of those bizarre or especially troubling or violent passages, do we know what to do with them, except slam our bibles shut and exclaim, “That’s why I don’t read the Bible!” You may have grown up in a different time and with a different approach to the bible, but I can tell you that more and more people have no training or experience at all in reading, let alone wrestling, with the bible, and the public exploitation of biblical texts to condemn or exclude people is becoming many people’s only exposure to this sacred text. That’s why one of the 3 main goals of the UCC is to educate about and immerse our members in this text so that we can offer a different understanding and living out of its truth.

In the story from Nehemiah which David read for us this morning, the people wept when they heard the law and had it interpreted for them. (From the very beginning, the texts have been explained and interpreted.) We are not told why they wept, but I imagine that after being in exile for a couple generations, and coming to understand their exile as the consequence of their having turned away from God and God’s law, that it was a bittersweet homecoming to their Truth. This is how God wants us to live, this is who we are meant to be, this is our true identity...and look how far we’ve gone astray from that. The recognition of that and the deep understanding of the pain that wandering and turning away had caused them dropped them to their knees. That is what a recognition of guilt–what we’ve done or haven’t done that has caused harm to ourselves or others–can do, but it should not leave us there, on our knees, weeping. As long as we can recognize those actions or thoughts that have taken us away from our true center, we can get up off our knees and continue the journey, wiser to the pitfalls that await us and that have tripped us up before.

“This day is holy to the Lord your God,”Nehemiah and Ezra and the Levites say to the people. “Do not mourn or weep...go your way..” Eat and drink and share what you have with those who don’t have anything... “and do not be grieved, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

“The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,” Jesus read from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, “because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Even Jesus picked and chose verses from Scripture, or at least Luke does as he tells this story. These words are actually from a couple of different chapters in Isaiah, and Jesus leaves out, “to proclaim the day of vengeance of our God.”

Here in this season of inaugurals, we might think of this as Jesus’ inaugural address. This is his vision for his ministry, this is how he understands his calling–anointed by God to bring good news to the poor, proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of God’s favor. This is what the kingdom of God looks like. It has arrived and it is still coming.

But just as some Americans heard President Obama’s second inaugural speech as visionary, hopeful, empowering and others heard it as a power grab, a frightening liberal rant; so too the people in the synagogue in Nazareth had different responses. Our assigned reading for today ends at a rather deceptive point, for next week we’ll read that while some thought Jesus spoke remarkably well, especially for a carpenter’s son, others thought he had become too big for his britches, and in fact, by the end of the scene, the crowd turns into a mob trying to throw Jesus off a cliff. “What child is this?!” indeed!

Good news to the poor, release of the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, freedom for the oppressed, and God’s kingdom come sound like good news in the abstract. But when you start to get real, the news sounds less good–you mean, good news for the poor means I have to share? You mean, I’m actually holding some of the chains of those prisoners? You mean, my eyes are the ones that need to be opened to the truth? You mean, the structures that oppress some people actually benefit me? You mean, God’s kingdom come means my comfortable world will get shaken up? This is the “good news”? And for Jesus’ neighbors, who were some of those who were oppressed, where was that phrase about ‘the day of the vengeance of God’?

Abraham Lincoln’s second inaugural address was, like Barack Obama’s, relatively brief as inaugural speeches go, but it was actually critical of the nation, it named slavery as one of the sins of the nation. Like Obama’s speech, like Jesus’ reading and interpretation, it too engendered wildly different and emotionally charged responses. Jesus’ choice of text and his interpretation of it are good news only to those who acknowledge that all is not right, that too many people are hearing and living only the bad news of shame, of oppression, of exclusion. This isn’t some “new age” thinking that Jesus has come up with–he reaches back into the tradition, back to ancient notion of “jubilee,” “the year of God’s favor,” where every 50 years, all debts are forgiven, the land returns to the original owner (who, by the way, is God) and all slaves and prisoners are released. It is an old hope given new life.

Leslie Cooke writes, “Too long we have been concerned that our gospel should give offense; it is time we were concerned that it is not giving offense enough. Our condemnation is not that [people] sometimes oppose the gospel but that so many ignore it. If people paid us the tribute of their antagonism, we should have less cause for concern.” (Faith Stakes a Claim, cited in Vt. Conference e-Kit, 1/24/13)   Are people criticizing and staying away from our churches because we are setting too many people free from the prisons of self-hatred and doubt and fear? Are our numbers dwindling because we feed too many hungry people or house too many homeless people? Or are we just too easy to ignore? Does anybody notice what we do?

“The spirit of the Lord God is upon me,” Jesus read, ““because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”   The story of that reading in the Nazareth synagogue is not over yet–we’ll read what comes next next Sunday, and Jesus’ vision continues to guide us as live into God’s future for us. In the meantime, I offer these words which echo those of Jesus and Martin Luther King Jr. and all those who throughout the ages, have called us to come home to our Truth–

Within the belljar of your heart let freedom ring...
And if that means one gesture today of permission to love your self or another a bit more kindly so be it...
And if that means a clarion call against oppression in your own backyard so be it...
And if that means a shofar blast of awakening to the potential within each of us to care for one another so be it...
And if that means a resonant voice in front of a crowd naming a shining future that is possible in a time that is dangerous then so be it.
What ever it looks like, however it sounds, however small or grand the shift, let freedom ring.
We must wear this mantle and carry this staff as if it was gifted to us...and it was...and we must.
(Maria Sirois, Daily Inspiration, 1/25/13)

May it be so. Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

"Awash in Abundance"-- 1 Cor. 12:1-11, John 2:1-11-- Jan. 20, 2013

John’s Gospel is anything but a free-flowing journal or documentary. It is, rather, a carefully constructed, even poetic, statement of faith, beginning "in the beginning"–back before time even began–"In the beginning was the Word"--and ending–or rather, trailing off–into eternity–"But there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written."

John’s Jesus is cosmic, totally in control, intentional, and, frankly, a little obtuse in some of his discourses. So, when we come fairly early on to the story of the wedding at Cana, we might be tempted to think, "Oh, ok, Jesus and his friends did do normal things like attend weddings." And wouldn’t it be funny, if as some have suggested, that Jesus and his buddies were such partyers, such big wine-drinkers, that they are, in fact, the reason why the wine ran out early?

It might be tempting to think that, but we’d be missing John’s point. "On the third day,"John begins the story. The third day after what? Jesus has just finished calling his first disciples–the third day after that? Or is it like, "On the third day after Jesus was crucified..." More likely that. We should keep our eyes open for resurrection life here.

"On the third day there was a wedding in Cana of Galilee..." The setting is a celebration of love. Marriage and weddings are over and over used in the Bible as symbols of the love between God and humanity, full-bodied, sensual, energetic. The Song of Songs is an erotic love poem tucked in the middle of our Bible, devoted to just this kind of love. This wedding at Cana is the setting for the first of Jesus’ signs, John tells us, a sign telling us about the nature of Love. It is to be celebrated. As one commentator writes, "God does not want our religion to be too holy to be happy in." (Robert Brearley, cited by Kate Matthews Huey in Weekly Seeds, 1/20/13)

We read that "the mother of Jesus was there." She is not named, and we have not met her before, as John’s gospel has no infancy narrative. If we’re looking for an insight into their family dynamics, neither of them comes off particularly well–Mary is a little nagging, maybe even the stereotypical Jewish mother–"They have no wine"–and Jesus’ response seems a little short and even disrespectful–"Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come." As one commentator suggested, "If I said that to my mother, I’d be in need of a healing after that." Like a People Magazine article, we may be hoping for some insight into the mother-son relationship, but John is not interested in that. In fact, this is the first of just two appearances of the mother of Jesus (she is never named) in this gospel–here, at the first of the signs that Jesus did–and at the cross, the final sign, when Jesus commends her to John’s care and she to his, creating the new community, literally with his blood. She is present at both times when, as John says, "Jesus revealed his glory."

So, here in the story of the wedding at Cana, Mary (we can name her) moves the story along, rather than being fleshed out as a real person. "They have no wine," she tells her son. "Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come." From a Positive Psychology standpoint, we might say that Mary is focusing on the negative, on the lack. Jesus deflects her concern, and then moves to reveal the positive, the abundance that is hidden within this situation.

We are talking about a lot of water being changed into wine here–something like 150 gallons. This is in-your-face abundance and excellence, not just a slight improvement. It’s a miracle, of course, but Jesus is the one so open to the energy and power of God that he could channel it in all sorts of ways. He was an infinitely clear vessel for that channeling, but we know that all of us and all of nature are vibrating with the same energy. "Cleave the wood and I am there," Jesus teaches in the Gospel of Thomas. God is in the wood-- and beyond the wood, of course–but all the miracles of Jesus reveal an interrelationship–a luminous web, as Barbara Brown Taylor calls it–between everyone and everything. And so the water is transformed into wine, and good wine at that. "In turning water into wine," Dan Clendenin writes, "Jesus offers us excess for our emptiness." (Journey with Jesus, 1/20/13) Then of course there’s Soren Kierkegaard’s cryptic observation back in the 19^th c.–"Christ turned water into wine, but the church has succeeded in doing something even more difficult: it has turned wine into water." Ah yes, "too holy to be happy..."

"Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk, " the steward says to the bridegroom, who had been perilously close to being shamed for not having enough wine, "but you have kept the good wine until now." The first wine served, perhaps like love at its beginning, is savored and enjoyed. But as time goes on, it’s easy to have our senses dulled, to become numb to the beauty and rich flavor that love can bring to our lives. "The thrill is gone," as the song goes. And not just from love, but, for so many people, the thrill is gone from life. There is a lot of pain–even trauma–present in our society, and we have become a culture of self-medicators. This past week’s drug raid revealed not only a surprising number of sellers and possessors of drugs in our community, but, as the hospital’s emergency room displayed, a large number of users whose supply had suddenly been dammed up. And that’s just the illegal drug users. That doesn’t begin to address the number of legal abusers of alcohol. We are a society full of pain, seeking to numb it by any number of means.

"You have kept the good wine until now." Jesus reveals, in this first of his signs, that not only is love abundant, it is to be savored, paid attention to, nurtured, not taken for granted. And it takes work. Imagine those workers lugging the water up and down the ladders to fill the stone jars, the "drably dutiful," as one commentator wrote (Robert Brearley, op cit.) They were involved in a miracle of abundance, and they had no idea. When we’re washing the dishes or wiping the tables after Sunday Supper, are we aware that we’re involved in a miracle of abundance, as hungry people are fed and welcomed?

"They have no wine," the mother of Jesus tells him. "Woman, what concern is that to you and to me? My hour has not yet come." Jesus seems reluctant to act at first, and indeed, Carol Lakey Hess points out the "scandal of divine reluctance–God’s seeming absence or inaction in the face of human suffering and need in any age or place....In a world where for so many there is not clean water–let alone fine wine–where is the extravagance of God? In a world where children play in bomb craters the size of thirty-gallon wine jugs, why the divine reluctance? Like Mary,[she suggests] perhaps we have a role in the story, if we truly believe in God’s goodness and generosity, for we can ‘nudge God with our observation; they have no wine.’" (cited by Kate Huey, op cit.) Perhaps like Mary as well, we can lift our observation to God and at the same time, prepare for God to act–"Do whatever he tells you," she tells the servants.

"When human resources are at an end," (Alyce McKenzie, Edgy Exegesis, Patheos, 1/13/13) Jesus’ "signs" show us, God is able to pour wine into our water jars and life into our lifeless forms. Four years ago, the United States was filled with more hope about its future than I have experienced in my lifetime. Millions of people gathered into Washington DC to witness the inauguration of Barack Obama without a single incidence of violence. The hope seemed to infuse even the criminals. Four years later, the level of hope is considerably lower. As one African American preacher said, to a great extent,"promises remain unfulfilled, hopes have been dashed, dreams shattered." (Rev. Dr. Alvin O’Neal Jackson, Odyssey Network, "A Vision for America," 1/20/13) "We have not quite run out of money yet, [he says] but we are running low on courage, vision and leadership." Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream of the Beloved Community is not yet realized.

Like the mother of Jesus, we can acknowledge the situation. There are too many without the basic necessities of life–food, shelter, health care, education–let alone the less tangible necessities–hope, dignity, justice. The jars are empty for too many of our neighbors, for many of us as well. But we must not just focus on the lack. Jug by jugful, even spoonful by spoonful, we can begin to fill the jars with the full expectation that God can transform our labors and our longings into abundance beyond our imagination.

Is it "our hour" as a church, as we come to our Annual Meeting, to be transformed into something truly remarkable, something that can save our neighbors and loved ones from shame, offering life that is not just existence but even flourishing and thriving? "Now there are varieties of gifts," Paul wrote to the church in Corinth, "but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good." We are blessed with an abundance of gifts. How can we share or reveal our abundance with the world and with future generations, even to the 7^th generation, as Ernie commended to us last week? Henry David Thoreau said, "It’s not what you look at that matters. It’s what you see." Do we see water or wine? Deficit or abundance? Decline or possibility?

"You have kept the good wine until now. Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory." May God’s glory be revealed in us. Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

2012 Giving Tree

Every year our Mission Team works with local agencies to provide gifts for families in Bennington County. This picture is of the tree crafted by Andrea Lampron and all the wrapped gifts collected.

"Called by Name"-- Isaiah 43:1-7, Luke 3:15-16, 21-22-- Jan. 13, 2013

My brief meditation this morning is really just the introduction to, and underpinning of, Ernie’s presentation a little later on about the challenges and opportunities we face today in the life of our church. And as we all become part of "the church" when we are baptized, it is fitting that we should look at the story of Jesus’ baptism which he shares with us.

All four gospels tell the story of Jesus’ baptism, but each has their own unique perspective. In some, the whole crowd hears the Voice from heaven, which some take to be thunder, saying that this Jesus is God’s beloved son. Others, like the one we read in Luke, have the Voice speaking only and directly to Jesus–"You are my beloved son; with you I am well pleased." The Spirit descends like a dove–"in bodily form," Luke tells us–and this tangible, feathered Presence alights on Jesus’ river-drenched body. Baptism happens in the midst of embodied life, in the presence of earthly elements. It’s not just an abstract, heavenly symbol.

"I have called you by name; you are mine," God says to Israel through the prophet Isaiah."Do not fear for I am with you...–everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made." Jesus was not and is not the only the only "beloved." God calls each of us by name, calls each of us "beloved," but our response to that claiming is "personal and situational," as Bruce Epperly writes. (The Adventurous Lectionary, 1/13/13) We are free to ignore that claim upon our lives, free to refuse to believe that God is able to love even us–as unworthy, or as flawed, or as confused as we may be or have been taught that we are. Even Jesus had to choose whether or not to accept the affirmation of the Voice–his public ministry lay before him, and he had to be tested in the wilderness to see whether this was a path he was going to take. But, as Epperly writes, "Fully alive, Jesus was fully open to embodying God’s vision in his own unique way, sharing God’s vision, energy, and power for the wholeness and salvation of humankind." (Ibid.) When and if we are "fully alive," God is able to work God’s vision through our unique selves, and we become part of God’s transforming wholeness and salvation of humankind.

Some of us were baptized as infants, and so "remembering our baptisms" may be a pretty fruitless enterprise. Others of us do remember our baptisms, as we were baptized as young or older adults in what is often called ‘believers’ baptism." Still others of us may not yet have been baptized, but for whatever reasons, consider ourselves part of the church community. It is said that Martin Luther, on particularly bad days, would look at the sign he had written for himself near his desk–"Remember your baptism." It’s not the sprinkling or the immersing in water that we are to remember. It is the affirmation and claiming that happens when we are baptized–"You are my beloved child," God says to each of us. Baptism doesn’t make us or our lives holy or sacred or mistake-proof, but it affirms, acknowledges, recognizes that we are, indeed, sacred beings, called by God, "created for God’s glory, formed and made by God," as Isaiah said.

Baptism is not just private and personal. It is a "powerful bonding experience," as UCC pastor Kate Huey writes, in which we understand ourselves as belonging to a community that is "engaged with God in the transformation of the world, in bringing a new world to reality at long last." (Samuel, 1/13/13) That’s why we yearn for and pray for God’s kingdom to come–"Thy kingdom come"--it has already been ushered in by Jesus but it is not yet fully revealed. Baptism "connects people with promises too big to fit into the world as it is presently constituted," as another commentator puts it (Richard Swanson, cited by Huey, op cit.)

Which is where we as a church community come in, where our discussions and prayerful discernment of our future come in. What we shall be has not yet been revealed. What shape or form the church will evolve into is still unknown. But by our baptism, each one of us has a part, has a stake, in what that future will be like. Our unique, individual gifts, and the gift of this particular, unique church community, are called into service by God for the transformation of the world. We can choose to respond to that call or we can ignore it. But the difference between those responses is literally the difference between life and death. "Choose life," God begs us. What will be our response?

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

"More Light" --Isaiah 60:1-6, Matthew 2:1-12-- Jan. 6, 2013

The Gospel writer we call Matthew is the most Jewish of all the gospel writers. He’s the one who most often puts the story of Jesus in the context of Hebrew scripture–"Thus, as it was written...," Matthew often says. He begins his gospel with a genealogy, tracing Jesus’ ancestry back to Abraham, the father of the Jews, through David and the various grandmothers and grandfathers of Jesus, down through "Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah."

As we heard in the reading from the prophet Isaiah, there is a universal stream in the Jewish tradition-- "nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your dawn." The Jewish people, at their best and brightest, are a light to the nations, not just a parochial, exclusive, tribal sect, and phrases from Isaiah’s prophecy infuse Matthew’s story of Jesus’ birth– "A multitude of camels shall cover you....they shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord."

So, according to Matthew, after Jesus was born, it was not Jewish shepherds but foreign astrologers from the East who came to find the Child. These wise men, or magi, were quite possibly Zoroastrians, followers of the ancient Persian religion that read signs and patterns in the stars and sky, who were simply doing what they were called to do–studying the stars–when they discovered something worth exploring more deeply, something worth moving out of their usual patterns and routines to check out, something worth the risk of a journey to an unknown destination.

They come to the political and religious center of Judaism–Jerusalem–where they assume those on the "inside" have surely seen the same thing they have observed–signs that a "child born king of the Jews has been born." These outsiders then discover that, whereas they have come to pay homage to this new-born King, the current man with the title King wants to murder the child. So, after giving their auspicious gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, they go home by another way.

We are not told–and we have no reason to believe–that the magi gave up their Zoroastrianism, but no doubt they never looked upon it or the world in the same way after their journey. More light had been shed on their ancient wisdom. The light of Christ was integrated into their worldview.

The word epiphany, as we’ve said, means a "showing forth," a "manifestation." But more than that, it’s like the last piece of a puzzle when, put in place, reveals a deeper, broader meaning. So there’s a sudden realization or comprehension about what the whole thing means. This new information or experience, insignificant by itself, now illuminates a foundation or structure that had previously been hidden. An epiphany is an "ah ha!" moment.

The journey of the magi enlightened their understanding of the bigger picture that their study of the stars and planets had led them to but had been inadequate on its own. And just so, by including this story of these exotic visitors from the east in his story of the birth of Christ, Matthew adds a piece of the puzzle that turns on the Light, so to speak, for his community of Jewish Christians: It’s not just about us. This Light is meant not just for the Jews but for everyone. In fact, our Establishment tried to put the Light out. God is perfectly able to use whatever instruments God wants to fulfill the Divine Intention for the world. Don’t be too quick about judging someone by the crown or turban on their head or by the signs tattooed on their bodies or the cars or camels they drive.

Christians have historically looked upon other religious traditions in a variety of ways. One, that still has plenty of currency, is the exclusive one-- that ours is the only true religion. The only way to experience God is through Jesus. Another is that ours is the superior understanding, but recognizing that other traditions have value. Still another is the inclusive perspective–that from the same Source there are many paths, all leading to one destination. One expression of this says that all people, then, are "anonymous Christians," just as there is a Hindu saying, "all people are Hindus."

A fourth perspective, which I tend to prefer, is the pluralist one–there are different visions of reality, with different understandings, different values, and there is no need for uniformity. What we need is dialogue. We can remain "Christian," but deepen and widen our spirituality through understanding the wisdom and perspectives of other traditions. Through them God sheds more light on our own tradition.

The story of the visit of the Magi to the Christ Child is a critical piece in the bigger puzzle, especially in our world of instant communication, ready access to the teachings of other traditions, and constant interaction with people from every part of the world. God has ways of reaching and illuminating people of all cultures and traditions, and those ways are multiple, complex, and specific to those cultures and traditions. God’s revelation to humankind is ongoing and evolving–God is still speaking, if you will–and how that revelation is communicated and understood depends on the specific culture and vocabulary of the people receiving the revelation.

This applies not only to different religious traditions but also to different generations and different cultures. The digital generation may look for and receive God’s light in very different ways and places than those of older generations. Pastor John Robinson told the Pilgrims setting off for the New World that "God has yet more light and truth to be revealed from his holy Word," and that is as true today as it was then.

The magi, after finding and experiencing the Christ Child, went home by another way, "warned in a dream," Matthew says, not to return to Herod. There is real and present danger in clutching too tightly to the understandings and privileges of our own tradition. It’s too easy to lose our perspective, to develop blind spots that keep us from seeing the shadows that may have developed in our own understandings.

One of the real gifts for me of my various times spent at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health is the interplay and enrichment of different religious traditions. Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish, Sufi, and Christian traditions offer their wisdom and practices, and I find my own Christian perspective enhanced, enlightened, and refined, rather than threatened.

John Philip Newell, the wonderful Scottish poet and theologian, says that Epiphany is not just about the appearance of God but rather the transparence of God–God’s Light is at the heart of and in everything.[Day1.org] That Light shines beyond the boundaries of our traditions and our assumptions, enlightening the path forward.

That Light radiates from within the bread and the cup, and as we take the bread and juice into our bodies, so we take in the Light and become vessels of it. May this blessing be ours as we join the magi on the journey home this Epiphany day–

May the angels of light glisten for us this day.

May the sparks of God’s beauty dance in the eyes of those we love.

May the universe be on fire with Presence for us this day.

May the new sun’s rising grace us with gratitude.

Let earth’s greenness shine and its waters breathe with Spirit.

Let heaven’s winds stir the soil of our soul and fresh awakenings rise within us.

May the mighty angels of light glisten in all things this day.

May they summon us to reverence, may they call us to life. (Newell, Praying with the Earth, p.4)

Amen, and amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

Early Christmas Eve, 2012

Even if we haven’t heard the story for a long time, we at least vaguely remember the characters– Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, the kings or the Wise Men (we rarely remember the word "magi"), and the angels. Then, of course, there’s Jesus, the one whom all the fuss is about.

You can Google all these characters and spend hours and hours reading all kinds of interesting and crazy stuff about them. But then, you’d miss the point of the story.

Because the point of the story is not just about Jesus, certainly not about "facts" about how he was born. The story is too important and too true for "facts." The point of the story is that God, or whatever you want to call the Life Force, the Energy that lights and runs and radiates through everything that is, was, and ever will be, your Higher Power, Love, with a capital "L" or Light, with a capital "L" –God came to inhabit human flesh, most clearly and fully in Jesus of Nazareth, but that was to make the point. God lived not only in Jesus but God lives in you and me and all around us. The fact of the matter is that lots of time we’ve got so much stuff and baggage and fear and busyness built up around us that we don’t even pay attention to the God who was born in us. Children often have less accumulations built up in and around them, so we see God more clearly in them. But just as we keep searching for God-- somewhere, out there, in the sky and stars, in holy places-- God in fact is searching for us, poking us gently from the inside sometimes, sometimes knocking us over to get our attention.

The really good news is that nothing–all our silly searching in all the wrong places, all our wanderings in the wrong directions, no failure or flaw, not even death itself–nothing ultimately can separate us from God, whose love and light we know in Christ Jesus. That Love and Light is being born–in us and all over the world–this night, this moment. Glory to God in the highest and on earth. Peace. Amen.

Late Christmas Eve 2012

The late Roman Catholic Archbishop Christophe Munzihirwa said, "There are things that can be seen only with eyes that have cried." Bishop Munzihirwa was martyred in 2001 in the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

"There are things that can be seen only with eyes that have cried." JK Rowling tried to communicate that to children in her Harry Potter books, where only those who had seen death could see thestrals, a strange, dinosaur-type creature. Harry Potter, whose parents had both been killed, and Luna Lovegood, whose mom had died, could both see them, while other children couldn’t.

The eyes of the people of Newtown, CT must be weary with crying this Christmas Eve night. They have been joined by millions of others, from the President on down, weeping over the slaughter of innocents this month. A commentator on NPR quietly reminded us of other eyes that have been crying, when, after reading the names of the 20 children and 6 adults who had been killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary School, he said, "We do not know the names of the 10 or 11 children in Afghanistan who died this week when they happened to walk along the edge of a field that had been mined."

"There are things that can be seen only with eyes that have cried."

This story that we read tonight–about the young mother and her not-yet-husband, about shepherds and angels, about a baby born and laid in the feeding trough of animals–can be heard as simply a lovely miracle story, a story for children, a story without blood or pain or messiness; and it is a beautiful story about God’s sending a child into the world to teach and show people about God.

But "there are things that can be seen only with eyes that have cried.." The story also has power for those eyes–through tears the story reminds us of how close birth comes to death, as childbirth was the foremost cause of death for women in Mary’s time and still is in many parts of the world; through tears the story tells us how God works through circumstances that are not at all how we would have liked them to be–an untimely pregnancy, a necessary journey at the worst possible time, rejection by people who can see only money or status or success. Through tears, the story tells us that it is often far away from the center of the news media, on the edges of society, that God sends messengers to tell of hope, and birth–to shepherds and peasants and those who frequent soup kitchens and homeless shelters. Through tears, the story reminds us that the Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. The story may make us nostalgic, but we should not be naive about its power.

This is power that doesn’t need to speak in halls of power. This is power that disregards society’s infatuation with celebrity. This is power that is at work even now, deep in the earth as seeds lie dormant, at work on the edges of our vision, in the spaces inbetween our cells and leaping over the walls and boundaries we have carefully constructed. This is power that, even now, is giving birth to new life, new dreams, in young people and old who dare to dream dreams and be open to God’s wonder-working power. This is power that even death cannot stop.

"There are things that can be seen only with eyes that have cried." Through the vision of tears we see not only great sorrow and suffering, but also deep joy and hope.

To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic,"

wrote historian Howard Zinn, it is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places–and there are so many–where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory."

The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. May we be part of the light. Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

Wed., Dec. 19, 2012 – The Light shines in the darkness...

The sanctuary at Second Congregational Church was full this past Sunday of folks who had come for our annual Christmas pageant and Jesus’ birthday party, but also of folks who needed to come together, maybe longing for a word or a reason or some way to understand the tragic events that took place in Newtown, CT last Friday. I know any number of colleagues who ripped up their prepared sermons to directly address those events and others like them, to give voice to the pain, sorrow, anger and confusion that many people were experiencing.

Just before the service, a number of parents of young children had come up to me and said, “We haven’t told our child about what happened in Newtown, so I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention it directly.” Ahh....it’s been awhile since my children were in first grade, and that was 20 years ago. How to honor those parents’ decisions and be sensitive to the wide range of needs and abilities of our church family?

Looking out on the congregation as I stood up to welcome everyone, I saw all those beautiful faces, some atop angel and shepherd costumes, some older and more reflective, and it seemed so good and right that we should all be there together–children in our midst, sitting with their parents or beloved adults, teens and adults in various groupings. Just gathering together in that place was healing. Lighting the Advent candles, even–perhaps especially–the candle of Joy, which, in the words Tom read, is both like an underground stream and a choice–lighting those candles was sign and symbol of the Light that shines in the darkness. Seeing the green ferns and trailing vines emerging from what 2 weeks ago had been a bare root on the communion table reminded us of the Life that emerges even from the most desolate settings. And the children ministered to us with their pageant–Mary and Joseph both responding so quickly and matter-of-factly to the angel’s news that they were to be parents of this God-child – “okay,” they said simply, the shepherd bowing with her lamb, the three wise men gallantly climbing the steps, King Herod’s bluster and then dramatic death, surrounded by the cutest thugs ever....”and all because of just a little Christmas.”

It is the middle of the darkest week of the year here, in so many ways. Rain and thick cloud cover make it even darker. Sadness and ache as we watch Newtown bury its children and fallen heroes. So more than ever, we long for the Light.

Here’s the advice my friend Maria Sirois, who’s one of the adjunct faculty of my Positive Psychology course as well as a psychotherapist, shared with us–

When tragedy strikes, here’s what we can do–
–Feel what we feel, so that neither grief nor anger become poison within us and so that others have permission to feel all that they feel.
–Bear witness without flinching from the darkness.
–Tell the truth.
–Honor the ordinary heroes among us and those who do the difficult work of holding the story in all its despair and desolation and those who begin the long, hard job of clearing and cleaning, uncovering and naming as much as can be uncovered and named.
–Hold onto the bits of light that emerge wherever they do so and from whomever.
–And surround those who grieve with care that is authentic and wholehearted. Love them up, feed them, show up and show up again. Bake if you can, drive if you can, buy them milk, share your memories if they are ready and however possible, be as a sequoia, rooted in your conviction that none of us need go through this alone and certain that every limb, every twig, every arm holds the promise of spring even as it anchors the ice of winter.

Mr. Rogers said to tell children to “Look for the helpers,” and indeed we lift up and remember the helpers–the teachers and staff, the first responders, the fire department, and police, the ministers, priests, and rabbis, the counselors, the funeral directors and personnel. Remember them in your prayers.

The Rev. Matt Crebbin is the senior minister of the UCC Church in Newtown, who was interviewed on the Today Show this morning. (If you missed it, check it out on Today.com.) He did a beautiful job of conveying the complexity and richness of our faith that is based on joy that is deeper than “happiness,”/happenstance.

The UCC and Pilgrim Press are donating 1000 copies of “Waterbugs and Dragonflies: Explaining Death to Small Children”. You can send $1 donation to https://secure3.convio.net/ucc/site/Ecommerce, although my guess is the $1000 was quickly raised. We have copies of this book in our church library (and I have one in my office). Feel free to borrow it.

The time for advocacy for safer gun laws will surely come, though that journey is complicated and fraught with difficulty. Support of mental health services and research is long overdue, and we need to have conversations about both. Our nation’s culture of violence is pervasive and destructive, and we must begin that long, hard self-examination sooner rather than later.

I welcome further conversation about how we as individuals and we as a church family might respond to events like Newtown, which, alas, will surely not be the last. We need to be the change we long to see, as Gandhi said. We need to hold on to the Light that is within and around us, being born into the world at every moment. “ The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” Thanks be to God!
–Mary

"...Into the Ways of Peace" --Luke 1:68-79, Luke 3:1-6 -- Dec. 9, 2012

After turning our attention last week to cosmic matters like the end of the world, when the sun, moon and stars would fall and people would be distressed by the rising of the seas, Advent–and Luke in particular–zooms into the particular this week. Like a Google Earth camera, panning through the layers of the atmosphere, Luke zeroes in on a very particular time and place:

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Anna and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.

You couldn’t hear the word of God in any of the zillion political ads this fall. You can’t hear it in any of the statements released by the White House or the leaders of Congress. Maybe it’s even unlikely to be heard from any of the pulpits or chancels or soapboxes of the church or other religious establishments. "The word of God came – not to any of the political or religious leaders of the time – but the word of God came to John, son of Zechariah, in the wilderness."

And John went all around that region around the Jordan, "proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins." A baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan write that "repentance means to ‘go beyond the mind that you have.’" (cited by Mary Ann McKibben Dana, in Journal for Preachers, Advent 2012, p. 5) Much of what we know today goes way beyond the mind that those who heard John’s message might have had, but the call to "repentance," the call to go beyond the mind we have is as urgent today as ever. We would do well to consider the ways we’ve become captive to outmoded ways of thinking–about God, about ourselves, about life–and Advent is an opportunity to do just that. That’s why, instead of being coddled and cooed around the manger from the get-go, in the texts of Advent we are shaken out of our comfort zones with end-of-the-world talk and this sharp-edged character of John the Baptist, crying out in the wilderness.

After all, we and the world are still waiting. Still waiting for ... what? Surely waiting for more than the latest iPhone, or the latest winner of the The Voice or American Idol; surely waiting for more than some political leader to solve all our problems..

Advent puts us in feeling-touch with what [one commentator] describes as ‘an unquenchable fire, a restlessness, a longing, a disquiet, a hunger, a loneliness, a gnawing nostalgia, a wildness that cannot be tamed, a congenital all-embracing ache that lies at the center of human experience.’ [Ronald Rolheiser, The Holy Longing, cited by Guy Sayles in JP, op cit., p. 13] That ache includes a yearning for hope, a hunger for meaning, a thirst for joy, a need for mystery, a craving for ecstasy, and, most of all, a desire to be known and loved. [Sayles, ibid.]

In the midst of our busyness, in the midst of all our decorations and gifts piled up in closets and attics, it’s all too easy to miss the One we’re waiting for. We’re paying attention to so many other things, trying just to keep up, trying not to disappoint anyone, trying to do what our culture keeps telling us we should be doing this time of year. So we don’t really have time to pay attention to that ache, that other hunger, and if we do manage to get it together to come to church on Sundays, we might be reminded–maybe we perceive it as a rather rude reminder–of just what that ache might be about.

"[John] went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins..." Even now, this morning, John is calling us to go beyond the mind we have, the mind that may tell us we’re woefully inadequate, God is so far away, God is making a list and checking it twice... Go beyond the mind you have [–repent], be immersed in the assurance and knowledge that God is everywhere, even inside you [the forgiveness of sins is about removing the separation between you and God]. Pay attention. Be made new.

Poet Mary Oliver is a consummate observer, quintessentially paying attention, and she writes, "Everyday I’m still looking for God and I’m still finding him everywhere, in the dust..." The news that God is everywhere, lovingly, searingly, powerfully present everywhere–that news is "garbled," as one writer puts it, "garbled almost everywhere except the wilderness." (Sayles, ibid.) It rings true, doesn’t it? that the word of God would come to John, son of Zechariah, in the wilderness, not to the pomp and proceedings of the political or religious establishments.

Zechariah, like almost any father, looked into his infant son’s eyes and saw there infinite possibility–so new, so longed-for, so yet untouched by the world’s brutality. "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel," Zechariah sang, "for he has looked favorably on his people and redeemed them....He has raised up a mighty savior for us in the house of his servant David....And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways..."

Some thought John was the long-awaited mighty savior, but here in Zechariah’s song the church affirms that he was the messenger announcing the coming savior. But John’s message is no less a saving message–"Repent, and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins. Go beyond the mind you have, be immersed in the assurance and knowledge that God is everywhere, even inside you. Pay attention. Be made new." John may have a saving message to the church, as Walter Brueggemann suggests, a church who may need to be called back to the basics, a church whose heart may have been compromised, a church who may have lost our critical edge, softened the gospel, accommodated to consumerism, become cynically accepting of social violence and developed a casual indifference to the poor. "Altogether," Brueggemann writes, " [this may have led to ]a dulled faith that cannot well receive the Christmas gift of newness. John, the carrier of costly readiness, is a wake-up call to Christians to get back to the basics of faith, to recover our initial resolve, and to be in a mode of hungry receptiveness." (Sojourners, Dec. 2009)

That is the gift of John the Baptist, this once Man-child to whom his aged father sang, "And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people by the forgiveness of their sins. By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high will break upon us, to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace."

"Prepare the way of the Lord," John would later cry, echoing the prophet Isaiah. "Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God."

...Prepare, prepare [writes Jan Richardson of John’s message].

It may feel like

the world is leveling you

emptying you

as it asks you

to give up

what you have known.

It is impolite

and hardly tame

but when it falls

upon your lips

you will wonder at the sweetness

like honey

that finds its way

into the hunger

you had not known

was there.

["The Advent Door," Advent 2, 2012]

Pay attention to the hunger. Watch for gratitude. Take time to breathe deeply and be still. Walk

in the way of peace. Go beyond the mind you have. Prepare the way.

　

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

"Drawing near..." --Jeremiah 33:14-16, Luke 21:25-36-- Dec. 2, 2012

The church year begins by shoving us off balance. Instead of looking to the skies for a hint of gathering angel choirs, we read this–"There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on the earth distress among nations confused by the roaring of the sea and the waves. People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken." Welcome, Advent!

Joanna Adams wrote of Advent a few years ago–and it rings true today–"This Advent I feel an urgent need for the light that comes from God, and I do not think I am the only one....The clouds of anxiety about the future are hovering so low and close that you can barely see your hand in front of your face." (Cited by Kate Huey in Weekly Seeds, 12/2/12) She finds herself "holding on for dear life to the reassurance that God intends to make the world right again." I know how she feels.

I daresay we could quickly come up with a list of things and events that make up that low-hanging cloud of anxiety–the impending "fiscal cliff" and on-going recession, the ice shelf melting into the sea, the rising of sea levels and the resulting extreme devastation of storms like Sandy, worries over our children or aging parents, nagging worries over changes in our bodies or financial situations, the struggles and concerns of those near and dear to us. And we’re among the most fortunate ones–imagine the anxiety of our neighbors who begin this month with a paltry sum for food and shelter, let alone any extra to buy Christmas presents for their children; or residents of the Rockaways or Staten Island or the Jersey shore whose homes were washed away; or refugees from the world’s wars–in Syria and the Congo, in Turkey and Jordan; those still living in the midst of war and violence. "People will faint from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the world, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken."

"The stories of Advent," writes one commentator, "are dug from the harsh soil of human struggle and the littered landscape of dashed dreams. They are told from the vista where sin still reigns supreme and hope has gone on vacation." (Gary W. Charles, cited by Huey, op cit.) "Now when these things begin to take place," Jesus tells his followers in Luke’s gospel, "stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near." He doesn’t say, "When the Son of Humanity comes in a cloud with great power and great glory, then you can stand up and raise your heads," but rather, "when these things begin to take place, stand up...for your redemption is drawing near." The question is, "How do we remain faithful when these fear-filled and foreboding signs begin to happen? What do we do when the chaos begins?" (Mark Davis, Left Behind and Loving It, 11/27/12) Stand up and lift up your heads, Jesus says. One translator calls this "the imperative of expectation." (Davis, ibid.)

I thought of that this week in the midst of the chaos here. I have infinite admiration for all those who kept facing into the chaos, who received each additional donation of "stuff" with good nature and thanks, who, after only very brief respites of sitting down and weeping, stood up and lifted up their heads, in expectation that Friday evening would indeed come, and the Snowball Bazaar would yet again open its doors to eager customers. The Imperative of Expectation. It was the expectation that kept them going. That’s what Advent helps us do.

Jeremiah looked out on the devastation of his own landscape–after shouting himself hoarse and warning the people and their leaders of the consequences of turning away from God and relying on other sources for their security. The Babylonian armies had marched and torched through and taken the leaders off into exile, leaving not only the cities but all the old ways of life destroyed. It is then, as one commentator describes it, that "the prophet looks out on the wasted landscape and begins to fill it with images of beauty, peace, and wholeness." (Amy Erickson, Odyssey Network, 11/27/12, "After the Chaos Ends") Jeremiah speaks of a "righteous branch," drawing on the image of trees that is deeply rooted in the Old Testament tradition. "The tree of life in the Garden of Eden story links trees with ideas of abundance, fertility, and renewal," (Erickson), and just rulers are often referred to as a "righteous branch." With great imagination and drawing deeply on his call to proclaim God’s intention for, and even present making of, the future, Jeremiah points to the small green shoot of life in the gray landscape of death and destruction. "What is happening underneath, what we cannot see, is nevertheless real," he says. (Huey)

Jesus points to another tree–"Look at the fig tree and all the trees," he says. "As soon as they sprout leaves you can see for yourselves and know that summer is already near. So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near." The kingdom is already in our midst, already beginning to blossom, so be alert. Pay attention not only to the signs around you, but also to yourselves. What are you doing in this twilight time between times? Between the failures of the past and the emerging of who you are meant to be, who we all are meant to be? Are you numbing yourself with "dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life," as Jesus says? It’s a question for our time and culture, as we are the most overweight, addicted, drugged, busy generation in our history. There’s a whole lot of numbing going on. "Be on guard," Jesus said, "so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch you unexpectedly, like a trap."

"The dreadful and terrible day, according to Jesus, will be known by its fruitfulness and its blooming as much as by its distress. And this, said Jesus, is how redemption draws near." (Nancy Rockwell, Bite in the Apple, 11/25/12) ... " known by its fruitfulness and its blooming as much as by its distress." It is understandable, even easy, to look upon Advent with a certain amount of skepticism. We’ve been to this movie before. Every year we start hoping again, hoping that this year, there really will be a new beginning, –for us, for our families, for our nation, for our world--that this year a child will be born among us who will make a difference in the life of the world, that this year, God will make the world right.

Nancy Rockwell interviewed perspective students for her alma mater. She was particularly touched by two of these bright 17-year-olds.

One young woman, who had been studying the classics, said she had responded to the Arab spring by deciding she could use her facility with languages and alphabets to learn Arabic. She found a summer program that took her to Jordan where she lived with an Arab family and learned a lot about the culture and the history as well as learning the language. Now she wants to become a diplomat. Urgently.

One young man, a jock through and through, captain of the crew, the swim team, the water polo team, has plunged into environmental sciences. Summers he is working in wetlands conservation, and this fall he’s written a paper on the pollution of the oceans. He wants to become an engineer who works to restore the now-endangered ocean waters. ‘All my pleasures come from water,’ he says, ‘and I need to give back. The planet needs a healthy ocean to survive." (Bite in the Apple

, 11/25/12)

The temptation to give in to frustration, despair, and fear, Rockwell writes, "will always be overcome by the light of those who pick up the pieces they know they can handle, and give the brief candle of their own lifetime to lighting the common way. There is something personal, something individual about the great and terrible–and fruitful day. It does come to each of us as a choice, what hope and expectation we bring to the world and how we use our lives."

"Now when these things begin to take place," Jesus said, "stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near." The "imperative of expectation" calls us to order our lives so that we live each day as though the day when God makes all things right is already here, the green shoot of the righteous branch is already emerging, there already is enough for all and each of us is enough. We are all part of the same loaf, the same cup. That is what this table reminds us of. The sap of the righteous branch is running through us, the lifeblood of Jesus is flowing through our veins, and even now, new life is sprouting all around us. Let us keep the feast. Amen.

Rev. Mary H. Lee-Clark

Second Congregational Church

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