The Temple and Change

a Sermon for Lent 3B
Texts: Exodus 20:1-17 and Mark 9:2-9

In our first reading from Exodus, God gives a list of rules to the Israelites. Eight do-nots and two dos: don’t worship another God, don’t make an idol, don’t use God’s name in a wrong way, do remember the Sabbath, and so on. We know these rules. We recognize them. They have informed the way people have lived their lives for over three thousand years—a pretty remarkable feat.

The character of the rules themselves is pretty remarkable. They direct behavior and action. Do this, don’t do that. Here are the proper rules for life; for the way we live together. Don’t steal or kill or lust after someone else’s property. These rules direct action.

But the rules themselves have a life of their own, don’t they. They have a proper name (capitalized and everything): The Ten Commandments. And they served, and continue to serve, as the basis for not only individual behavior, but collective behavior and our institutions. The Sabbath is kept holy, the worship of God and no one else, for instance, serve as the principle instructions for the Israelite people themselves, and the Jewish faith.

When Jesus turns toward Jerusalem in this morning’s gospel, he’s following the rules. He is heading to the Temple for Passover. But he doesn’t seem to act like a good Jew when he gets there, does he? Instead of taking an animal into the temple for sacrifice, he fashions a whip and drives the livestock out of the place. He throws over the tables of the money changers. His actions are not only loud—but they are violent and destructive. Jesus expresses a righteous anger that many of us may find troubling or difficult to deal with.

So what do we do? We refer to this passage as “The Cleansing of the Temple”. We justify his anger as being in the right place and that money changers themselves must be the problem—that they were the 30’s CE equivalent of lawyers—‘have you heard the one about the moneychangers…’ And yet, the people in the Temple were following the rules. The moneychangers and those selling livestock enabled the people to make their sacrifices in the Temple—they facilitated a proper practice. Everyone there was following the rules.

It is no doubt hard for us to deal with this arrangement—let’s be honest. Our freedom fighter is their terrorist. For those that work in customer service fields—or anybody that deals with people—you no doubt know what its like to get yelled at; to be chastised for following the rules. For not only following your boss’s orders, but the rules outlined in the employee manual. My wife and I both worked in bookstores for years and dealt with angry customers with threats and sometimes reasonable arguments. All we could do is say “no, I’ve never thought about that before” or “Let me speak to my manager.” When we were the manager, we would simply say “I’m sorry, but company policy says…” The righteous customer never likes to hear that.

But we can’t really compare Jesus to an angry customer, can we? We can’t separate what we know about Him from this action. But this anger, this action does seem at least a little out of character, doesn’t it? Even if he were truly surprised by what he saw—I can’t imagine he was—it still wouldn’t condone this action. It isn’t the moneychangers that have any say in what they do—it’s the Temple authorities. It’s like responding to a telemarketer at dinnertime as if he or she really had any say in when your phone rings when the company employs them to do just that. It seems like misplaced rage.

The problem with this reading of Jesus is that we think we know who Jesus really is—not just the parts with which we are often familiar, but all of Him. Our experience of Him, our knowledge of Him, our belief in Him—all of it. As Brian McLaren suggests, Jesus isn’t simply an answer man—in fact, he often responds to questions with more questions. He also doesn’t only speak in words—but actions. This great big action in the Temple was a visual parable. His driving out the animals and throwing the money to the floor and flipping over the table were an incredible visual statement about our relationship with God.

The Gospel begins by referring to the location of this passage as being the Temple, but Jesus refers to it as “my Father’s house,” a distinction that Jesus intends to make a severe statement about. It’s identity, purpose, and reason for being is about to change. The notion of worship is about to shift from the indirect worship that is temple sacrifice to the direct worship of God—wherever one may be. Jesus’s radical theology here is matched by his radical action of flipping over tables.

The implication of this change isn’t simple, though. It means dealing with hard questions about practice—and worse—dealing with their underlying understanding of the rules. Those governing rules. In Mark, this same passage is linked with Jesus’s final teachings, including his declaration of the Great Commandment and its companion: to love God and one’s neighbor. Jesus is asking these people to not only deal with change—but change that seems fundamentally wrong to them.

But isn’t what Jesus asking of them freeing them? He is freeing them from more than this simple obligation, but the hierarchical nature of the practice: spending more money on a “purer” animal in order to incur more favor from God.

And doesn’t Jesus free God from that narrow relationship, allowing God to love every one of his creations?

I think He does. I think Jesus wasn’t freeing a couple of sheep and cattle from a horrible ending, but us. Jesus loves those rules as we do. Jesus loves the faiths that have grown out of those rules as we do this faith. Jesus loves His Father’s house and all of the people there—visiting or working. But to love them and us—change had to come.

This congregation has had to deal with change. A changing city, a changing membership, and a changing world beyond these doors: St. David's knows change. It knows the pain and worry that comes from it. But it also knows hope. It knows what kind of place it can be, a mirror for the changing and diversifying culture around it.

In revealing to us the freeing power of change, Jesus offers God’s grace as the strength, as the means of making the impossible, possible. That undeserved, freely-offered, unbeatable grace. We don’t have to go to the store to pick it up and we don’t have to make more money to earn a better share: God just gives it to us. “Here you go,” God says. “You look like you could use it.”

Listen up

a Sermon for the Last Sunday after Epiphany, B
Text: Mark 9:2-9


We’re visual people, aren’t we? We watch TV and movies more than we listen to radio shows. They tell of the famous Lincoln and Douglas debates going on for seven hours—now, it can be like pulling teeth to get people to watch for an hour in their own living room!

They say that my generation is more visually oriented than its predecessor, growing up on the Atari 2600 and Nintendo Entertainment System, and the Millenials are even more so.
Some suggest that if we want to communicate with the emerging generations, we need to think visually.

This morning’s gospel seems tailor-maid for a visual representation—it seems to operate solely on visuals. In the first verse, Jesus picks three disciples and hikes up a mountain to be by themselves. And, while nobody else is watching, Jesus is suddenly transformed in front of their eyes. It is easy to imagine the film adaptation, isn’t it? The quiet leader, names three people to go on this secluded hike with him. “Peter,” he says. “James, John, you’re with me.” Out into the wilderness, they hike. And as their base camp is out of sight, the leader holds up, stopping in the middle of a clearing. The three stop, wondering why they aren’t moving. Suddenly, a bright light shines around their leader, and his clothes change from dust-covered gray to a brilliant white. And the three can tell, they’re not sure how, but they can, that Jesus is different—he’s changed.

The visual examples continue, as Elijah and Moses appear, and they have a conversation with Jesus. Amazed, Peter suggests that they pitch three tents for these three special people.

Then a cloud comes over them and a voice speaks a familiar phrase: “This is my Beloved Son; listen to him!” And without warning—it’s gone. The cloud, the light, Elijah and Moses, everything. And standing there is Jesus.

Jesus then leads them down the mountain, telling them not to speak of this.

In the midst of all of these visuals, it can be pretty easy to get distracted by any of them. Each piece of the story seems to be an allusion to something else.

1. Jesus’s walk up the mountain is reminiscent of Moses’s walk up Mt. Sinai.
2. Elijah and Moses may be a reference to the Prophets and to the Law.
3. The tents that Peter suggests are a reference to Leviticus and protection of holy and sacramental things.
4. The voice in the cloud speaks some of the same words as at Jesus’s baptism.

Other elements have potential symbolic meanings:

1. Selecting 3 disciples parallels the three figures (Jesus, Elijah, Moses).
2. The cloud symbolizes the presence of God.
3. Jesus asking the three to say nothing about it is a recurring motif in Mark.

And some elements add confusion to a concise story:

1. There are 7 characters in it—that’s a lot.
2. Major story elements happen simultaneously
a. Jesus is transfigured
b. Elijah and Moses appear
c. The cloud speaks of Jesus
3. The events end suddenly.

It’s pretty easy for us to get distracted by everything that is going on—all the time. We have to figure out what is going on in scripture, what is going on with our budgets and all of our church stuff, what is going on with our economy, our homes, and our families. There is so much going on that it can be really difficult to cut through it all—to see what’s there.

But in the midst of all of those visual cues—all of this action in this passage—all of the things that could distract us from understanding it, we are given one strange clue.

In Mark’s depiction of Jesus’s baptism, the Spirit, descending like a dove says to Jesus: “You are my Beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.” In this passage, the voice in the cloud says to the disciples “This is my Beloved Son; listen to him.” Listen. Don’t just watch or observe. Listen.

The disciples are just as likely to hear that word and catalog it as patently obvious as we are: “of course we’ll listen to Jesus!” “Makes sense; he says lots of good stuff,” we think. But for a relationship that is born out of observation, imitation, and practice, listening requires different skills. It requires the ability to reflect, and openness to not only understand what is said, but the emotional and personal background that created the words. Listening requires us to shut off that internal editor that is looking for the next appropriate thing to say, and instead, being present to hear what is said.

This statement takes even more importance when placed in its context. In the immediately preceding verses, Jesus tells his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem, undergo suffering and persecution, and then rise again in three days. This is the first of three such pronouncements. And each time, the disciples misunderstand him. The second time, later in chapter nine, it even says: “But they did not understand what he was saying and were afraid to ask him” (9:32).

“This is my Beloved Son; listen to him,” the voice says.

This passage is truly the crux—the transition in Jesus’s ministry when his ministry turns toward Jerusalem. His transfiguration is a physical manifestation of a changing call. But God gives us our instructions: “listen to him” God says.

Some of us act like Peter—willing to defend Jesus, despite his instructions. Some of us act like James and John—asking Jesus to elevate them as most important. And some of us act like all of the disciples—arguing over who is the greatest. We could all work on our listening skills.

But here we are, on the precipice of Lent, on World Missions Sunday, being told to listen to Jesus; perhaps more importantly, listening for Jesus. As we fast, take up new endeavors and teachings, or however each of us chooses to mark the 40 days, we certainly have the opportunity to listen. To shut out the distractions, close our eyes, and open our ears. To listen for what the Spirit has to tell us. To reflect on the needs of those around us and those we cannot see. To reflect on the great hunger of those we have met and those we will never meet. To reflect on the preventable and curable diseases that afflict those nearby and those 6,000 miles away. To hear what some of us are already doing and what each of us can do.

Listen up.

Baptism and the Birth of Story

a Sermon for Epiphany 6B
Text: Mark 1:40-45


I want to talk for a minute about water. Water is many things. We know that our bodies are composed mostly of water. We know that water is the one thing we can’t live without: without shelter, we can perhaps survive months, without food, we can potentially survive a couple of weeks, whereas for water, its days. It is our most essential element.

We are a little landlocked here in the middle of our state, but Michigan survives on water. Its abundance makes it difficult for us to see the value Israelites would have placed on it. Two of the most potent stories for Christians involve a scarcity of water. The first is the Israelites’ departure from Egypt and their ensuing decades in the desert. The second, is our gospel for the first Sunday in Lent in which Jesus goes into the desert to quarantine himself. Of course, we know this as the temptation story based on what Jesus found in the desert, but Jesus’s time in the wilderness was about deprivation, cleansing; he deprived himself of this most necessary resource. Being deprived of water would no doubt lead to a great appreciation of the substance.

It is also an essential element of our spiritual faith and religious tradition, most notably in baptism. We also know of it from its place in Jewish cleansing rituals and in Jesus’s washing of his disciples’ feet. This is our relationship to water.

In our gospel this morning, Jesus cures a man of his leprosy. At the 8:00 service, I spent time talking about the first part—about the relationship between Jesus and this man. Copies of that sermon are in the narthex. Here, I want to take time on the second part. The part in which Jesus gives the man instruction and the man seems to ignore it.

We don’t know much about this guy, right? Let’s look at what we do know.

1. The text refers to him as a “leper”. We know that we shouldn’t call a person a leper any more than we would call someone a cancer or an AIDSer. He is a man, not a disease.
2. We know that he has a skin condition. The disease we know in modern times as leprosy was unknown to them—leprosy in Scripture instead speaks of any skin condition—a rash, chickenpox, for instince—so it is entirely likely that this man’s condition may not have been permanent.
3. He is ritually impure based on his condition. His status as a man with a skin condition put him as an outsider for the time in which he has the condition.
4. As long as this man has a skin condition and does not seek ritual cleansing, he will be considered ritually impure. This means that any contact with him would cause another person to become ritually impure.
5. A cleansing ritual would have included the man’s bathing in water.

That is what we know of him. So this man comes up to Jesus, asks to be cured, and Jesus makes it happen. He then said to the man “See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.’ Here, Jesus is telling him that the first part is done: the part in which his cause of impurity is removed, but his status as impure remains. As a good Jew, he must go to a spiritual leader who would return him to a right relationship with God. But he doesn’t. He runs around telling people about Jesus.

This passage raises some real questions for us. What of the man’s ritual impurity? What of the man’s defiance of Jesus? And what of Jesus’s own ritual impurity? By curing the man of his condition, he has made himself ritually impure and he didn’t seek the ritual cleansing he commanded the man to receive. At that moment does Jesus believe he possesses the so-called ‘leprosy’ and is now in a permanent state of impurity? I don’t know.

I do know that many of us think that we are impure or that we do something, “wrong” that must be atoned. We come to church or seek out a clergyperson for a ritual cleansing. Some of us no doubt think that we have done something or embody something so “wrong” that we could never atone for that level of sin. We might see ourselves as permanently impure—that no amount of ritual cleansing could wash away that sin. For some, the belief is that we are sinful from birth—that our very flesh is sinful. Some extend this notion to baptism—as the great, permanent ritual cleansing.

But I don’t think this is Jesus’s intention, nor do I think Mark is suggesting anything like this. In last week’s gospel, just two verses before the start of this week’s, in verse 38, Jesus tells his disciples, ‘Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do.’ Jesus’s intentions are proclamation. So what did this man do immediately after he is cured by Jesus? He runs into town and starts blabbing. But he isn’t shouting like some crazy person, right? It said that “he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word”. The same word is there: proclaim. And spreading the word is different from gossiping or ranting or whatever. It is more like a prayer chain or some other targeted attempt to get information to many people quickly. This man’s action was the fulfillment of what Jesus just said was what he “came out to do.”

[What is perhaps most intriguing about this gospel lesson for us is that we don’t really know how Jesus responded to this experience, just how we would respond. We would be annoyed because we couldn’t go anywhere without being mobbed; that someone else is doing the job that we were called to do; that people seem to be more interested in the miracles than they are in His proclamations. I’m sure that these would annoy us. I can’t help but think that Jesus was pleased.]

One of the things I take from this is that we are all storytellers. That we have received this wonderful good news that we are entrusted to pass on—not to possess or keep to ourselves—but to spread and share as God’s. That we are capable of such an act as storytelling. Telling our story, Jesus’s story, God’s story.

This is what we will be doing in a few minutes as we gather around this pool of water, inviting our newest member into the family. My wife and I will make vows, witnesses will make vows, and the entire community will make vows to raise this new member as a full and important member of the family. We are called to pray for her and support her. We are called to live, ourselves, as Christians. And we are called to “proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ”. In other words, we are vowing to be storytellers, because we already are storytellers.

In this baptism, within this sacred water, we are all committing to not only look after the spiritual health of this beautiful girl, but to pass on our stories to her; to continue the practices of the church with her. Through our vows and with this water, we are committing our love to her.

The inevitable response

a Sermon for Epiphany 3B
Text: Mark 1:14-20

I’m wondering if you find this gospel from the first chapter of Mark as shocking as I do. The Scripture has an innocent man arrested and a strange rabbi comes along collecting disciples like vacation spoons: “Here we’ve got Oklahoma and Texas…Oh, don’t forget that we’ve got to stop again in Nevada and California!” And the disciples go along with it. They’re like “what else are we going to do?” and so they leave everything behind and follow this stranger. Let’s acknowledge how shocking this really is.

As usual, Mark hasn’t really fleshed out this story, which makes the disciples’ response all the more bizarre. We read this gospel in the teachers’ meeting and Kevin said: “I bet Zebedee wasn’t too happy that he lost a couple of workers—couldn’t they at least stay and finish their job?” We don’t know.

Jesus is pulling families apart, demanding immediate returns, and Mark doesn’t let us in on what is really going on. He doesn’t tell us how the disciples come to say yes. Has Jesus’s reputation preceded Him? Does he give them a more compelling argument than ‘Follow me and I will make you fish for people,’ such as travel, riches (in heaven), and groupies? Can you imagine a modern response to this:

As Jesus passed along the Lansing Mall, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew delivering pizzas—for they were pizza deliverypersons. And Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me and I will make you deliver people.’ And immediately they left their pizzas and followed him.

Jesus’s argument has to be more compelling than what’s here, right? Perhaps they know that Jesus is a rabbi, which would give him a special station—and that his offer to these common people is like winning the lottery.

We don’t know because Mark doesn’t say.

We do know, however, that Jesus is in the business of making offers that we can’t refuse, right? Jesus invites each of us to come along and follow Him—expecting us to drop everything and go—damn the consequences. For some of us, Jesus pulls us away from our families—away from husbands and wives, away from children and families, and away from parents and mentors. Jesus calls us, He gets us, but He doesn’t always get those sitting next to us—not yet anyway. And we have to deal with that choice—that choice of dropping the line, hopping out of the boat, and leaving loved ones, perhaps for ever.

And Jesus intones that this is immediate—we must act quickly. We do it now. He makes a simple request: “Follow me” and we are to make a decision. Not a “oh, I might like soup for lunch—or a sandwhich…no, soup” type of decision. We’re talking about a clean break, decisively setting off in a new direction. Getting our butts out of the boat and following Him into the unknown.

It would be one thing if Jesus sat us down and told us where we were going, right? He pulls out the map and says that we’re going to take a left at the second light, go down Saginaw a few miles, and so on. But he doesn’t. He says “Follow me.” He might throw in “don’t be afraid” for good measure. And that’s it.

John Shea, in a commentary on the lectionary, suggests that there are three elements in this gospel that seem to be coded into our DNA: call, leave, follow. Jesus calls the disciples, and their natural response is to leave. They then naturally follow. Each element of this structure is a decision, a response to external stimuli. This doesn’t imply that the disciples didn’t have a choice or that Jesus gave the disciples an opportunity that they should refuse. No, for Mark, the point is not what brought the disciples to hear the call, leave their families, and follow Jesus, but those actions in and of themselves. Those actions, call, leave, follow, are the actions of discipleship. They are the foundation of discipleship. Call, leave, follow.

This is where Jesus is clear. Remember, the destination is not the worry, it’s the following, right? Jesus gives clarity to the relationship, to what it means to be a disciple. What it means to follow a rabbi—this rabbi/teacher. Call, leave, follow.

This clarity is achieved by removing the very things that might distract us. We don’t know when John the Baptizer is arrested, but Mark gets him out of the way here so that the story’s central focus is on Jesus and His disciples. That way, we can fix our vision on the call; on that central relationship; on that moment in which the biggest decisions are made: call, leave, follow.

On Tuesday, in the midst of a most historic inauguration, the ascent of the first African-American president, a day in which millions gathered in public squares to witness an astounding, earth-moving moment, we heard our nation’s leader call us. He said: “Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.” He is asking us to respond to the needs around us: to move decisively. President Barack Obama is no messiah, but that fact makes his words no less prophetic. That he is an American president makes his words no less appropriate for our congregation, our denomination, and our church.

And when he says: “What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply,” he isn’t just talking in the abstract—about D.C. or Congress or K Street—his words apply to all of us: to our culture, our society, our church—every place in which politics are perpetually present. The ground has indeed already shifted. We are truly in a defining moment. A church moment and an American moment.

We know the stuff in our DNA, the stuff that makes us anxious about the shifted ground and presidential transitions; challenges from the pulpit and from the podium; ministry concerns and economic ones. But we have something else in our DNA: that response to call: leave, follow. We have Jesus’s teaching, the Spirit’s inspiration, and God’s love. And we have the opportunity. An opportunity that is, itself, historic. An opportunity that can forever define who we are and who we are called to be. An opportunity to allow God to guide us where we need to be, not where we want to be or where we are most comfortable. We have an opportunity to live like a people called.

Today and tomorrow. This month and next year. We are called. Let’s leave and follow.

Birth Stories

a Sermon for Christmas Eve

Text: Luke 2:1-20

One of the interesting things about childbirth is the talking afterward—being able to share in your birth story. I could have told you that a year ago as Rose and I were preparing to have our beautiful daughter, Sophia. Everyone seemed eager to share their birth stories—many of which involved children that are fully-grown. As new parents, we enjoy sharing in our birth story.

Jesus’s birth story doesn’t really get the full treatment, does it? It says simply:

“While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.”

We don’t get to hear about Mary’s labor or the circumstances of the delivery. We don’t get to hear who cut the umbilical cord or how they stopped the bleeding. I’ve read that if you give birth at department store or in a cave, you should use shoelaces to tie off the cord. I don’t think that’s what they used. For a birth story, that’s pretty uninspiring—probably wouldn’t make A Baby Story. I’m sure there are ways that Luke could have given us a little more pizzazz. What did the inn keeper look like and how was his “sorry, guys” delivered? Did he say it with irritation? “If I made an exception for you, I’d have to make it for everybody!” Did he say it with condescension? “You know, there’s a pretty nice barn around the corner—you might be a little more…comfortable there.” I’m just curious. In any event, Mary and Joseph’s birth story seems to be a bit short.

What we get instead is a thorough conversation between an angel and shepherds. In this part, we actually get some dialogue! Some action! We get the angel appearing out of nowhere and he gives them their instructions and then suddenly there’s a whole posse of angels singing. And then it says something funny: it says “When the angels had left them”…as if they wanted to make a grand entrance and then wander home. Maybe they had to hoof it. Anyway, all of this action and all of this dialogue gives us the fireworks of the story.

But before we go any further, I have to tell you something. The angel didn’t appear to random people. He didn’t stop some yahoos on the street. He picked out shepherds in the field. You probably have the wrong impression of shepherds. Growing up on Christmas pageants where little 7 year-old boys get to play shepherds gives each of us a certain mental image. And our image of Jesus as shepherd gives a certain regal flair to the job. But shepherds aren’t the cool kids in school. They’re lower class workers who sleep in the fields with their sheep. They’re people that wouldn’t be allowed in most places because they smell funny. To take this impression even further, over the course of the first two chapters of Luke, angels appear to Mary and Elizabeth and to shepherds. We’re not talking about powerful movers and shakers—the corporate CEOs and Wall Street bankers here, but a girl, an old woman, and day laborers.

And it’s hard with our pastoral picture of the manger scene, with our adoration of this brand new baby born to the world, to think about what it means. To think about the innocence of birth and of childhood in the context of the whole gospel.

My favorite scene in Talladega Nights has Will Ferrill’s character, Ricky Bobby praying for that sweet baby Jesus—the Jesus of birth and of Christmas—the Jesus that is innocent and can’t be held accountable for what the adult Jesus says and does. The baby Jesus isn’t confrontational or difficult or rebellious or argumentative. He is purely sweet and innocent and not the Jesus we know.

Except that he is. He is the adult Jesus. We don’t celebrate tonight only the birth of Jesus as if He were reborn again in a couple of hours, just as he was born again this time last year. We celebrate Jesus’s birth. We celebrate this moment in time where God said something to the effect of: “These people need a pick-me-up”. And God, the Great Mystery, joined us on earth in a new way—a way that is different even than God’s presence at creation. Remember in Genesis 3:8 it says “They heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze” as God is walking around the Garden looking for Adam and Eve. This is completely different. This birth, growth, living, death. This the whole kittencaboodle of the life package.

But remember, the text doesn’t dwell on Jesus’s birth, right? It doesn’t say “Jesus was born,” but that “[Mary] gave birth to her firstborn son.” Jesus is referenced only as Mary’s firstborn son. Even Jesus’s birth, God’s birth in a human person, isn’t the centerpiece, is it? And really, poor Mary, the mother doesn’t get the literary backpatting for her part either. It’s the shepherds—those day laborers that propel this story. It’s the shepherds who not only believe the angel and follow the angel’s instructions, but race to see this miracle baby. They race to see who is going to lead them. Think about that for a second. In Roman occupied territory, in a land in which the emperor calls himself King and “Son of God”, these shepherds are running to the mangerside of this little baby boy. I could imagine if these guys were royalty and the baby born was a legitimate heir to Henry VIII or something, right? But this is the Messiah, in Greek, literally anointed by God. This is the big one.

The way this story is told, the way it is set up, isn’t supposed to be simple and easy. It is to showcase the choice—the biggest choice in their (and our) lives—which god are we to follow: the one we call simply, God or the Roman Emperor. The shepherds lead us to the right choice, don’t they? Isn’t that what they’re there for?

The Christmas story is scandalous and troubling. It overturns the order of things and suggests opposites—a leader born among animals, the marginalized are given awesome responsibilities, and the upper crust and the in-the-know are left ignorant of what’s going on. That shepherds are given the authority of attending to Mary and Joseph shortly after the birth of the Messiah is unbelievable. This is what choosing God is like. It is trusting, following, and running to find the anointed one with such exuberance that it can’t be contained. It is telling, professing, and proclaiming the good news of what has happened. It is finding, rejoicing, and worshipping God for all that has occurred.

This scandalous Christmas story is about Jesus without talking about Jesus. It is about how we relate to Him, and therefore God. It’s about us and our choice to follow the unconventional God, revealed through unconventional messengers. It’s about how we relate to a world that makes so much sense to us and seduces us with the promise of wealth, power, and prestige. It’s about simultaneously resisting temptation and giving up control. The Jesus revealed to us on Christmas is an innocent and beautiful baby; it is also the Jesus of life and death—the Jesus of growth and suppression—the Jesus of happiness and sorrow. The Jesus revealed tonight is the Christ born and crucified. The Jesus revealed tonight is the Jesus we meet in our neighbors, our loved ones, and our guests and in strangers and enemies.

May we behold Jesus, the source of good news and great joy, revealed to us in the miracle of birth. Amen.

Storytelling

a Homily for Thanksgiving

Texts: Deuteronomy 8:7-18 & 2 Corinthians 9:6-15

Imagine what it must have been like for the Israelite people to be on the precipice of entering their home: the land for which they have longed. The land that they never knew except through stories and tales of their ancestors. A land that they are only now getting to glimpse after a long, arduous, and dangerous journey from relative comfort in Egypt. Imagine what it is like—to stand there with anticipation, excitement, and outright joy for finally realizing your dreams. One of your closest friends falls to the ground in joy, tears streaming down his face—what can he do but worship G-d? A woman slides down into her partner’s arms, overcome—she had been faithful to G-d, but she never thought she’d see this day. Children tugging at their parents’ clothes in awe and wonder at what this new land will look like.

Our Thanksgiving story shares some of those elements, doesn’t it? Pilgrims, seeking freedom in a new land; a dangerous journey that imperiled their very existence; anticipation of what would come.

For the Israelites, this was the end of a long journey. A journey in which many who were responsible for getting them there, would not get to finish. Moses and Aaron, for their betrayal of G-d, would die. In fact, those that left Egypt would be prevented from completing the journey: only their offspring could enter the new land. G-d’s punishment is severe and undeniable in light of this incredible gift. A gift so perfectly described in our Old Testament lesson from Deuteronomy which says:

Do not say to yourself, ‘My power and the might of my own hand have gained me this wealth.’ But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, as he is doing today.

It is hard when we are feeling an economic crunch to be thankful for what we have and to think about it as wealth. It is hard to give up ownership of it. It is hard to give God any credit, let alone total credit. It is hard to give God ownership of what we have, because what is left? It is hard not to conserve, store, horde, or otherwise “play it safe”. This is what we do. This is no different than what the Israelite people, wandering in the desert were doing when they questioned G-d.

We’re addicted to ownership and possession. Its part of what it means to be an American. We own our responsibility, our independence. We might give God credit for accidents: the things that weren’t supposed to work in our favor like winning a raffle or finding a ridiculously good parking spot on Black Friday. But the rest is our own ingenuity and natural talent, isn’t it?

In the gospel of the talents from two weeks ago, Jesus tells a parable about these slaves that are each given talents: the first receives five, the second receives two, and the third gets one. Later, the master comes back and through the courage and mindfulness of the first two slaves, God doubles their investments (100% is an incredible interest rate, isn’t it?). The third slave, on the other hand, sits on and squanders what is given him for which the master severely punishes the slave. With unemployment heading into double digits, increased poverty and need for resources, and churches and non-profits strapped for cash, in a moment of scary, economic uncertainty, how can we not be that third slave?

In other words, today, as we gather here, how can we be thankful? How can we be thankful for such misery and fear? How are we to be a people of light and hope when we can’t see it— when we don’t know it? When the winter is bleak and the prospects are few?

Moses shows what giving real thanks is about: relinquishing ownership. Giving it up. It’s about what G-d has given the people, how G-d has provided for the people, how God today provides for us. It’s about giving thanks. Giving thanks for the incredible gifts that none of us deserves, let alone earned.

This is God’s undergirding economic philosophy: faith can achieve miracles that far surpass compound interest and dividends. We just have to give up ownership. As Paul wrote in tonight’s Epistle: “And God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in every good work.” Paul clarifies ownership rules. He helps us understand God’s contract. The contract made with a people long passed. A people we know only through story; through the tradition of sharing the lives of our ancestors with the next generation. A story tradition that saw a people in the midst of extreme adversity set foot on a foreign shore and try to do the unthinkable: simply survive the winter.

Like the Israelites, there is no happy ending, really. Centuries of abuse, exploitation, and death follow. The treatment of the Native Peoples is perhaps the biggest scar on American history—and the most embarrassing part of our story.

And yet it is our story. As is the struggle and arrival of the Israelites. As are the trials of Jesus and His apostles. As is the formation and fulfilling of St. David’s Episcopal Church. This is the story—our story. This is what we talk about as we gather around tables tomorrow. Our story. As we share a communal meal, giving thanks for those that came before, in the tradition of our foremothers and fathers. Our story. As we gather tonight around this table to share in this tradition from ancestors. Our story.

What G-d revealed to the Israelites and reveals to us tonight is a different ownership model. We own our relationship to God. We own our story. We own how we relate to people. All of the wealth—the houses, the property, the cars, the TVs, comfy beds, dining room tables, couches, skyscrapers, bridges, freeways, railstations, airports, seaports, vessels, temples, pyramids, ruins, and Wonders are God’s. All of this is God’s.

Tomorrow, I’m going to my sister’s house with Rose and Sophia. We’ll gather at a table with three generations, two family branches, to share in our history—our story. We’ll visit with my Uncle Hal and Aunt Barbara as they celebrate their wedding. We will gather to talk about the next chapter in our story. All of this will serve as the impetus of thanksgiving—the time to reflect on thankfulness, to set aside as Sabbath thankfulness.

Because we don’t run around with 364 days of thanklessness—but we also don’t need to put all of our thankfulness pressure on one day—one dinner—one shot at praising God for what God has given us. We don’t need to run around perfecting a feast to be thankful—in fact that usually distracts us. But we do need to sit with other people, telling our story, walking through the lives of ancestors and the old you—yesterday’s you—the you that is captured in a sister’s memory. That is our story.

May the God of hope and wonder guide you safely on your journeys, bring compassionate action from your thankfulness, and grant you grace through your storytelling.

Humility and the New Equality

a Sermon for Proper 26A
Text: Matthew 23:1-12

“The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses' seat,”

Jesus says. They are important. They are our leaders.

“[T]herefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do, for they do not practice what they teach.”

They are, in other words, hypocrites.

The Jesus of this morning’s gospel is…difficult. He has gone on the offensive and verbally attacks the Pharisees and scribes. He concedes that they’re actually very good teachers, that they know what they’re talking about, but just don’t act like them. They’ve got that all wrong.

The gospel continues through the rest of this chapter as Jesus’s condemnation continues, and increases.

In verse 13, Jesus says:

“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you lock people out of the kingdom of heaven.”

In 17 he says:

“You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the sanctuary that has made the gold sacred?”

In all, He says “Woe to you” 7 times, he calls the Pharisees and scribes “hypocrites” 6 times, and “blind” 5 times: all in this one chapter.

But let’s put this in perspective. Though we are approaching Advent, the beginning of our church calendar, we are in the midst of the final days of Jesus’s life here in Matthew. Jesus has entered Jerusalem, foretold his impending death to his disciples, explained their place in all of it, and here, he has come to the Temple for his sacrifice and final teachings. As we have heard in the last few gospel lessons, as the Pharisees and scribes attempted to trap Jesus in theological exercises, Jesus trapped them. Remember especially last week’s gospel about the Greatest Commandment as Jesus argues that:

‘“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’

So Jesus, after thoroughly trouncing the authorities, turns his attention to the people, to make his own statement, and directs his ire toward the Pharisees and scribes.

When Jesus talks about phylacteries and fringes [a phylactery is a long box containing scripture—think of a fancy Bible cover], you can imagine he is talking about one of our candidates for public office, can’t you? One of those people who is always smiling and kissing babies and speaking about the “strength of the American workforce” going on about the virtues of American Exceptionalism. He or she wears a tailored suit, making sure to have a flag pin prominently displayed on the lapel.

In fact, we ask for substantive debate from them, and then bemoan when we actually get it. We are really listening for the zingers: those memorable lines.

As much as Jesus is nailing these leaders for their hypocrisy, he is revealing something about himself that troubles us here: he is passing judgment on them. We want to be open people. We fight against that voice of judgment because of what it means. We have watched the negative campaigning that has held our TVs hostage for months. We have witnessed the judgment passed by us and about us as Episcopalians, as members of the Diocese of Western Michigan, and as the people of St. David’s. Who is Jesus, then, to pass judgment? How can we learn to love all of our neighbors if we are allowed to judge some of them? Who am I, standing in the pulpit, to pass judgment? What kind of example is Jesus giving us and what kind of example are our candidates for elected office giving us?

Jesus reveals to us in the gospel that judgment is a part of love. Recognizing difference and relationship is central to our ability to love those around us. Recognizing when someone you love is doing something wrong gives you the chance to help them. This is why the previous verses about the Great Commandment are so essential to this gospel: loving one’s neighbor is a part of loving God. These two are essentially connected. Loving your neighbor, the hypocrite, involves pointing out his/her hypocrisy. Jesus uses judgment to not only reveal the problem with the Jewish authorities (their hypocrisy) but also to reveal the true teaching (humility). See, it isn’t really about who the Pharisees and scribes are, but about who they are not. They are not humble. They see themselves as special and demand that others see them that way too.

For Jesus, the teaching is really directed at the crowd. A visual example of the way not to act. He tells the people not to use titles like rabbi and father. The instruction, that these are God’s titles highlights what they are not: our titles. You may be a mother or father because you gave birth to a baby, and yes, you are her mother or father. Jesus isn’t calling for the stripping of such a title from you. But He is talking about position, power over or dominance of another. We, as children of God, are equals; it is only God that has a position of power over us. We are all saints. This is a radical concept here: true equality.

When Jesus says “All who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted” he is telling his disciples to do more than simply “be nice” to people: to be humble before them. The disciples, as leaders, must serve their followers.

For most of us, that seems pretty messed up. Some of us like our “phylacteries broad and [our] fringes long”. Some of us exercise the only authority we have in life when we come to church. Some of us only know how to lead through dominating others. But Jesus calls us to something different.

We are currently living in a moment in which we have no choice but to re-examine our understanding of leadership. All leadership: in the church; in our city, state, and country; in our global communion. We have the chance to look at how we lead and at our motivations. We can look at our priorities and our vision for the future. Jesus reveals the style of leadership (humility) in our lesson today, but he also reveals the why: preparing the Kingdom of God. That’s why we are listed among the saints. It is our right relationship with each other that brings closer that right relationship with God (and vice versa).

As you go into this week, take time to reflect about the Kingdom as you prepare to vote. Reflect also on what God is calling you to do in the life and ministry of St. David’s. Through planned giving and outreach to the powerless: here and abroad. Through food baskets and mosquito nets.

Jesus reveals the Kingdom as a great reversal of fortunes. For virtually every one of us in North America, that means that we are all called to serve others. May God reveal to you your place in this radical equality.

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NOTE: I chose not to move All Saints' readings to Sunday, as this text was so good! That, and it made much more sense in the context of our lectionary!