Christ the King 2023

                 People seek a King: Help wanted.  Must be strong and handsome, able to win wars and secure land, bring prosperity, help us to grow strong families, bring us through trouble, feed us good food, heal all our maladies, organize all the people and govern with wisdom.  Must be healthy, have a great wardrobe, eat the most luscious food every day, live in a fancy castle, and live a life among the rich and famous.  Must make us the envy of our neighbors, destroy all who stand in our way, allow us to amass wealth, and reward the rich with power while the poor get what they deserve for being lazy.  This King should be somewhat distant, letting us govern ourselves and make decisions that benefit us, staying out of our way and not changing us.  We are a people who easily forget.  So don’t make us remember that we were ever slaves in Egypt or that we ever wandered the wilderness, lost.  Make of us a great nation, better than other nations, and then let us defeat them and take everything that is theirs.  We like wealth and shiny things.  We like to be powerful and we like to win.  Give us those things, and you can be our King.

                King seeking people: Help wanted.  King seeks people who have been mistreated and scorned, enslaved and beaten.  Must want to be free and willing to learn that freedom means caring for one another and complete focus on Kingdom values of sharing and not hoarding, of being willing to wander and seek rather than know all the answers, of learning to trust the King rather than themselves, of treating one another with equity regardless of social status, of commitment to each other and the kingdom.  The people must be poor and lost, the underdogs, weak and scrappy, faithful and focused, generous and thankful.  Give me some people who are open to this kind of King and I will shape them into my people.  I will bring my Kingdom among them.  We will learn to be King and people together.  Through them I will bring my blessing to all the earth.  Through them the world will know me and learn my Kingdom values and find peace, cooperation, love, and abundance.  My gifts include being willing to live among my people, working side by side with them, not compelling them to do things my way but allowing them to make decisions for themselves.  In addition, I am a hard-worker, have been around since the beginning of time, and have a vision of a peaceful and equitable world that I will carry out with or without the people’s help.  If you have a vision of bringing heaven to earth in which all tears are dried, everyone has enough to eat, where all wars cease, then please respond quickly to this ad.

                Christ the King Sunday: What does it mean to us, whose main concept of a king comes from fairy tales?  What does it mean to a congregation serving this King?  What is King in our lives?  What matters most to us?  What are our priorities?  In a religion that has been so misused to intimidate and take away power from people who are suffering, in a religion that has been used to point to people on the margins, who are sick or in prison or in the way of a hurricane, and say, “You deserve what you get!” how does our view of our King make a difference in our response to our neighbors?

                In our reading from Ezekiel today, we get an image of a King who is seeking us out, all who have been scattered, who have been hurt and betrayed and damaged by the value system of this world—the greed, the blaming of the poor and weak, the favoritism of the powerful.  We are a people who don’t know what we’re looking for.  We might not even know we’re looking.  But we are aware that we are afraid, overwhelmed by the powers of this world.  We have hurt our neighbors, trampled them as we fled for safety.  We had been betrayed by shepherds, abandoned and left alone for the wolves.  Our own ways have not been serving us.  They are not working well.  They are not bringing about life for us or anyone else. Did you see the news story of the sheep that had been stuck on a shoreline over a cliff. It was so burdened with wool, could not take care of itself.  

Into our woundedness and pain, comes a king like none we’ve ever encountered.   This King is muddy.  He’s been searching.  He’s covered in scratches from the thorns along the path.  He's pulling the rope to get us up over the cliff and back into the fold.  He’s desperate and calling to us.  He’s gathering us together.  He helps us up.  He’s not afraid to touch us.  He notices our wounds and binds them up.  He lies down at the gate of the sheepfold to protect us.  He learns our names.  He knows our fears and our habits.  He leads us to abundant pastures and keeps our hooves from polluting the waters of life. He is a king we follow because he is reliable, he is there, and we are slowly learning to trust.  When we get out of line, when we start to think we are better than others, this shepherd King puts us in our place.  We realize that we are in his presence, not because we deserve to be, but because our King is one of life and love.  We realize that there is more than enough of that love and pasture to go around, so we can stop being anxious and afraid and get on to the task of living, not just for ourselves but in community, in the flock.

                The King we believe in is described in our reading from Ephesians.  This is a King who showed his power in his willingness to let go of power, one who drew all kinds of people to himself, not just the right kind of people.  This is a King who gives hope to us not in the temporary, material things of this world, but a permanent relationship of love, adoption into a family, responsibilities, powers, and a new vision of what really matters.  This is a King who, because of the people he talked to and empowered, and because of the Kings he defied, the values he was not willing to live under, was handed over to death.  He was so threatening to the values that rule this world, that he was put to death.  People thought they could kill his vision, that they could kill those values, that they could kill the hope that people had in a new and refreshing value system.  But that vision had already been passed on to a small, scrappy group of disciples, who were forever changed by their encounter with this King.  They found that King was still with them, and that the spirit of the King was stronger than ever, giving them courage to go forth and tell the good news, the vision, the love, the community, the empowerment available, the alternative view, the vision of truth that turned the world upside down.

                In our world, kings and law makers are far away, rich, inaccessible.  They seek to serve the very rich, the ones who line their pockets with donations.  They make rules that benefit themselves.  They don’t know us and they don’t care about us, except that we make them look good. 

So here is the alternative view—that we have access to our King, we can be in his presence, seek it out and we are constantly being heard.  The cries of the hungry reach the ears of this King.  He knows their stories.  He knows their names.  He sits at their tables.  He feels their wants. Here is a king who went about having dinner with people who didn’t matter to any King or even mayor before him, who knew the pain of hunger himself.  Here is a King who was a stranger, born a bastard child, with nowhere to lay his head, in an occupied country, a refugee in Egypt, a wanted man from boyhood, who has known scorn, an enigma to his own disciples, rejected and hated.  Here is a King who was stripped of his clothing, naked upon the cross.  Here is a King who said on the cross, “I thirst.”  Here is a King was sick and imprisoned, betrayed, arrested, denied, mocked, and killed.  This is a King we can meet everyday, everywhere people are hungry or thirsty, naked, alone, afraid, sick, or imprisoned.  This is a King of all of us.  When we are doing well, our own desires become our King.  We make King the value system of this world that says we get what we deserve.  But we all find ourselves in need and that does not mean our King has abandoned us, but that he loves us and is with us.  How do we serve this King, even when we’re doing ok, when we are tempted by the gods of prosperity and belief that we can do it ourselves?  How do we get in the sheep line rather than the goat line?  How do we make Christ our King?

               The truth is we are both sheep and goats.  We have at times turned our backs on people who needed help and other times have responded with compassion.  We fail to see the opportunity to meet Jesus when we encounter someone on need.  How do we not waste this opportunity?  How do we make our encounter with Jesus in the sick and hungry the priority?  How do we change our priorities to make this vision in the Gospel the focus?  This is what we are each here to do: visit the sick and imprisoned, give clothing food and water, meet Jesus in the poor and lonely, welcome the stranger.  How do we open our eyes to see Jesus?  How do we make room in our lives to meet him in people around us?

                Thankfully Jesus offers love and grace and many opportunities to meet him.  Jesus welcomes us, feeds and clothes us, leads us beside still waters, puts us back in the sheep line when we wander off, makes a community of us, encourages us, loves us, and reigns as our King.  We don’t need to be afraid that we’ll end up in the goat line, but only trusting Jesus to keep seeking us out.  And we don’t need to look at others and decide they are among the goats, because Christ is King, and this King keeps seeking us until all are in the sheep line, safe in the fold.  Just keep looking to the King and listening for his voice, accept his healing, and tend to him among the wounded and weak.  This vision of an abundant pasture with a shepherd leading us is assured.  And we shall dwell in the house of the Lord, forever. 

November 19, 2023

 These Gospel readings are hard to grapple with, especially when we consider that by and large most of us are heavily invested in the world as it is.  We benefit from it and it gives us comfort.  But we’re allowing ourselves to listen to Jesus, a materially poor man who identified with the destitute.  How you hear the Gospel reading today depends on how you relate to the systems of wealth, built on the labor of the poor that reward the rich and powerful.  If you benefit from the system of wealth that rewards those who are already rich and powerful, then you might see this story as one in which God is the wealthy landowner and in which the rich are rewarded with even more riches.  But if you’ve ever stood in line at the food stamp office, been evicted or had your car repossessed, or wondered how you would pay your bills, you might see a picture of a system of wealth that is imposed by human beings to improve a few lives and keep the poor miserable.

            Once again, I caution against making the rich landowner into God.  Especially since it seems he is doing some ungodly things, like being willing to charge interest, which was completely against the Torah, and being harsh, reaping where he did not sew, etc.

            The time in which Jesus said these things, the wealthy were happy to exploit the labor of poor people to work the land to enrich the landowner.  As time went on, the landowners were very happy to extend loans to poor farmers at 40-60% interest, so they could foreclose on that land and enrich themselves.  The wealthy did not concern themselves with whether the poor would starve to death.  Long before Jesus, prophets rose up to condemn these actions and remind people that they have a responsibility to their neighbor, that God shared this land with them as stewards, and it all was meant to be a blessing for everyone to have abundant life, not hoarded.

            We have similar problems today.  We have laws and customs that make it so that the more you have, the more will be given to you.  CEO pay has no limit, it seems, while teachers can’t even afford to live in the neighborhood of the school where they work.  I pray in gratefulness everyday that I was able to buy a house almost 20 years ago so that I can afford to live near enough to my workplace and friends and the places I love to be.  I hurt for others who are always on edge about whether their rent will be raised, because that could be me and it is the case for people I love.

            So we have this story about a wealthy man.  We have to be careful not to automatically cheer him on as our culture has trained us to do.  We think he must have deserved it, that he is much to be admired.  Not necessarily, according to God’s values.  He is rich.  We know, because he can afford to travel.  He can afford to have servants watch over his land.  He has liquid assets in no small amount, like 20 years’ wages, that he distributes to his servants for them to do his dirty work for him of exploiting others to increase his wealth. And they do, in two cases, because they know their proximity to him could mean life or death, prosperity and comfort, or poverty. 

            But there is one who won’t play the game.  Instead he tells the truth to the rich man about who he is—that he doesn’t do the work, but drives others to do it, that he is harsh.  This truth teller is not about to participate in this system of oppression and he will face the consequences. 

            I can’t help but think of Jesus before Pilate, being grilled about who he thinks he is, not participating in the system that honors Pilate, that increases Pilates’ wealth and standing and power, how Jesus challenged that power, and mocked it, riding in on a donkey with no military display.  And I can’t help but think of Jesus being thrown out into Gethsemane, where he surely gnashed his teeth in suffering on the cross.

            We have so many unjust systems—of wealth, of imprisonment, of eviction, of healthcare.  The world tells us if people don’t have access it is a character flaw.  I find this infuriating, because I was a child on food stamps and my dad worked just as hard as any other dad and my mom did daycare to support us.  They were motivated and engaged and yet we were poor.  Most people are born into poverty.  It isn’t about character at all.  I didn’t deserve to be in need.  I didn’t deserve not to go to the dentist on a schedule that might mean healthier teeth now.

I live a very different life, now, as does my child.  I had privileges that other people didn’t have which allowed me to get out of poverty, including the color of my dad’s skin—which allowed him to get a VA loan not available to Black service members at the time.  I also had access to a congregation of educated people that gave me hand-me-down clothes and work babysitting and picking blueberries, housesitting.  They gave me college scholarships and paid for my books in seminary.  I had access to people with wealth and connections who knew the story of a God who isn’t tolerant of people accumulating wealth and congratulating themselves for their moral superiority.  They knew a God who shared with them and inspired them to share with others.  I got to be a recipient of that sharing and now I get to also share with people in need from my plenty.

            As for those of us who have found ourselves richly blessed, with money, time, abilities, I hope we won’t bury them in fear of an angry God or in fear of misusing it in a messed up system.  But when we find our talents used to prop up systems of oppression we will withhold them in resistance. John the Baptist was likely from the community of Essenes who renounced wealth and lived in the desert to avoid participating in the oppressive system and being drawn into hurting their neighbors.  That is certainly one way to respond to an oppressive system.

            I witnessed another response in Nicaragua.  People there live on $2 a day on average.  But that is just what can be recorded in the economy.  Most of them live free on the land.  They cultivate that land to feed themselves and their community.  The wealth of what they grow is shared rather than monetized.  If they bought and sold all that food it would be worth a lot.  Instead they share it, with God providing rain almost daily, rich soil that they can keep rich by growing shade-grown gardens so that bird droppings act as fertilizer.  I hope you’re getting the idea that the people we met in Nicaragua knew their blessings came from God and so many of them lived outside the system.  They were left out of the system because they were not seen as having anything to contribute, and yet God knows their value and their neighbor knows their value.

            Another example of resisting and influencing the systems of injustice is participating in  Interfaith Advocacy Day in February.  We all gather to talk about our values and find our talking points and stories, then we meet with our state senator and representative and share our perspective.  Anne Nesse, one of our new members testifies at the capitol all the time—you should ask her about it.  She is advocating for the environment—not to be exploited for money until it can’t recover, but to continue to be a blessing to future generations.  We decide when and how to act about the injustices and inequalities in our systems and we get to decide whether we are willing to benefit from them.

I see an example of withholding and temporarily burying talents in response to an unjust system in the teacher and nurse strikes.  Who suffers from the large class sizes and aging buildings?—our kids!  It’s not their moral failure—but they suffered for it.  So my son is out every day on the picket line and he knows a lot about unions and chants and the reasons why the teachers strike.  When the rich and powerful distribute and withhold wealth or talents to get their way, no one bats an eye.  But when a poor person does, for some reason people balk at that.

            It may seem convenient to blame systems, but systems are set up by people often with good intentions, but they benefit some and not others.  Not all systems are harmful.  Some systems work to break the cycle of poverty.  Some work to benefit the workers.  For instance, farmer’s markets are a way to support local farmers and businesses, directly.  Also churches ideally bring together people of all different socioeconomic situations so that people build relationships and share with each other.

            Jesus went about the Judea and Samaria challenging the systems which kept men and women separate, which kept lepers isolated, which kept the priests in power and the poor blamed and ignored.  Jesus refused to ignore the injustices.  Just talking to people outside his circle and giving them healing and dignity of telling their story so we even know them today, helps us be brave to hear the stories of people on the margins in our midst and to know that when we are in debt and poverty, it isn’t a moral failure.

            Let us use our voices, our talents, our gifts to point out where we could all do better and change our systems to benefit those on the margins.  We can remember that everything is a blessing from God to be shared and distributed.  Jesus was thrown out, killed, in this world’s systems and values, but we have different values as citizens of God’s Kingdom even now.  We have a choice to live differently, relate differently, and to resist, because we have a different vision where no one has to be afraid of losing everything but there is enough for everyone.

November 12, 2023

 I don't think anyone is wise in this Gospel reading!  The bridegroom isn't wise in taking so long to show up.  The bridesmaids aren't wise not knowing how any of this works, to be ready.  And certainly the bridesmaids aren't wise who send the others off to the store in the middle of the night instead of sharing.

I like to pretend to be wise, but I am in fact foolish, something I confessed the moment worship started this morning.  If I say I am not foolish, I deceive myself and the truth is not in me, but if I confess my foolishness, God who is faithful and merciful will forgive my foolishness and cleanse me from all disconnect with God and my neighbor.  I am unprepared, I am overprepared, I am self-centered, I am arrogant, I have a hard heart.  I am foolish.

The truth is everyone is foolish.

The bridegroom is foolish.  I don’t think Jesus would be mad that I said that.  He is delayed and we don't know why.  Maybe he has a perfectly good reason.  Maybe he's partying with his homeys.  Maybe he's got cold feet or he's nervous or his suit got something spilled on it and has to be changed or he lost the ring (which actually happened at a wedding I did, but was found thankfully in time).  We don't know why he is delayed.  That is the same with the coming of the Kingdom of God.  It is delayed and we are waiting.  We can't change that circumstance, but we do have control over our response.

Maybe we fall asleep.  No one can stay awake forever.  No one is expected to, wise or foolish.  But then a shout comes, a heads up, a hint that things are about to change.  In that moment, some of the bridesmaids find they are not prepared.  They don't want anyone to know they weren't ready.  They could have asked to walk with the other bridesmaids.  Certainly one lamp is sufficient for two people, but then everyone would know they were unprepared and they don't want to look foolish, so they ask to use some oil. Are we prepared for change or do we dig in and try to keep everything the same?

I worry about people with ADHD or who are neurodivergent.  Our brains don't all work alike.  Some of us get overwhelmed trying to organize and prepare.  This Gospel story doesn't seem fair to people whose brains are wired differently.  

What is the oil and what is it they don't have enough of?  What don't we have enough of as we wait for Jesus?  Oil sometimes symbolized good works.  You'll be wanting to store up some good works while waiting for Jesus.  If it is good works then we don't have to worry that someone didn't have enough oil because they didn't have access to resources, because they were poor.  Anyone can do good works.  

Maybe oil is energy for making the light shine.  Do we have energy for the waiting?  Do we have the energy to sustain us through all the long waiting?  The truth is we all have to gas up now and then.  No matter how big our jug of oil we bring, this waiting is going on for thousands of years and maybe sometimes we give up on waiting, on expecting the bridegroom to knock at any moment.  What would it be like to hear the trumpet blast right then or what a restart would mean for humanity?  Do we expect Jesus to come back?  Do we expect war to cease as the wars seem to intensify and we feel helpless to respond?  Do we expect every tear to be dried?  Do we expect everyone to have a place or enough to eat or the earth to be healed?  I don't.  I'm in for the long haul.  I don't have any expectation of being rescued.  So I am storing up my energy, working day in and day out to bring people relief and a little light and taking my days off so I have a little oil when the voice calls from the gate.

And these wise bridesmaids, wise and selfish--they knew that the arrival of the bridegroom was imminent, but instead of offering to walk with these others, they send them off to 7-11 or whatever place you can get oil at midnight.  They will be admonished on the last day by Jesus, I was thirsty and you did not give me a drink, I was naked and you did not clothe me, I had no oil and you did not share your light.  These bridesmaids are why I would prefer to officiate a funeral than a wedding any day.  All too often weddings are a show of wealth and power and arrogance, whereas a funeral can be a time of real reflection about what really matters, a time of compassion and a coming together to support someone who is grieving.

We come here today and we do not have what we need to get through the night to get to the party.  But there is plenty of good news.  It is good news that we are all invited.  It is good news that whether we are wise or foolish (and we are foolish), the bridegroom Jesus is coming.  It is good news that there is enough oil, enough energy to keep us going, if we can humble ourselves not to take from others but to walk with others until we do have the energy.  There is grace in community when we help each other.  There are many times I am out of oil.  I am out of faith.  I am out of energy and ideas and patience.  It is in those moments that I know I can stand next to my brothers and sisters and their light shining is enough.  And there have been many times when I have been out of whatever resource, in my grief and pain and someone has come and stood next to me and shone that light, sang that song, prayed that prayer that lifted me up and filled my lamp.  

Last week, my friend Janell made a labyrinth on the beach as she and my friend Shelley had done shortly before Shelley died.  Janell invited me to walk the labyrinth together and then in the last leg of it, two sets of bald eagles appeared on the beach.  There was a source of food nearby.  So I was feeling empty, missing my friend I see every year at Convo.  But Janell shone that light for me and I accepted her holding it for me and together we saw some extraordinary signs of hope and life.

For all of us, we are waiting a long time.  We try to be prepared, but we can't be awake all the time.  We can't stay awake forever or have forever stores of oil.  We can look for the signs of the nearness of Christ.  It might not be a trumpet blast.  It might be a thirsty person, a hungry person, a naked person, or a person whose oil has run out.  In those moments the bridegroom surprises us and shows up unannounced.  We can wake up to the Kingdom coming near and breaking into our world.  We might see Jesus and we might be transformed.  And even if we aren't ready, he will come into our midst and give us new life.  If we miss it, there will be other weddings where we will get another chance.

I hope you will sit with me in the dark a little while and wait with me.  I hope you will be foolish with me.  I hope you will ask to share some of my light if you run out of oil and not run off on a foolish errand to do everything yourself.  I hope if I run out of oil, you will let me walk with you a little while on this journey.  

Wise or foolish, Jesus is the light of the world, and he is the one who will light our way to new life and love.

All Saints 2023

 People have been saying, this is going to be a difficult All Saints, an emotional one.  Just in the past few weeks, Facebook has been reminding me of these saints.  Last week it was the reminder of the double duet with the two grand pianos and Sonya standing there, no hint she would join the Saints eternal this year.  I was asked to wish my friend Susan a happy birthday.  She died not long before All Saints Day last year but it is still jarring to think she’s not up to her usual shenanigans on this earth anymore.  We’ve lost friends we didn’t have a service for and that leaves a strange feeling, like there’s something left unfinished or dangling.  And we have in our minds wars and disasters that feel heavy, we have mass shootings on our hearts that defy our ability to understand the senseless loss of life.  And on this day, in the face of death, we choose to celebrate.

We celebrate the lives of these people that touched our lives or touched other lives we don’t know.  We celebrate their memories.  We remember them because they are still part of us.  Nothing will ever change that.  And we celebrate because we know there is more than this life.  Here, we just get a little glimpse of what life is.  The saints who have died see much more clearly.  They know what it is to be in the presence of God, at the feast that has no end, residing in one of God’s dwelling places.  They are at peace and they are at home.  We know we will be reunited but it is painful now to feel apart from them and not have them here with us.

As we wait for the day when heaven and earth unite, we work toward God’s vision together.  Today we hold up that vision which inspires us and gives us hope to keep working.

The Book of Revelation is a word painting for suffering Christians.  It was written for those persecuted by Nero to have a vision of hope, in which God and the Lamb, Christ are in the center, surrounded by the saints and martyrs, singing and worshiping God, with God’s love and light extending from that central place and rippling out in concentric circles to the farthest corners of the heavenly realm and breaking into our world. 

And we get glimpses of it.  Did you recognize any of the words this morning in that reading?  We enact this scene, or try to every Sunday morning at Church.   We place God and the lamb, Jesus, at the center, and we gather together as many as come, although all are welcome.  There is no distinction, but all worship together from any nation, all tribes, and peoples and languages.  I wear the white robe for all the rest of you.  It is like a uniform that the saints wear, so that no one’s clothes are better than any other or a distraction for the saints.  We sing this song, “Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.”  Sound familiar?  We sing these words from Revelation as we enact this scene, as the Kingdom of God breaks in, living this vision of what is to come.  We don’t just sing by ourselves, but our voices join with the saints gathered around the throne, collapsing the distance between us and them, between our world and the Kingdom of God.

As I grieve those I love, I like to remember their voices.  I can hear them, my grandma’s so stern and blunt, Sonya’s so kind and caring, Marge’s so welcoming, Carl’s so matter of fact.  You can hear them, too.  When I stop and listen to their voices, I feel like they are right here with us.  So when we sing, I like to hear their voices joining ours and it lifts me up.  I feel God’s Kingdom so close.

                And it isn’t just in our singing that these realms come near, but anywhere and anytime that people have enough to eat and drink, where there is shelter and protection, when compassion and tenderness is shared.  This is fully the reality in the heavenly realm, and there are points where it breaks into our world when God’s love touches our hearts and brings the Kingdom through us to others in need.

                Never does the heavenly realm see so far away from this world than in the values that matter to God and the values that are lived in this world.  That’s where the Beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew come in.  In this world, we think someone is blessed if they are confident, don’t know the pain of loss, are full of good food and all kinds of treasures, are merciless, are smart, refuse to compromise, and don’t endure any suffering.  That’s when a person can say they are blessed.  Those are the people we tend to admire.

                However, that is not what God admires or values or honors.  When we are so full of ourselves, how will we ever have room for God?  When we have all the comforts of life, what would cause us to open our eyes and look for something more, for a Kingdom and a realm of misfits?  If we can do it all ourselves, why would we need each other or God? 

To be blessed is to have room for each other.  To be blessed is to have room for God.  To be blessed is to look for God.  To be blessed is to realize that we all are broken and we all need healing.  To be blessed is to be honest about ourselves and our imperfections and shortcomings.  To be blessed is to be ready to receive.

I remember working as a chaplain, I found patients at the hospital were open to talking about their spirituality, more so than most people I met who were healthy.  I found my patients were blessing me with their openness to God’s presence.  Much of the time, I think we go about our day and don’t give God’s vision a single thought.  But when we mourn or feel helpless, we find ourselves remembering what is most important, and putting our hope in God, instead of our own power.  That’s when the Kingdom of God is breaking through and giving us new life. 

In the Beatitudes, God lays out God’s values.  Jesus begins with an unexpected blessing, for the poor in spirit, the merciful, etc.  This is a current reality that someone is living.  They didn’t choose this mode, it is the way things are.  Then Jesus offers a vision of a future reality that is God’s vision, of comfort, inheritance, fulfillment, mercy, vision, adoption.  This is the promised future.  This is the Kingdom of God which the martyrs know fully, and which is breaking into this world. 

Two times in the Beatitudes it isn’t a future reality, but a present reality.  For both the poor in Spirit and the persecuted, Jesus says, “Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”  This is a present reality more than the others.  They have access to it now.  They are part of it now.  It is theirs.  It is not far away, but here on earth, God wiping away the tears, these folks focused on what matters, living God’s values, open to God’s presence, upheld in community, shining with God’s light and love.

Every Sunday we also pray that God’s Kingdom come and it does come regardless of human defiance.  The saints and martyrs are in that reality even now.  But we also pray it comes among us, that it breaks through in our world in our words and actions.  And we pray that we would open our eyes to see it in the hungry and homeless and ill around us and reach out to them as Christ in our midst.  “See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called Children of God; and that is what we are.”  And that is what our neighbor is.  “Beloved, we are God’s children now.”  This present reality gives us hope for the future that God is revealing to us.

May you have hope in more than your own comfort and stability.  May you find the broken places in your life, spaces that God dwells and shines a brilliant light.  May you look for God’s Kingdom coming into the world and participate in it.  May you know blessing in pain.  May you know God’s presence and share it.  May God’s future Kingdom promise be collapsed into your everyday reality.  May you live in the values of the Kingdom.

Reformation 2023

 This week, I have been pondering the word “freedom,” and trying to untangle it from the loaded patriotic word that it has become to see what God means by freedom and what God wants for us in setting us free.  Let’s look at our scriptures today and see what we find.

            In the Hebrew scripture, God is reminding the people that God has freed them from literal slavery in Egypt, but not to go running off in every direction or without a leader or relationships, but to follow a path in the wilderness together.  God took brought them from oppressive work and mistreatment to 40 years of learning to trust God and to work together to build relationships.  The people were learning to be in life-giving relationships with God and each other.  Some scholars believe that in the wilderness, lots of little bands of misfits came together and found a home and a people together with the Israelites walking together until they formed a unique identity as a people who God cares for, who have a responsibility to care for the smallest and weakest among themselves.  Freedom meant freedom from forced labor, from fear for your life at the hands of a slaveowner, from family separation, from the whims of a violent and jealous pharaoh.  Freedom meant the ability to follow leaders who cared for the people, to be in community with others, to work together, to trust God, to take on values that brought abundant life to the community.  This freedom also meant not having to trust—but having the choice whether to follow these values of God or not.  There were many times people chose not to trust, which had consequences sometimes of loss of life and spending 39 more years out in the wilderness than what was actually necessary.

            Psalm 46 was one of Martin Luther’s favorites.  He wrote “A Mighty Fortress is Our God” based on it.  He knew what it meant to be captive, enslaved to his fear.  He feared his father, who he could not please.  He feared God who he could not please.  But this psalm helped him overcome his fears.  God is there to help us so we can be free from fear.  God is bringing to reality a vision that is beautiful and life-giving.  When Martin Luther saw God as an angry father, he was absolutely paralyzed.  This was the image the church perpetuated to control people.  When he became a monk, he started to read the scriptures and he found there grace and hope.  It freed him to speak the truth to the church authorities, which at times led him to have to go into hiding and become something of a captive.  But this truth of God’s love meant that no matter what anyone did to him, he would always have the freedom of knowing he belonged to God.  This epiphany led him to translate the Bible into the common language of the people so they could read it for themselves and also become free.  Education became a means of freedom.  It meant people could access the word of God themselves and no one could control what they knew of the freeing promises of God.

            Another of Martin Luther’s favorite verses is Romans 3.  We are not justified by our works or deeds.  That’s not what makes us right with God.  It’s helpful to know the law because there are some helpful guildelines to help us relate to others, and also because these laws show us what sorry shape we’re in, that we are slaves to our desires and to our fears.  But we’re not meant to stay in that sorry state.  Jesus gives us a most beautiful gift, the gift of grace, the gift of relationship, the gift of welcome, of family with him.  We have been slaves—worshipping ourselves and our own power, trapped in our cycles of addiction and fear.  Jesus comes to unite heaven and earth, to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable, to stir us all up until we all look up and say, “I don’t want this life of slavery to sin anymore.  I want the life that Jesus is offering.”  It is a freedom that comes with relationship to Jesus, to follow the way he lives and in relationship and responsibility to vulnerable neighbors.

            Finally in the Gospel of John, Jesus offers freedom to those who are listening to him.  They first deny all the ways they enslaved and trapped in life and even their own history, their own story.  They claim that their relationship to Abraham means they have always been free.  But Jesus and John the Baptist have never been impressed by that relationship.  God could make stones into children of Abraham.  No big deal.  It isn’t a blood line that makes us free or not.  Instead we are all related to Abraham because he couldn’t keep all the rules, either, but God valued the relationship they had and that was enough.  Abraham found enough trust to leave his home and walk with God through many dangers.  Sometimes he didn’t listen so well and relied on his own smarts which got him into trouble several times.  Sometimes he really complained because God hadn’t followed through on the plan to give him a son, but the relationship and conversation continued.  Abraham related to many unexpected people on the journey with hospitality and grace that God had welcomed and related to him.

            Sometimes we get stuck like these folks Jesus is talking to in the Gospel.  It might be hard to admit some ways we might be enslaved or trapped.  We get trapped in our ideas of what family is and how we are or aren’t related to each other.  Who is my brother or sister?  Who am I disconnected from?  Who do I dismiss or ignore?

            We get stuck in wanting to control things, to make the decisions, or in our dependence upon violence or the threat of violence to get our way.  We get enslaved to money and comforts.  We get enslaved in alcohol or food or exercise as a way to feel in control.  We idolize sports figures and celebrities. 

            Trinity’s Anniversary is right around the corner.  We’ll be looking at our history.  We’ll get practice telling our story.  We’ll examine where we have been enslaved and trapped.  We’ll see the vision and hope the people before us held.  We’ll remember our relationships.  We’ll remember when we were faithful.  We look there not to go back there but to see what we can learn.  Maybe those stories will shed light on where we are now and help us articulate our faith and our vision.  Maybe those stories will inspire us to strengthen relationships with neighbors.  Maybe we will see where we get stuck and be honest about barriers within our church.  Maybe we will find ourselves freed, not to do whatever we want, but to follow Jesus, who used his freedom to show no partiality, to cross borders in his sharing the good news, to risk illness and pain and ridicule to spend time with people on the margins, to offer healing and love, and to put people to work bringing in the Kingdom.  That’s what freedom is for—to get to work alongside Jesus and all God’s people, loving the world in truth and action.

            Someone said this week that when the Israelites were getting ready to cross the Red Sea, it wasn’t Moses raising his staff that parted the waters, but the first person to stick their toe in the water.  It was the faith of one person to take the first step that God was responding to.  For us that person is Jesus.  He was completely free, but he came in human form to lead us from slavery to freedom.  He stood on the threshold and stuck in his toe and so we follow although the path is often difficult.

            I invite you to stand up this morning.  Close your eyes and imagine with me.  We are standing on the edge of the Red Sea.  We have left our comforts, our homes, our shackles.  We are uncertain of where we are going.  We smell the water of the sea.  We feel the breeze.  We hear the marching of Pharaoh’s troops.  We look around and see that we are surrounded by friends.  Our anxiety eases a little.  We see Jesus before us and the sea parting.  It is roaring and foaming.  And together we move forward following our Savior.  We’re not going to arrive right away.  We might need a year of training, learning how to trust and we might need 40.  But we’re moving toward abundant life together, freed to love our neighbor and work for the common good.

October 22, 2023

 There was a big argument on Facebook a month or two ago on one of the pages for Glacier National Park.  Because we visited there this summer, I joined the page to figure out what hikes we should take and any other helpful advice people had to share.  The debate was about a painted rock.  Someone had painted a rock and placed it on a trail at Glacier to be found.  The person who found it was none too pleased!  In their view, this rock was litter, graffiti, something that defaced the pure, unadulterated beauty of Glacier.  Many people joined in the outrage about the rock.  And many people joined the opposing view that someone was trying to bring delight and joy, leaving something for someone to find, playing a game.  On the one hand, the beauty of Glacier National Park was of at utmost value, a beautiful work of art.  A Christian would say it is God’s handiwork, with God’s fingerprints all over it.  On the other hand, someone brought their own artwork into the space as an improvement and not everyone agreed it was an improvement.

            In today’s Gospel, Caesar puts his likeness and image on a coin and Jesus and the Religious leaders have a conversation about who it belongs to.

            Jesus calls for the coin and for the people there to examine their relationship to it, to God, and to the Political leaders.  For Jewish people, the coin was a mixed symbol.  It was a symbol of oppression and occupation by a foreign Empire and yet it was something they needed to get by in life.  A denarius was a day’s wages, so it symbolized work and energy and even being exploited at work.  The coin bore the image of Caesar who declared himself a god.  It was not permitted in the temple since it could be construed as an idol or referring to a false god.  It was shocking that they had this coin here in the temple, but maybe it had skittered across the floor earlier in the week when Jesus overturned the tables of the moneychangers. 

            Here is this image of this leader in the Temple, in God’s dwelling.  The two together make quite a contrast.  God made everything good and full of value, independent of whether it could be used to generate wealth or not.  God called the birds of the air good, the seas, the dry land, the light and the darkness, all the creeping things, and all the green plants for food even before humans were created and able to use them for anything.  God created all this, including this gold used to make the coin and assigned it value in relationship with everything else and in proper balance, to give blessing and life each in their own way.  God created all this to allow blessing to flow among all creatures and so life would flourish.

            What a contrast to Caesar and many of our political leaders who value what enriches them, and each of us to a certain extent.  It is part of our fallen nature to be selfish and afraid and to hoard.  Caesar was the best at playing the power game, which is why he ended up at the top and then he used his power to increase the power of his friends and those who could enrich him. He used his power to put his likeness on coins and statues so everyone would know he is important and of value.

            How different from God, who didn’t want God’s image anywhere.  God’s fingerprints were already all over this earth, God’s hallmark in the availability of blessing and the flowing of life. 

            So here we have money, which only has the value we assign to it.  It is a concept, not a thing, a symbol of access to all that God has made.  God made everything and showed it to the humans and asked them to steward it faithfully, to keep the land and protect it, gave them access, although with limits, because just because you can access it doesn’t mean you should.  I speak of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  So humankind had access but also warned to watch out since not everything was healthy for humans. 

            As a fallen humanity, we have claimed what is God’s and given access by way of money.  You can have enough to eat and good quality food, but you have to pay for it.  You gain access with money.  You can have a safe place to live and comforts if you have money that gives you access.  God gives access as a free gift for the flourishing of life.  Money restricts access or grants it without regard to what is best for the flourishing of life.  As we look at this coin, we take all this in.

            Here is Jesus who these religious leaders are buttering up with compliments like, “You show no partiality.”  In other words, you let the blessing flow regardless of merit or who will bless you back.  The rain falls on the good and the bad alike.  So here is this coin bearing Caesar’s image and here are we, humankind, the ones bearing God’s image, made in the likeness and image of God.  How do we live out that image?  By letting the blessing flow, of course--=by showing no partiality.  What does it mean to bear the image of God we carry within each of us? I hope it isn’t about looks, but about our hearts.  It certainly must mean a responsibility to carry God's values within us. What is it about God's image that we hold in common? It is the heart of God, the values of God, the focus of God on life-giving ways. And we take that image wherever we go. It isn't just something we wear or embody at church. Yes, we may dress up a bit, shave, put on a clean outfit, to come here. We also try to put on a good attitude and a friendly smile, even if we aren't feeling that social. But God's image is stamped on us every other day of the week, as well. We carry God's image, God's values to work with us. We carry it with us to the store, to the ballot box, to the bank, when we drive our cars, when we take out the trash, when we fill out our estimate of giving card, when we volunteer our time, when we forgive, when we show no favoritism, and even when we pay our taxes. Jesus' values led him to give his life that we might have life, to disregard his own welfare for the sake of others. We give thanks that he made new life possible for us, that he made that connection between God and humankind, between heaven and earth so clear and so available to us who have done nothing to deserve a place at God's table of grace. Yet, here we are, all valued, all invited, all chosen by God.

Next week, we estimate our giving for the coming year in a way that incorporates God's values. Our estimates help the congregation create a budget, so we aren't guessing. It helps you set an intentional goal, with prayer, to use this gift from God, money in a way that supports God's values. It also helps separate you from your money, which can so easily become an idol, no matter who's image it has on it.

It used to be that the offering was taken, the first fruits from the field, the best of the flock, and it was burned. Many a pastor has fantasized about taking the offering, putting it on the altar, and setting it on fire. The reaction would be priceless. Nowadays, very little of what ends up in the plate is paper money anymore. Most of it is online giving or checks, so it wouldn't be so effective. But the thought of destroying the money, in theory, is appealing. It means the giver truly has to let go and says, “This isn't mine anymore.” Like the prayer says, “We release what has been given to us.” Then no more could one's offering be held over the church's head. No one could say, “Do it my way or I will withhold my tithe.” No one could say, “We can't offend this or that important/rich person in the congregation or they will stop giving.” Destroying the money destroys the power it can have over us, the partiality we might have because of it.

However, if the money is destroyed, it can't be used to do the work that supports God's values of giving life impartially and supporting all in need. Alas, there will be no fire in the offering plate today. We work together to pass a budget that we believe supports God's values. Our budget tithes our offerings to the larger church to pay some administration costs that help us stay connected to other Lutherans and from time to time get support for calling a new pastor or other support during a conflict or challenge.  Our budget provides support for a food pantry that feeds hungry people in our neighborhood and trains neighbors to prepare for disasters so that blessing and life can flow.  These gifts provide baby care kits, that creates partnerships between our congregations. Our budget also pays the staff to carry out the work we see as important.

So what about the painted rock at Glacier National Park?  Glacier is an especially sacred place to a lot of people because of its natural beauty.  God’s image is all over it.  People leave their fingerprints, too.  Humans have built roads and trails to provide access to all this beauty in a limited way, in a way that is meant to contribute to that sense of the sacred.  Since we’re going to leave our mark, we should leave it in a way that points the sacred beauty, rather than to us and our artistry.  I would argue that in this case, this painted rock might show beauty and a sense of the sacred, but that it would fit better in a community garden or in someone’s yard where our own image and fingerprint doesn’t get in the way of God’s.

God has given us generous hearts and gifts to share and put God’s image all around us.  So let us examine our relationship with all that has value.  God gives us something priceless, of ultimate value, love and relationship which hold firm through disasters and all the surprises in life.  The value of this relationship with God only increases as time goes on.  So let us hold to what is truly important and lasting and worthy of praise and let the beauty of all that God has made inspire us to live lives of justice and peace.

October 15, 2023

 The first baptism I did in my first church was for baby Leland who is now a full grown adult.  Leland’s dad Michael didn’t attend church very often and I was at that church at least five years before anyone told me the story.  Michael had a mentor he really looked up to—a guy who was kind to him and took him under his wing.  This mentor always wore a cowboy hat and boots and when this mentor died, Michael honored him by wearing his cowboy hat and boots to the funeral.  But when he walked in the door, one of the elders of the church shamed him for wearing a hat in church.  Michael never looked at church as a place of welcome again.

It was only this year that I explained to my son the arbitrary rules about hats in church and the difference when a girl or woman wears one and when a boy or man wears one.  He looked at me, completely baffled and I had to agree, the ideas of what is appropriate and respectful dress is so very confusing.

Today is another of the parables of Matthew.  Parables are never supposed to make us comfortable, but sometimes we have used this parable to be comfortable.  We have said to ourselves, I am the one in the streets that was invited to the banquet after others refused and I will always be dressed appropriately!  Too bad for those others!

If we read the parable this way, then we are doing what we often do and automatically put God in the role of the King.   The King here is violent and petty and vindictive, even though he lures us in with a moment of grace where he extends the invitation out to the unexpected people. We should be careful not to equate kings with God, because often they are quite different.

Doesn’t God invite the little people in the streets from the very beginning?  Doesn’t God invite with generosity and forgiveness and love and abundance?  Doesn’t God continue inviting when we first decline the invitation?  Doesn’t God understand when someone doesn’t have the right clothes for the party? 

Isn’t it the world that has exclusive guest lists?  Isn’t it the world that gets all excited when Taylor Swift goes to a football game, shows up somewhere unexpected?  Isn’t it the world that insists on fancy dinners meant to impress and show power and make people envious?  Isn’t it the world that lashes out in anger and violence?  Isn’t it the world that is unforgiving if someone wears the wrong thing to the Academy Awards?

What if this parable instead is supposed to make us look at the systems of power in our world?  How do the powerful decide who gets invited first and who doesn’t?  How do the powerful reward waste?  How do the powerful systems say who gets to eat or who gets to sit next to whom?  How do the financial systems make the rich richer and keep the poor in the streets?  How does the world protect those in power and bring violence to those who are vulnerable?  How do the world’s systems try to control people and keep them apart from each other?

We have different prisons for people who are rich and the rest of us and people with black and brown skin get longer prison sentences.  We have huge divides with income inequality, so that CEOs make hundreds of times what an entry-level worker makes. We have systems that keep men and women in certain jobs and out of others.  We have an education system that is income and neighborhood based, so that the rich keep getting more and the poor keep getting less. We are divided and this parable talks about division.  The rich and poor never meet.  The one is destroyed and the other takes its place, but is controlled by violence if it doesn’t meet the arbitrary and difficult to follow rules of the ruling class.

Church can be this way!  When I was on my sabbatical, I visited other churches each week and I was terrified, because I knew how many ways it could go wrong.  Would I be dressed the way I was expected to in that setting?  Would I be welcome?  Would I fit in?  Would I make some terrible offense or mistake without knowing it?  I found obstacles going into unfamiliar settings.  Thankfully, I had a 3 year old with me at the time, so that softened everything and I always introduced myself as a pastor on sabbatical, so I was one of the elite they had to be nice to!  I worried that I might have a Michael experience like he did with his hat and offend someone. I didn’t want the embarrassment of causing a scene.

We, too, at Trinity and Santa Cruz have customs and rules that we have no idea about because we’re used to it.  Stand up, sit down, sing this, read this.  We are pretty flexible in our dress, but where we sit can be a challenge.  Then we have ways we corral the kids and not everyone sees the children’s role the same way.  Now we’re about to depave the parking lot.  I sat there studying the map to see who was losing their parking spot.  I’m happy to find a new one—I have a back up, don’t worry about me.  But you never know who you might upset and if they have power to punish or if they will be hurt. I’ve seen it happen before.

Jesus came that all might have abundant life, not to impose arbitrary rules.  Whatever in the church is getting in the way of abundant life, we can identify those things and remove them.  Whatever in society is getting in the way of abundant life, we are commanded to use our voice, our power to make abundant life flow to those most in need.

If we’re not going to equate God and King, another way of looking at the parable is that Jesus may be the one who comes to party in the wrong outfit.  He refuses to play the power game of the King of the world.  He refuses to flatter anyone or follow arbitrary rules.  And so we threw him out of the party, hung him on a cross to die, because he wouldn’t play our power games.  And he rose from the dead with forgiveness and love in his heart and invited us to live a different way, to make his Kingdom of justice and peace our vision, where no one is thrown out, where violence is not the way, where each person’s gifts are important, where there is no more crying or grief or pain, , where we invite people far and wide, where we respond to the invitation, where we come together from different cultures, speaking many different languages and yet the culture of love and hope bringing us together.