The Force of Living Water

“The water that I will give will become... a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”

In last Sunday’s gospel Jesus drew on the image of wind to convey a spiritual truth.  Today’s reading draws upon another basic element – water.  Jesus launches into a conversation with a woman who has come to a well to draw a day’s supply.  He is thirsty and asks her for a drink.  This simple request launches a lengthy conversation that covers a wide array of subjects.  At one point Jesus proclaims that he is the source of Living Water and that whoever drinks of him will never thirst again.

Thirst – and we are talking deep thirst – would have been a common experience in that region in that era.  It is still a common experience in many parts of our world today.  Our access to clean drinking water, as well as the abundance of beverages of choice, is a blessing we could easily take for granted.  I was so pleased last year when we rallied together to raise nearly $2,000 for the creation of family wells at remote locations in other countries.  We understood the connection between clean water and quality of life.  It is nice to know that somewhere two or three families or farms or small villages have a way to satisfy their thirst because of our Lenten offering from 2013.

As I meditated on today’s lengthy gospel lesson I kept thinking about a slightly different property of living water.  Not only does it quench thirst, but over time it also has the ability to break down, break through, and smooth out what stands in its way.  Erosion.  Images of erosion vary from the glorious splendor of the Grand Canyon to washed out sections of road on the Outer Banks after a tidal surge.  Have you ever walked barefoot in a steam of rushing water and felt the smooth rocks beneath your feet?  Over time, moving water has worked away all their rough edges. 

Not long ago I watched a cable documentary that tried to determine the origin of Noah’s flood.  It theorized that after the last ice age a huge body of water covered most of central Canada and the upper Great Plains.  All of this water was held back by dam made of ice.  When that blockage gave way, the water rushed forth at an enormous rate in volumes we can scarcely imagine.  It raised ocean levels worldwide by a significant amount; creating the English Channel, the Black Sea, and other bodies of water we take for granted.  Water literally changed the face of the earth.

I think this is a helpful way to look at the encounter Jesus had with the woman at the well.  Think of all that it broke through, moved away, and reshaped.

·   Men did not speak to woman, but Jesus engages this woman in conversation.

·   Jews did not speak to Samaritans and vice versa on account of long-standing ethnic hatred, but Jesus foregoes all of that.

·   Moral objections are raised – the woman has had multiple relationships – and they are swept away.

·   Questions about the practice of religion are brought up – where is the right place to worship? – and dismissed.

·   That the woman came to the well alone at about noontime indicates she was an outcast in her community.  She was not welcome when all the other women normally gathered in the cool of the morning at the well.  And yet, she leaves her conversation with Jesus, returns to the village, and tells everyone about what she has found.  She is reconciled with the people who have pushed her away.

·   The villagers come to the well to meet Jesus and decide to invite him to stay in their town – something that was unthinkable at the time.

No obstacle, no barrier, no impediment can stand in the way of Living Water for long.  Eventually the water will overcome it and make its way toward its eventual destination.  From this encounter we learn that the destination of the Living Water that is Jesus looks like this:

·   It is a place where people find the true and living God not because they are good enough, but because God is gracious beyond all measure.

·   It is a place where broken relationships give way to a reconfigured community; a community where Jesus is always a welcomed guest.

·   It is a place where each person is respected regardless of age, gender, class, ethnicity, or moral integrity.   

To live in this kind of place is never to thirst again.  It is a world we are moving toward inch by inch, choice by choice, carried on our way by the gushing flow of Living Water.

I have enjoyed the brief mediations in this year’s Lenten Devotional from Episcopal Relief & Development.  March 17^th’s entry was written by Moses Deng Bol, a bishop from the South Sudan.  He described how in that part of the world “women are the marginalized of the marginalized”:

Official government statistics say 98 percent of women in the region cannot read or write.  Although a few girls go to school, most will not complete their education.  They will likely be married off for a dowry.  The dowry may be paid in stolen cows, a practice fueling current tribal conflict in South Sudan.

The bishop goes on to note:

Yet we rely on these same women to provide food, manage our homes, and raise our children.  They are such a central part of our society, and, I think, these women are the key to unlocking a better future for South Sudan.

March 19^th’s devotional described how an association of women in southwest China, empowered by a microloan, have come together to create better lives for themselves and for their community.  They are now at a point where they are making a profit and using this money to provide better care for the elderly, for children, and for poor families.

These stories, among many others, evoke for me the image of Living Water as running water that removes barriers and overcomes obstacles on its way to a good and godly destination.  I am looking forward to making a contribution to efforts like these at the end of Lent as we collect change for micro-development projects.  Just as last year’s effort addressed water as thirst, this year’s work focuses in figuratively on ‘water’s’ ability to transform.  It is a tangible way that you and I can be connected to Jesus the source of Living Water.

Today I am most mindful of the final barrier that Living Water will overcome, the barrier of death itself.  Death is the great darkness in the future that each of us must face, and with the sudden passing of Stephanie Freel, that darkness seems especially close today; not only to us, but to our children who have lost a Sunday School teacher and mother of one of their own.  Our faith is that nothing – nothing – nothing – can stand it the way of the gush of Living Water, not even death itself.  We rejoice that Stephanie has been welcomed to that place were she will never thirst again even as we recognize that a different kind of water pours forth from our eyes in the form of tears. 

Today I am grateful for the power of Living Water to overcome all things on its course to a Holy Destination.  And I pray that the One who was thirsty as he sat beside a well so long ago will come to us and comfort us with a Living Water we so desperately need.

Jesus said, “The water that I will give will become... a spring of water gushing up to eternal life.”

People of the Wind

“The wind blows where it chooses… and so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

I was ordained a transitional deacon on a Saturday morning in June in the year 1987.  It is called “transitional” to distinguish those who will later be ordained to the priesthood from those who are ordained deacons for life by vocation or calling.  St. Paul’s, Akron, where the service took place, is a large church built in the Georgian style.  A good number of people participated in the service – two full choirs, readers, a preacher, presenters, the clergy of the church, clergy from the diocese, clergy from other area churches, both bishops of the diocese, and little old me.  We got ourselves organized on the walk in front of the church before the service began and the line stretched on and on and on. 

A storm was brewing.  As we waited for the procession to begin we could see it and hear it moving in quickly from the west.  We barely got inside before torrents of fury were unleashed.  It was warm that morning and because the church lacked air-conditioning its large windows were open to let it what earlier had been a gentle breeze.  But with the onset of the storm, fueled by much cooler air, that breeze transformed into powerful gusts of wind that whipped around to and fro – not only outside the church, but inside as well.  The air around us was moving and alive.  Some said it was the Holy Spirit coming to be present at the occasion, but I fretted it was God’s last ditch effort to put a stop to my ordination. 

The storm passed after a few minutes and that rushing of air inside the church subsided soon there after.  The ordination moved forward with the kind of quiet dignity and gentle reverence one comes to expect of an Episcopal Church service.  I actually don’t remember much about the service, but if I close my eyes I can still hear and feel the power of the wind rushing through the church.

I suspect that each of us here this morning has had an experience similar to that; most likely not at a church service, but somewhere, sometime, and perhaps many different times.  We know the feeling of stillness giving way to powerful movement, of calm giving way to energy, of lethargy becoming animated.  Jesus, in trying to describe life in the Spirit to Nicodemus, draws on the image of wind.  He suggests that we people of faith are to be animated, energized, and alive.  We are people of movement who are doing more than going through the motions.  Jesus told Nicodemus that the Spirit’s presence in one’s life brings about fundamental change, as if one was born for a second time.

I found myself reading recently a portion of an 18^th century book titled Religious Affections written by the revivalist Jonathan Edwards.  He was a leading figure in the Great Awakening that took place in the 1730’s.  Edwards was convinced that a person’s natural state is to be inactive.  It is only when we are moved by what he called an ‘affection’ that we spring into action.  So for example, the affection of covetousness moves a person to seek worldly goods, the affection of ambition moves a person to seek glory, and the affection of lust moves a person to seek sensual delights. 

What intrigues me about Edward’s book is his thinking about religious affections – those things that are the causes of religious action.  He named ten:

1)  Holy Fear – trembling at the thought of God’s holiness.

2)  Hope – hoping in God’s person and in God’s promises.

3)  Love – the affection that rules our relationship with God as well as our neighbor.

4)  Hated – our intense response to sin and evil.

5)  Holy Desire – longing for God as “a thirsty deer pants for water” (Psalm 42:1)

6)  Joy – delighting in the Lord.

7)  Religious Sorrow – a brokenness of heart, which God will not despise.

8)  Gratitude – thankfulness expressed as praise to God.

9)  Compassion – demonstrating God’s mercy in our lives.

10)  Zeal – a passionate commitment to live out our faith in dynamic ways.

In his day Edwards contended with many clergy – including Anglicans – because he was convinced that true religion had to be more than a rational or intellectual affair.  He felt faith must emanate from the heart and that its expression must be “enthusiastic”: 

“If we are not earnest in our religion, and if our wills and inclinations are not strongly exercised, than we are nothing.  The importance of religion is so great that no halfhearted exercise will suffice.  In nothing is the state of our heart so crucial as in religion, and in nothing is lukewarmness so odious.”

He is describing life as being like a quaint, quiet worship service when if fact it should be like one where everyone is enveloped in a powerful rush of air.  Edwards describes it as having the external appearance of religion – its form – but either not knowing or denying its power.

And that I think this is what Jesus tried to communicate to Nicodemus.  As a Pharisee, Nicodemus had mastered religion’s appearance and form, but knew little or nothing of its power.  He knew the affections as holy ideas, but not as an animating force in his life.  I give him credit because he recognized there was something different about how Jesus practiced the faith, and rather than condemn or attack him, he sought him out and asked honest questions.  And I sympathize with his confusion at Jesus’ answer.  “We people of the Spirit”, Jesus told him, “are people of the wind”.

I grew up in an Evangelical environment where as a youth I was encouraged to “give my life to Christ.”  I was encouraged to “come to Christ” through a conversion experience.  That event happened to me when I was in the ninth grade.  It was a powerful, life-changing moment that has been the foundational decision of my life.  And it was an experience that I encouraged others to seek for themselves. 

Now, decades later, I question some of the theology of this approach.  Salvation comes from the Lord, not from a conversion experience and the sacrament that points to this is Baptism.  I also question some of the psychology of this approach.  More than a little bit of it tends to be manipulative, especially when aimed at teenagers and young people.  But here is what I don’t question and what I do embrace about my own conversion… the passion and the power I received from it.  I am not a perfect person or a perfect Christian to be sure, but I am all in.  Religion for me is not appearance or form.  It is life itself.  I have been from that moment years ago a person of the wind energized at my best moments by what Edwards called religious affections.

People frequently ask me why some other church is doing so well.  Why are they growing?  Why are so many people going there?  What do they have that we don’t?  If I answer honestly I say I don’t know.  I don’t get to visit other churches in order to discern what they are doing that is working so well for them.  I suspect, however, that there is one single common trait they all share.  It is not contemporary music or great preaching or drop down video screens or casual clothes and coffee cups in the worship service.  The common thread is that each congregation has a significant number of people who are passionate about living out the Christian faith.  Each has many people who are being blow about by the wind. 

In Edward’s day there were many good and faithful church people who wanted nothing to do with what they called “enthusiasm” in religion.  They were comfortable with and confident in the external expression of religion and its form.  Faith being animated served no purpose at all for them.  But there were others who found that religion’s windy power made them new and energized believers.  And then there were some who knew they were missing out on something, but couldn’t name it.  These were people who, like Nicodemus, saw in the enthused something they lacked. 

The image of wind.  Imagine two kites.  One is leaning against a wall in a closed garage.  The other is soaring high above a beach, caught up in the persistent ocean breeze.  What is the difference between the two?  Both are kites, right?  Neither creates the wind, but one is caught up in it while the other is not.  That kite in the wind… it is living into the fullness of its intended being.  The one in the garage… not so much.  Which one are you more like? 

Jesus said, “The wind blows where it chooses… and so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

 

 

"About', "Knowing," and "Using" the Bible

Ladies, on the scant chance that any of you might think I would be some kind of ‘prize’, let me dispel such nonsense by outing myself as a channel surfer.  Yes, I hold the remote control in my hand and flick away.  I am told women find this behavior to be incredibly annoying.  I channel surf for two reasons.  First, I find it challenging to pay attention to television for extended periods of time, especially during commercials.  And second, there is some pretty fascinating content being broadcast on other stations.  Nowhere is this more true than on the Christian networks!

One day I happened to surf into a program called “The Bible Bowl”.  It was a game show of sorts that pitted teenage teams against each other in a quiz show format of bible trivia.  Each team had three members and there were teams from three different churches.  One team, it appeared to me, might have struggled to answer the question who was born in a manger.  Clearly, their youth minister and Christian Education director were in for a rough personnel review at the end of the year.  The second team appeared to be confident in their knowledge that Noah built the ark, Moses parted the Red Sea, and Paul wrote a lot of letters.  But the third team – ahhh – this team had done its homework.  They knew their stuff!  In fact, I wondered if they did anything else in life but drill for bible trivia. 

Within a nanosecond of each question, one of their youth smacked down on the buzzer and blurted out an answer.  And I am not talking about basic level bible here.  Question: “Name the daughters of Zelophahad.”  Buzzzz!  “Mahlah, Tirzah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Noah.”  “Correct.  20 points.  Next question:  Who became king of Jerusalem at the age of seven?”  Buzzzz!  “Joash!”  And so it went.  I trust you can imagine the look on the faces on the other two teams as obscure question after obscure question got devoured by this one church’s walking, talking, teenage biblical concordances.  It was the kind of television experience that encourages me to keep the remote close at hand!

It strikes me that most Episcopalians know about the bible.  We are familiar with some of its basic stories and content.  Most of us know others who know the bible, perhaps not to the obsessive level of that quiz team, but pretty darn close.  We know folks who can quote chapter and verse and in a matter of seconds can open a bible to the exact passage they are looking to find.  So there is knowing about the bible and there is knowing the bible, but there is also third level.  It involves knowing how to use the bible.  We see each level at work in today’s readings.

Think back to the first lesson.  God speaks to Adam and gives a command: 

“You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

The text plainly indicates that this word was given to Adam and to Adam alone. 

The scene shifts and now the crafty serpent is talking to Eve.  Both are aware of what God said to Adam so the implication is that Adam passed along what he had been told.  The serpent: “Did God really say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden?’”  It is a calculated distortion to see if Eve knows about God’s word or if she knows God’s word.   Notice her answer.  She is partly right and partly wrong: “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.” 

While not touching the fruit God has told you not to eat makes sense, it was not what God said.  Did Adam add this to what he told Eve or did Eve make it up on her own?  Either way, this difference between knowing God’s word and knowing about God’s word opens the door for the crafty one to challenge the entire notion.  Eating the apple becomes the greatest misuse of God’s word in Scripture. 

And then we have the Gospel reading.  Three times the crafty one tempts Jesus.  Jesus repels the first temptation to turn stone to bread by quoting Scripture.  The devil sees an opportunity for a second temptation - throw yourself from the pinnacle of the temple - and then makes the case for doing so by quoting not one, but two passages of Scripture.  The devil knows his bible!  There is no doubt he could tear it up on that quiz show.  What the devil doesn’t know is how to use the bible.

Now when I say “use the bible”, of course I mean “use it in the right way” (whatever that means).  Most people who know the bible well know how to use what they know.  I knew a guy in college who really knew the bible and he could use what he knew to justify pretty much everything he did.  Do you remember the movie Oh God staring George Burns?  Well, my college friend thought it was blasphemous so he cobbled together a couple of verses from the bible taken from here and there as a pretense for setting off a smoke bomb in a crowded movie theatre.  I hope you have never encountered a person that extreme, but I am confident each of you knows someone who knows the bible and knows how to use what they know.

I am sure we could all tell a story about someone who used the bible in the wrong way, but how would we describe what it looks like to use the bible in the ‘right’ way?  Maybe the place to start is to change the question.  Perhaps the question is not how we use the bible, but rather how does the bible use us? 

Both Paul and the author of the Letter to the Hebrews use the image of the bible as being like a sword.  This image in particular gives rise to the idea of using the bible as if it is something we command to affect an impact on others.  I knew a Korean seminary student who dreamed a putting together a bible study using “just the right verses in just the right way” that it would reunite the two Koreas.  His was a vision in keeping with the image of the bible as a sword.  At least he hoped for something positive.  Others use the sword-like bible to cut their adversaries to the quick.  Their go-to approach is to use the bible as a weapon that wields the message “I am right and you are wrong and here is why”.

But what if we shift the image from sword to scalpel?  And what if we see ourselves not as the surgeon but as the patient?  How would we see the bible differently in this light?  How would we see it if we understood it to be an instrument to open up us (as it were) to affect our greatest healing; if we used it not to see what we could do to others with it, but rather what we allowed it to work in us?

Or what if we shifted to another image… Scripture as being bread?  What if we thought of the reading the bible as a way to nourish and nurture our lives?  What if its primary purpose was to give us strength for life’s journey?

Speaking of life’s journey, that suggests another biblical image… Scripture as a light.  What if we understood the bible as being like a lantern, a means to help us move forward in life when the path seems dark and uncertain?

Or what if we saw Scripture as being like a letter; perhaps a love letter from One who has invested everything in us?  Or maybe like a letter from a parent who guides, corrects, chides, inspires, teaches, and encourages us – all written from the perspective of One whose connection to us can never be shaken.

Or what if we saw Scripture as being like a shot of adrenaline… something that energizes and motives us to move, to take action, when we see that things are not as they should be?

Of course, some words of Scripture cannot be sugar coated.  Some of what it has to say is deeply critical of our individual condition as well as the way our culture expresses its values and concerns.  From this perspective, are we justified to use it as a sword; as a weapon that wrecks havoc on everyone whose ways we find objectionable?  There are times in extreme when Christians must stand up, proclaim the Truth, and be willing to suffer the consequences.  But most often we need to think of Scripture as a being like a beacon in the night that illuminates not so much right and wrong as it points out danger while guiding the way to safe passage.

Last Wednesday, I spoke the words of the faith encouraging each one of us to observe a holy Lent.  One aspect of this calls on us to read holy Scripture and to meditate upon it.  This directive is meant to encourage us to participate in a more intensive, more focused practice during these forty days.  Certainly it is not the only time during the year when we read the bible, but this is a time for us to grow from knowing about the bible toward knowing the bible, and from knowing the bible to allowing the holy Scriptures to use us.

Lenten Alignment

For Christians, today is perhaps the most-counter cultural day of the year.  We are gathered to embrace truths that our culture would rather not face.  In a society that emphasizes human potential, we kneel today to acknowledge our limitations.  In a society that promotes self-esteem, we bow our heads to admit our failures and to acknowledge our faults.  In a society that worships youth and strength and beauty and vitality, we engage in a ritual act that professes our own mortality.  Yes indeed, Ash Wednesday is counter-cultural!

So why do we do this?  What are we trying to accomplish here today?  Let me suggest two potential answers we should reject.

The first is what I call the “Time-Out” answer.  I was a fairly inventive person as a child.  I could figure out any number of different ways to occupy my time; creating a new game, working on a shop project, and don’t get me started on the multiple possibilities of filling time with a hose of running water and dirt!  But often there was a rub.  What I found fun my parents considered destructive.  Time after time, while I was in the midst of some form of revelry or another, my father showed up, surveyed the damage, and lowered the boom.  Think of that as an analogy of what I call the “Time-Out” answer (but believe me when I tell you back in the day we had something much more painful administered to the backside before time out started, which – by the way – we called, “Go to your room”).

The rational for Lent as “Time-Out” is that once a year, in the midst of all our fun and joy in life, we need to be brought up short for a couple of weeks.  As a little boy, I began to anticipate retribution if I was having too much fun.  It was as if the yin of play had to be kept in balance with the yang of you are trouble.  So Lent comes along once a year and in the midst of all our fun, puts us in time out so we can ponder what we did wrong.  The bottom line is this: “Don’t come out of your room, or Lent, until you are sorry for what you did!”

Why is this not a good way to observe Lent?  In a few moments I will say the words of our liturgy inviting you to the observance of a holy Lent.  Nothing about the “Time-Out” approach strikes me as particularly holy.  It feels juvenile and repressive.  I suspect it may have a particular appeal to ex-Roman Catholics and all others who had guilt drilled into them from an early age.  There is something about a church season drawing on guilt that feels meet and right for some folks, but ultimately is more pathological than holy.

So I encourage you to reject the “Time-Out” approach to Lent.  Here is a second possibility I don’t encourage either.  I call it the “Total Depravity” approach in honor of the Protestant reformer John Calvin.  He held that human nature was so fallen on account of original sin that we can do nothing to please God or to save ourselves.  In fact, according to Calvin, we are so totally depraved we cannot even on our own reach out for divine grace and forgiveness.  English reformers held that while human nature was tarnished by sin, we are still capable of doing good and pleasing God who through the Cross of Jesus demonstrates a willingness and deep desire to forgive our sins.

There are some recovering “Total Depravers” lurking around in the Episcopal Church.  They are former Baptists, Fundamentalists, or (like me) originally members of a Reformed tradition.  “Total Depravers” are the folks who work hard, contribute much, reach out, help others, exhibit selflessness, and yet still feel deep down that they are nothing more than a miserable sinner.  They are all too willing to engage Lent because it reinforces what they believe to be true about themselves.  It gives them a chance (drawing on the language of today’s collect) to acknowledge their wretchedness. 

Wretchedness is a strong word, isn’t it.  Given all the churches I have been a part of over the years it goes without saying I have known a lot of people.  Some were real pieces of work, to be sure, but I don’t know that I have ever known a person who was wretched.  Through our baptismal promise we profess a belief that Christ is present in each and every person… including you.  If Lent is for you a kind of wallowing in your self-perceived depravity than you need to find a way to embrace the beauty and grace that is Christ being present in and through you.   

So if Lent is not “Time-Out” and if it is not about “Total Depravity”, what is it?  Why do we engage in this spiritual activity that is so counter-cultural?

Let me suggest that it is about “Alignment”.  What we do this day – and throughout the season of Lent – aligns us with reality as we understand it in the Christian faith.  In a world that says we can have it all, we align ourselves with the Christian reality of our limitations.  We know that we are not perfect.  We know that we don’t control everything.  We know that even our best at times is not enough.  In a world that elevates self-esteem to be an inalienable right, we are comfortable owning up to our mistakes.  We can acknowledge the pain we cause and the brokenness we foster.  In a world that lives in denial of the reality of death we are more than willing to proclaim that we are mortal, formed the dust and to dust we will one day return.

This is reality as we in the Christian tradition understand it.  It is not a reality entirely embraced by the world.  The world’s view, as we see it, is skewed.  It is a distortion and those who adhere to it experience a disconnect with reality.  They are frustrated when faced with limitations, defensive when confronted with failures, and anxious when reminded about death.  If you react to these in any of the same ways then Lent is an opportunity for you to realign yourself with the Christian view of reality.

You see we focus not on what we can’t do, but on what we can.  Given your current limitations, what does it look like to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and to love your neighbor as yourself?  This is always the question.  And the answer never revolves around what you can’t do… you know, if only I had more money, or if only I had more time, or if only my knees didn’t hurt so much in the morning.  Given who you are right now and what you are capable of doing, how will you love God and your neighbor?  You never have to worry that it doesn’t measure up to what someone is capable of doing.  Heck, you don’t even have to worry about if it measures up to what you yourself used to be able to do.  Given who you are and what you can do today, how will you love God and your neighbor?  This is one way to align yourself with the Christian reality.

Here is another.  You don’t have to be perfect.  You can make mistakes.  While it is never acceptable to hurt another person, it happens, and it happens all the time.  We align ourselves with the Christian reality that we are sinners and from time to time we sin.  What do we do with this knowledge?  Do we get defensive or dismissive or do we try to shift the blame?  No, we accept it.  We openly and willingly confess our wrongdoing, seek to amend our ways, and receive forgiveness as it is extended.

And finally, as we align ourselves with the reality of the Christian life and faith as we face our own mortality, not through fear and denial, but with courage, joy, and the conviction that at death life is changed, not ended, and that there awaits for us a dwelling place eternal in the heavens.

I invite you to join us Wednesday nights in Lent for our Potluck Dinner & Program where we will explore some of these themes in greater depth.  We will think through why Christians can face mortality with joy and courage.  We will talk about embracing our limitations.  A chaplain from Obici hospital will walk us through quality of life and end of life issues – a topic we have titled “Living on your Own Terms”.  Members of the parish will help us to think about what will happen to our worldly goods – a topic we title “Giving on your Own Terms”.  And finally, we will look at Burial Office itself and provide you with a guidebook that will allow you to record your own wishes for the Celebration of your Life.  For us Christians these are not morbid or depressing topics.  They are ways we align ourselves with reality as we believe it to be.   

One final thought, in just a moment, as I invite you in the name of the Church to an observance of a holy Lent, I will encourage you to engage this season as a time of self-examination and repentance; of prayer, fasting, and self-denial; incorporating reading and meditating on God’s holy Word.  I encourage you to engage these practices not as “Time-Out” nor as a “Total Depraver”, but rather as a way to align yourself with the reality of the Christian faith and life over and against the distortions of this world which can so easily influence us.

As to a Lamp Shining in a Dark Place

Many years ago I spent a couple of days camping at a park on the shores of Lake Ontario just east of where the Niagara River meets it.  It was peaceful and quiet there, especially at night.  I remember sitting on the beach one evening and looking out over the lake as the sun went down.  Eventually it became dark and there were no lights anywhere across the landscape, save one.  Across the lake, just on the line of the horizon, I could see the illuminated skyline of downtown Toronto.  The CNN Tower, which stands at over 1,800 feet tall, was clearly visible, but from where I was sitting looked to be only about a quarter of an inch in height.  I remember being amazed that I could see the city across the lake.  Easily it was thirty miles away or more.  I also remember that try as I might to look at anything else, I could not take my eyes off that lone light in the darkness.

In today’s Epistle reading we heard the words of St. Peter:

“You will do well to be attentive to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place.”

His image of a lamp shining in a dark place is what triggered my memory of that evening spent gazing across the lake.  The lone lamp in the darkness, the single flame of a candle in an unlit room, the faint light of a distant city in the night – each draws and holds our attention as nothing else can.

It is a wonderfully evocative image, isn’t it.  But did you catch what the image stands for in Peter’s letter?  This is what he uses the metaphor to represent:

“Jesus received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, ‘This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.’  We ourselves heard this voice come from heaven, while we were with him on the holy mountain.”

For Peter, what he heard God proclaim about Jesus served to confirm everything the prophets of old had written and said about the Messiah to come.  Jesus is that person.  God’s voice confirms that Jesus, the Beloved Son, is the lamp shining in the darkness.  He commands our attention as a lone light in the nighttime.

The season of Epiphany ends this week with the beginning of Lent.  As its name suggests, this is been of time of revealing, discovery, and ‘ah-ha’ moments.  What has been revealed is God’s true nature as made known in the person, words, and work of Jesus. 

This year’s lectionary readings for Epiphany have been drawn from Matthew’s Gospel.  Other years the readings come from Mark, Luke, and John.  During those times we have readings where Jesus turns water into wine at a wedding, commands a raging storm to calm, and effects a human healing.  These epiphanies reveal that, like God, Jesus is not limited to the constraints of the natural world.  It strikes me that this year’s readings offered not one single account of the ‘miraculous’; not one single display of Jesus’ divine power.

The readings we heard fell into two basic groups.  The first few weeks in Epiphany we heard about Jesus’ baptism and his initial experiences with his eventual disciples.  Do you remember how John the Baptist had to keep pointing out Jesus so that those who had been with him in the wilderness near the Jordon River might investigate the Messiah for themselves?  This first phase of readings culminated when Jesus invited Peter, Andrew, James, and John to put down their nets and to follow him in order to fish for people.

The second cluster of readings was drawn from a portion of Matthew’s Gospel known as The Sermon on the Mount.  We heard the Beatitudes (“Blessed are you…”) and a whole host of teachings – many of them very challenging.  Jesus teaches that we are to love our enemies, to turn a cheek to those who strike us, and not to lust, even in our hearts.  Last Sunday Jesus concluded these teachings with this interesting command: “You must be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  Now that is a tall order, isn’t it!

So, in this year’s Epiphany season Jesus has revealed God to the world through two primary actions: creating a community and then discipling that community.  Let me say a word about each.

Creating a community.  We understand God’s very nature to be communal.  Isn’t that what the Holy Trinity is all about?  Three Persons/One Being may be confusing to understand, but put simply it is a community.  God exists in a community of relational harmony that embodies perfect love through mutuality and respect.  The community of God desires not to hoard this love but rather to extend it.  God brings forth all of creation and especially the human family to share in God’s communal life.  We live into this life by being in relationship with God and by being in relationship with one another through “ever-widening circles of fellowship” (to borrow a phrase from the prayer book).  The Church exists to incarnate God’s open invitation to join in community.  We do this, in part, as we live into our baptismal promises to “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves”, and as we “strive for justice and peace among all people, respecting the dignity of every human being.” 

God’s invitation of community knows no bounds or boundaries.  The gates of the Kingdom are always open and there is always an empty seat at the table in order to have space for the next guest to arrive.  God exists in community and seeks to extend that community throughout creation.  This is exactly what we saw Jesus doing on those early Sundays after the Epiphany. 

The lessons then shifted to reveal Jesus as discipling the gathering and growing community.  We heard a series of teachings.  Some are difficult to accept.  Almost all are difficult to keep.  And it culminated with Jesus saying that our righteous must exceed that of the Pharisees.  We must be perfect as God is perfect.

I suspect that when most people hear this they think of God’s perfection as being like a measuring stick.  Those religious leaders Jesus dismissed may have thought that way.  They may have thought of themselves as being the standard and measure; conveying overtly a message to that masses that you people are not as good as we are.  But Jesus says they are not the measure and, in fact, they fall far short of the standard.  God as Community is our goal.  Well, on one hand I suppose people were delighted to see Jesus cast aside the notion of hypocritical religious leaders as being role models.  But how worrisome is it that Jesus now sets the bar for discipleship at an impossibly high mark – God’s perfection? 

Do you remember going to an amusement park as a small child and having to stand next to one of those character displays that says you must be so tall to go one this ride?  Well, if you were not tall enough at the time you had a reasonable hope of growing so that next year or the year after you could.  If God’s perfection is that kind of measurement, then we can be assured we will never come close.  

But what if we think of God’s perfection not as the measure of discipleship, but as its destination.  Imagine me sitting on the shores of Lake Ontario gazing at the faint light of that city so far away.  Imagine I decide to get in a boat and start rowing my way toward the city.  With each stroke I get a little closer.  Over time the city appears bigger and brighter than before.  Discipleship is not about meeting a particularly impossible standard.  It is about a journey toward a holy destination.  It is, according to Peter, about paying attention to Jesus the way you would pay attention to a lamp shining in a dark place.  Discipleship is not about being good enough or pure enough, because we are neither.  It is about where you are going and how you are growing and what you are always in the process of becoming. 

As we move from the season of Epiphany to the season of Lent we will be given the opportunity to consider where we are on this journey, to ponder again our commitment to the destination, to consider where we have drifted off course, and to renew our attention to the one who is like a lamp shining in a dark place.

Love & Pray for your Enemies

A preacher, upon reading the text we just heard, set out to write a sermon about loving your enemies.  He knew it was a difficult teaching that was challenging for congregants to accept, so he worked extra hard, giving it all he had.  When Sunday came, he preached a very thoughtful, inspiring sermon that was persuasive from beginning to end.  At the conclusion, he asked those present to raise a hand if they had been convinced of the need to love their enemies.  Only about half present did so.  Undeterred, the preacher dove into the subject for another ten minutes.  After that, he asked for another show of hands.  This time 75% indicated they were now willing to love and pray for their enemies.  Another ten minutes of preaching and now everyone raised a hand with the exception of ninety-eight year old Mildred Phlymaldihide.  The preacher asked her stand up and explain why she was not willing to love and pray for her enemies.  In a shaky voice she said, “Well, I don’t have any enemies to hate.”  How could that be wondered the preacher?  “Oh, I used to have lots of enemies back in the day,” she continued, “but, I outlived them all.”

We are forever blessed that the Disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray.  From this one simple question we now have the Lord’s Prayer; a prayer that has done more to shape human spirituality and action than any other.  How I wish one of those disciples had spoken up in today’s text and asked Jesus to teach them how to pray for their enemies.  Should we pray that they see their error and come over to our way of thinking?  That seems a little self-serving.  Should we pray that their efforts against us be thwarted while our efforts against them succeed?  Should we pray differently for enemies of our country than we might pray for our own personal enemies?  When our enemy is not a person, but rather a thing - say, perhaps something like cancer – how should we pray?  I really wish we knew how Jesus prayed for his enemies, but we don’t.

We do know this, however, Jesus had enemies.  We can divide them into two basic groups: those he confronted and those he did not.  The occupying Roman forces fell into this second group.  Unlike many other messianic figures in that age, Jesus took a passive approach of non-resistance with regard to the Romans.  He was no insurrectionist, nor was he going to lead a violent uprising.  There is not a single story in any of the Gospels were Jesus directly attacks Roman rule.  What would be the point?  It was futile to resist such a dominant and ruthless force. 

In the face of such powerlessness, Jesus teaches a way to find empowerment that is now often referred to as ‘the second mile.’  By law, a soldier had to right to make any person lug his gear a mile.  Can you imagine setting out on a busy day and getting sidetracked by some Roman thug too lazy to carry his own gear?  Or what if you were working hard in the field trying to grow food for your family and was told abruptly to get walking?  Jewish men found the practice to be humiliating and infuriating.  You can imagine how startled people must have been when Jesus suggested that they voluntarily carry a soldier’s pack a second mile. 

Have you ever seen the 1967 movie Cool Hand Luke?  There is a wonderful scene in the movie where Paul Newman’s character is working with other inmates at menial labor tarring and shoveling gravel along a sunbaked country road.  It is work they did day in and day out under the supervision of gun toting prison guards.  One day, feed up with the indignity of the work and treatment, Newman’s character does something radical… He begins to work with all of his effort and energy.  The entire chain gang responds in kind and before you know it they have exhausted the day’s supply of materials.  They spend the rest of the afternoon sitting in the shade of a tree waiting for the prison bus to arrive at its scheduled time.  Cool Hand Luke could not change his circumstances, but he could change how he approached them.  That is exactly what Jesus is teaching his followers to do.  “You are powerless,” he said, “to resist this law, therefore you must rise above it.” 

Scholars of church history now suggest that some of the earliest converts to take the Gospel message of Jesus to the corners of the Roman world were soldiers.  How many of them do you think might have been converted during a ‘second mile’?  Just imagine how that conversation went:

Soldier: O.K. loser, you can put down my gear now and go home.

Christian: No, I’m still good.  I’m happy to carry it another mile.

Soldier:    What?  Why in the world would you do that?

Christian:  Well, let me tell you about Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified but now lives.

At its heart, Jesus’ teaching about the second mile was a way of preserving one’s dignity and integrity while accepting that some enemies hold certain advantages over us that cannot be altered or challenged.  There will be times that we encounter enemies too powerful for us to confront openly.  When this happens, we can wonder what Jesus might have us do to maintain our own sense of dignity and integrity and how that might, just might, open the door to something transformational.

As I said earlier, Jesus had other enemies that he could (and did) challenge... often.  Certain religious, legal, and political leaders were constantly nipping at his heals and he was more than willing to take them on.  He was unimpressed by the way they took God’s laws and codified them into certain types of external behavior.  To their way of thinking, it was permissible, for instance, to seethe in the presence of one’s enemies as long as you didn’t act upon it.  For Jesus, this was not at all what God intended.  The Law must reign in our hearts even as it rules our actions.  Anything less than this means while we may act peaceably enough, we are still being torn apart on the inside.  For Jesus, that was no good.

In today’s Old Testament reading we heard Moses receive from God a series of moral imperatives.  It is a wide ranging laundry list: don’t glean all the food from your field so that the needy have something to eat; don’t lie or defraud anyone; and my two favorites: don’t scream insults at someone who is deaf and don’t put an object in front of a blind person causing him to trip.  With each instruction comes God’s command: “You must be holy for I am holy.”  So in addition to being just plain wrong, when we act in a way discordant with God’s personality we lose something important about ourselves.  God’s image embedded in us at creation becomes tarnished, or muted, or perhaps diminished.  It is the equivalent to what happens to a world-class athlete who gives up training.  Each day spent sitting on the couch and each bag of potato chips takes him farther and farther away from his true self. 

The last imperative God gives to Moses is a direction not to hate in your heart any one of your own kin (and for some of us that is enough of a challenge, isn’t it).  From there God speaks about neighbors, saying we must love those close to us as we love ourselves.  Jesus expands this idea of neighbor to include all people, even, and especially, our enemies.  He saw in hatred the cumulative spiritual effect of sitting on the couch and eating potato chips day after day.  That which is in us which is of God begins to disappear; being eclipsed by the hatred. 

That Jesus had enemies – people who challenged him in public, mocked him in private, schemed his downfall, and eventually out-and-out sought to have him killed – suggests that what was godly in him was always under threat of being overshadowed by hatred.  Again, I wish we knew the words he prayed that led him to love those who sought his ruin. 

The Book of Common Prayer contains a collect for our enemies.  It reads:

O God, the Father of all, whose son commanded us to love our enemies: Lead them and us from hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in your good time enable us all to stand reconciled before you, through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

I find helpful its sense of mutuality and hope for eventual reconciliation.  I know clergy who offered this prayer on the Sunday after the 9/11 attacks on our country and (as they say) actual results varied.  Some found it calming and restorative.  Others were outraged. 

Perhaps one day we will find our self in Mildred Phlymaldihide’s position and we will have outlived all of our enemies.  Short of that, we have a real challenge on our hands.  The writer Anne Lamont said that hating our enemies is akin to drinking rat-poison and expecting all the rodents to disappear.  It just doesn’t work that way.  What we lose is our self and the wonderful way God’s Spirit is intended to shine through our cracks.