Sunday, January 2, 2022

The Second Sunday after Christmas Day

The Rev. Clint Brown

Theme: Natural theology and revelation

There comes a point in every faith journey when you suddenly realize that Jesus – the guy up in heaven, the guy you worship, the guy who came and suffered and died to complete an awesome cosmic purpose in the mind of God – well, that august figure had to have, at some point, been a boy: a boy who scraped his shins, played hide-and-seek with his friends, licked the brownie bowl when his mother wasn’t looking, and, sometimes, got a runny nose and had to stay in bed. The gospel accounts do us no favors, of course. Their job is to make Jesus the Christ. Once he’s born the next thing we get is Jesus the man, wading into the Jordan River to be baptized by John. He is already in his early thirties. Baby. Man, albeit a God-Man. That’s pretty much how we conceptualize Jesus for ourselves. Until that day when you say to yourself, “I believe in a person,” and now you emerge into that open space where theologians roam, because now you are invited to speculate about that most wondrous and fascinating question: how can Christ be both divine and human at the same time? Don’t worry. At this point we can leave things to the theologians – the how and the what – because the important thing is that we have asked the question at all, and so this little story from Luke’s Gospel of the boy Jesus becomes tantalizing as a glimpse into what the childhood of a God-Man looks like. What does it tell us?

The first thing to notice is that Jesus’s family is very pious. They are obedient to what the law requires as a matter of course and have just visited the Temple in Jerusalem to make the proper observances for the Passover. Jesus, we are told, is twelve years old. That is an important detail. According to the Mishnah, the age of twelve years old is one year before a boy becomes responsible for his own religious commitments, so all that we’re about to see is meant to be seen in that context, that Jesus is ahead of the curve: precocious and eager and intensely interested, well beyond his years, in the things of God, so much so that when the caravan departs for the return journey to Nazareth, Jesus stays behind in the temple. It is so relatable. We all know the experience of being so absorbed in an activity that we lose all track of time. But here there is something more. It is not just a few hours. It is several days. At some point, Jesus would have had to impose on somebody to give him a place to sleep and a meal, would he not? Jesus had time enough to realize that he was left behind, and yet he chooses to remain. When his anxious parents burst in, their question is why did he think that was okay? But notice Jesus’s question. Why did they not know to come to the Temple first? I must be “in the [things] of my Father” (Luke 3:49), he says, and it is crystal clear that the father referred to is not Joseph panting breathlessly next to Mary.

There are many things we can make out of this story, but what I would like to comment on briefly this morning is this image of Jesus in love with learning. “I must be about my Father’s business” is Jesus’s way of saying that the things of God are the primary and essential thing. We may have many choices about what to do with our lives, we have many ways to occupy ourselves, but God is to be our chief preoccupation, and, my friends, God is in everything. Every interaction we have with another, every time we stop to daydream about a drop of water, every insight of science and the arts, these are all the “things of God” and worthy of our attention if we will but stop to pay attention.

Now it was not too long ago that there was presumed to be an unbridgeable divide between science and religion, between reason and faith. It was even called a “conflict” because it was assumed you had to choose a side in a fight to the death. But, in fact, that is not the case. There is no conflict, because if the universe is God’s handiwork then it must bear signs of its Creator. Whatever science and reason have to teach us about the universe can only reveal the nature of God. And what has our quest for understanding revealed? It has proved that the universe is an orderly system governed by laws, laws that can be discerned and depended on. Our greatest doubts and incomprehension have only served to strengthen the case. Whenever human understanding reaches a limit and finds itself staring at a wall, whenever it seems we have no other recourse but mystery, further investigation always reveals an explanation. Countless times on the far side of a conundrum we have found ourselves landing again on something solid. It is just us who have to catch up with the way things really are. And look at what we’ve accomplished. By splicing together the laws of nature we have found ourselves capable of medical breakthroughs and moonshots, yet the principles of flight and the mechanisms of disease were just as true a thousand years ago as today, it was just the people didn’t know it. The miracles of a thousand years from now are quite possible today except that we don’t know yet how to get at them.[1] There is a lot we know, even more we don’t know, yet what we do know, what we can say, is this: there is purpose in this universe because everything in it is directed to some goal.

Thus far has science and reason gotten us, very far indeed, but, alas, it does not take us all the way. Despite our immense capacity and great successes, there are yet limits to both our science and our reason, for what is the nature of this God who has written his name in the stars? For this, God reached out a helping hand.

Man [writes Saint Thomas Aquinas] is directed to God as an end that surpasses the grasp of his reason…but the end must first be known by men who are to direct their thoughts and actions to the end. Hence it was necessary for the salvation of man that certain truths which exceed human reason should be made known to him by divine revelation. Even as regards those truths about God which human reason can investigate, it was necessary that man be taught by a divine revelation. For the truth about God, such as reason can know it, could only be known by a few, and that after a long time, and with the admixture of many errors; whereas man’s whole salvation, which is in God, depends on the knowledge of this truth. Therefore, in order that the salvation of men might be brought about more fitly and more surely, it was necessary that they be taught divine truths by divine revelation.[2] [end quote]

So it is that God became flesh and dwelt among us. God reached out to us because it was too important to leave everything up to us. Life’s great purpose is to know God, and so God came to show us God’s very face.

[1] Frank E. Wilson, Faith and Practice, rev. ed. (New York: Morehouse, 2009), 25.

[2] Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, 1a.1.1, quoted from Introduction to Saint Thomas Aquinas, edited by Anton Pegis (New York: Random House, Inc., 1948), 4.

Saturday, December 25, 2021

Christmas Day

Text: Luke 2:1-20

Theme: Christ’s birth is a confrontation

The Rev. Clint Brown

“Upon you…while still living among us, we already bestow divine honors…and confess that nobody like you will arise hereafter or has arisen before now.”[1] Words of exalted praise and adoration, a fitting tribute to offer to a king, and especially appropriate on this day when we celebrate the birth of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords…except that they were not spoken about Jesus. These are the words of the poet Horace, penned to recognize not the Word made flesh, but to bestow divine honors on the Roman Emperor Augustus, during whose reign Jesus was born: Caesar Augustus who, as this quote makes clear, was already considered divine while still alive. In telling the story of the birth of Christ, it is easy to overlook the fact that before it mentions angels, or mangers, or shepherds, Luke’s account mentions Augustus and Quirinius. The context for the birth of Christ is Empire, and the Roman Empire’s omnipresence stands in the background of the entire Christmas story. The imperial machine is pulling all the levers. With its long arm it reaches into the lives of the lowliest of its subjects and decrees the movement of whole populations. The registration or census referred to is itself a mechanism for exerting domination and control. Yes, the context for the birth of Christ is Empire, and it is in the confrontation between the divine Augustus and the divine Jesus that the true message of Christmas is to be found.

To fully appreciate the events of Bethlehem, we have to rewind the clock some thirty years and travel almost a thousand miles west to the town of Actium on the western coast of Greece. Here, in the pivotal year of 31 B.C., the last great naval battle of the ancient world was fought, securing for Octavian, the adopted son of Julius Caesar, victory in the civil war that had bled the Roman Republic for twenty years. On a long September afternoon, Octavian’s galleys defeated the combined forces of Marc Anthony and Cleopatra, giving the couple no other recourse but suicide. With their deaths, all claimants to the imperial throne had been dispatched. At last, there was peace. Around the entire Mediterranean, a collective sigh of relief went up. Octavian had brought order to the chaos, and, as the adopted son of the divine Caesar, he well-deserved the epithet “son of god.” Surely this one was touched by divinity, and, in no time, not just the poets but also the ordinary folk were acclaiming him “savior of the world.” By his victory, it was said, he had brought “peace on earth.” And so, Octavian took for himself a new, more appropriate name to better reflect his elevated status. He would call himself Augustus, the august one, an appellation that, in current usage, carried with it a faintly religious connotation. Augustus was a level up from humanus; literally translated, Augustus means the “One Who Is Divine.”[2] And just in case you thought that this was ancient history with very little bearing on your life now, just think that every time you date a check or fill out a school registration form in the month of August, you are still acknowledging the greatness of Augustus.

With this background firmly in place, we begin to see that there is a whole lot more going on in the Christmas story than our cute nativity scenes may suggest: Son of God. Peace on Earth. Savior of the World. Even the word “good tidings” or “glad tidings” appears, which becomes in our literature the word “gospel.” Long before these became the stock phrases of Christmas pageants and Christmas cards, they were the terms of imperial propaganda, and so Luke is being deliberately provocative in using them. He knows exactly what he is doing. The Christmas story is a scandal. It is the beginning, just the beginning, of what will remain ever after a confrontation between the kingdom of God, on the one hand – in all its apparent weakness, insignificance, vulnerability – and the kingdoms of this world on the other. “The Roman vision incarnated in the divine Augustus was peace through victory. The Christian vision incarnated in the divine Jesus was peace through justice. It is those alternatives that are at stake behind all the titles and countertitles, the claims and counterclaims.”[3]

For Christians, our difficulties with the Roman Empire have long since evaporated. There is no longer a literal empire with which we have to contend, at least for most of us anyway. In one of the supreme ironies of history, the Empire that had apparently neutralized the threat of the Jesus movement by crucifying its founder was itself converted when the Emperor Constantine declared Christianity the state religion less than 300 years later. But make no mistake. We do live with empire. Its spirit is alive and well in all the corrupting influences which underlie so much of how we live and how the world operates, which show up in how poorly we treat one another and how we build towering edifices not to peace and kindness and the just distribution of wealth, but to greed and pride and open rebellion to God. In that sense, empire is always with us, vying for our allegiance, wooing us with its seductive promises. Empire is the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God; the evil powers of this world which corrupt and destroy the creatures of God; the sinful desires that draw us from the love of God.[4] All that we renounce in our baptismal covenant is what the Incarnation confronts, and it demands a decision. It demands a taking of sides. Will you crown the king of empire or will you crown the King of Love?

[1] Quoted in Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan, The First Christmas: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s Birth (New York: HarperCollins, 2007), 63-64.

[2] Borg and Crossan, The First Christmas, 61.

[3] Borg and Crossan, The First Christmas, 166.

[4] BCP, 302.

Friday, December 24, 2021

Christmas Eve

Isaiah 9: 2-7; Psalm 96; Titus 2: 11-14; Luke 2: 1-14

The Rev. James M. L. Grace

In the Name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. AMEN.

I was at a loss for what to say for a Christmas Eve sermon this year. I knew that I wanted to say something about the reading we heard from Titus, but I did not know what. So, I pitched a question to the Vestry at our regular Vestry meeting earlier this week. I said to them, “let us hypothetically say that you are a priest and that you just might be preaching on Christmas Eve on this short reading from Titus. What would you say in your sermon?”

Members of the Vestry had all kinds of responses, and I will share a few of them here – with you. One Vestry member – let us just say it might have been Mary Eyuboglu – said that this reading from Titus describes the grace of salvation’s appearance. She added that Titus reminds us that Jesus’ birth offers salvation to all, and that salvation should inspire us to do the next right thing. That is a good sermon there.

Another member of our Vestry – maybe it was Spencer Vosko – said that Titus encourages us to take the gift of Christmas and to pass it on. Also good. Another member of our Vestry – John Alexander – suggested that Titus is helpful for all of us during a season in which we easily can get caught up on worldly things. John suggested that Titus reminds us of what we should be focusing on.

I was struck by the wisdom of our Vestry members, and for my sermon tonight I am just going to say “ditto” to everything they already said. It has occurred to me more than once that we might have a better sermon tonight if they were standing in this pulpit tonight rather than I. Nevertheless, in addition to what has been said about Titus, I have three truly short points, and then I will wrap up.

1.        Titus is an easily overlooked book in the New Testament. It is a short letter of only three chapters possibly written by the Apostle Paul to some new congregations on the island of Crete. Kind of random for Christmas, don’t you think? I believe the reason we read it on Christmas is because it mentions the appearance or manifestation of Christ – his birth.

2.       Which brings me to my second point – the letters, or Epistles, in the New Testament say little about the birth of Jesus. Titus is an epistle, a letter, and it is perhaps unique in this way – it mentions Christ’s birth. So, Titus is somewhat unique in this regard in its reference to the birth of Jesus.

3.       Which brings me to my last point. In the very last verse, Titus identifies the guiding principle behind Jesus’ birth – that he would redeem us and save us from ourselves. We are carrying a lot on our shoulders right now – sadness, pain, loss, hardship, financial insecurity, anxiety, pandemic fatigue, illness, addiction, etc. But we are not carrying any of it alone, because the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all of us. We are saved.

Now the wonderful thing about choosing to preach on a short passage is that it results in a short sermon, which on a late Christmas Eve, you might consider an early Christmas present. Merry Christmas, everyone. AMEN.

Sunday, December 19, 2021

The Fourth Sunday of Advent

Micah 5: 2-5a; Canticle 15; Hebrews 10: 5-10; Luke 1:39-1:45

The Rev. James M.L. Grace

In the Name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  AMEN

Today we hear Mary’s song – the Magnificat – the words the Gospel tells us Mary sang, upon hearing Gabriel inform her she was to give birth to God’s son.  The word “Magnificat” is simply Latin for the first three words of her song – “My soul magnifies.”  Magnificat.  Our translation reads “my soul proclaims,” but the meaning is the same. 

The Magnificat is Mary’s joy-filled response to God’s invitation.  She is to be a mother, and to welcome her infant son, Jesus, into the world.  To do so, Mary demonstrated great faith and trust in God.  Something I often overlook when I read the Magnificat is that the young woman who joyfully sung them will also be the older woman holding her adult son’s lifeless body in her arms. 

But at this point of the story, Mary does not know what is in store for her son.  She does not know the pain he will feel, the rejection he will encounter, or the joy he will bring into the world.  As beautiful and compelling as the Magnificat is, there is something else – a moment which occurs just before her song, a moment which occurs just a few verses before, in which she speaks the some of the most profound words in all the Bible.  “Let it be done to me according to your word.”  Mary surrenders to God’s will, unlike many others in the Bible who seek to get out of doing what God asks them to do.  Notice what Mary does not say.  She does not say, “let it be done to me according to your word, but don’t let it cost me my health.”  She does not say “let it be done to me according to your word, but don’t make it too hard, or make it cost too much money.”  She does not say “let it be done according to your will, but can I get something out of it too?” 

Mary simply accepts the angel’s words, accepting what God gave her to do. She does not ask for more or less, she just receives what God gives.  She does not ask God to make things other than the way they are. 

This has been a hard year – no question.  We have endured more than we thought we would before this year started.  At least I have.  And if I am going to be very honest with you all, when I have had to endure hard moments and pain, I have not always done so in the spirit of Mary’s words “let it be done to me according to your will.”  Sometimes, quite the opposite. 

Even so, we are called to be the light.  And there are a lot of people who need light right now.  A few days ago I made a donation to the St. Bernard Project, which is a non profit organization that rebuilds homes following a disaster.  They are on the ground responding to the devastation caused by a series of tornadoes across states in which one hundred people are feared dead.  St. Bernard Project has a four star rating on Charity Navigator, which is the highest rating they offer. 

Today we are going to take a collection for this charity, and all cash coin or designated checks put into the alms basin today will go to the St. Bernard Project.  Mary says in her song “the Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.”  We are the hands of the almighty.  Let us do good things.  Let us reach out.  Let us be light.  Let it be according to your word.  AMEN.

Sunday, December 12, 2021

The Third Sunday of Advent

The Rev. Clint Brown

Themes: Sing; “spilling over;” Beethoven Op. 132; God “spilling over” into our world (the Incarnation)

The prophet Zephaniah says, “Sing aloud…shout…Rejoice and exult…” (Zephaniah 3:14). And the First Song of Isaiah says, “Cry aloud…ring out your joy…Sing the praises of the Lord...” Singing, shouting, praising, rejoicing. This is the work we are given to do this day on Gaudete Sunday, the Third Sunday of Advent, “Gaudete” being the Latin imperative meaning “Rejoice!” We are joyful because a child is soon to be born in Bethlehem who is the Savior of the world. We are joyful that all our longings will be fulfilled and that ancient wrongs will be righted and justice will reign on the earth. We are joyful that no matter our circumstances, no matter how bad things look on the outside, on the inside we are confident that our faith in Christ is neither misguided nor misplaced. So whether we feel in the mood for it on this particular day or not, there is reason to be joyful. “Rejoice!” we are told, and it is a command.

Our model for this, of course, is the Apostle Paul who, when writing to the Philippians, wrote: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice” (Philippians 4:4). But as Jeff Bohanski reminded us last Sunday, this letter to the Philippians, so suffused with joy was not written while Paul was lazing about in comfortable retirement on a beach somewhere. Rather, Paul was under house arrest. At the time he wrote it, Paul was well aware that his life’s work, in the many churches he had founded, was being undermined and even undone by rivals, and, after twenty years of hard traveling in service to the Gospel, he was tired and weary. No one could begrudge Paul if, for just a moment, he wanted to complain a little or express some regret. But rather than complain, he tells the Philippians in his introductory remarks that life is about distinguishing the greater from the lesser (1:10), and that he counted his imprisonment as among the lesser things. Five times the word “joy” appears in the letter (1:4, 25; 2:2, 29; 4:1) and the verbs “rejoice” and “be glad” no less than eleven (once in 2:28; 3:1; 4:10; and twice in 1:18; 2:17, 18; 4:4).

What is apparent from even the most cursory reading of Philippians is something that many of us have come to realize in our best moments – something that we need others’ help reminding us when we are not at our best – that circumstances are not the thing upon which our happiness depends. Even when confronted with the worst that life can dish out, we can yet feel a confidence, a sureness, that everything is alright. Paul was fond of calling this life the life “in Christ,” in Christ being his image for suggesting submersion and suffusion with the spirit of Christ. At all points the life that’s possible through the glorified Christ penetrates you, lends it a totally different quality from one lived without him. A truly Christian life is one so full that it spills out of us into all the life around us; into the lives of the people we know; into our awareness and perception of the world itself. And that’s what we mean when we speak of joy. It is not denial. It is not putting on a happy face and pretending everything is okay. It is a life of abundance. Joy is life in excess. It is the overflow of that which cannot be contained within any single person[1] and must reach outside.

No wonder, then, that we must sing. Zephaniah, Isaiah, Paul – each of them knew that we need a more elevated language for joy, and that language is song. “Sing the praises of the Lord, for he has done great things, and this is known in all the world.” “Music…stands quite alone,” wrote Schopenhauer. “It does not express a particular and definite joy…but joy [itself], in the abstract, in [its] essential nature…[enabling] us to grasp and share [it] fully in this quintessence.”[2]

Most people nowadays are unaware that in 1825, two years before he died, the ailing Beethoven suffered a dreadful bowel inflammation that interrupted the composition of his last five string quartets. Throughout the spring and summer, he endured the trauma of not only the condition, but also the appalling medical science of the time, such as it was, that ended up killing more people than all the Napoleonic wars put together. That recovery from the illness was not assured can be surmised by his handling of the third movement of Op. 132, which he took up when he resumed working again. At the top of the score he wrote an inscription, “Heiliger Dankgesang eines Genesenen an die Gottheit, in der lydischen Tonart,” “Song of Thanksgiving, in the Lydian Mode, Offered to the Deity by a Convalescent.” The impulse to sing, you see, was irrepressible.

And so it is for us. We have to sing and rejoice because we have no other option. That is what you do when your heart is so full of thanksgiving, when the news you have to share is so great. It is joy – our joy – spilling out into the world around us, to tell a grieving, hopeless, pandemic-weary world that God is coming to be with us – Immanuel. Joy is spilling over. God is spilling over into our world.

[1] Eugene H. Peterson, introduction to Philippians in The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2018).

[2] Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea, Vol. I, 52.

Sunday, December 5, 2021

The Second Sunday of Advent

Malachi 3:1-14; Canticle 14 (Luke 1:68-79); Philippians 1:3-11; Luke 3: 1-6

The Rev. Jeff Bohanski

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way.  You, my child shall be called the prophet of the Most High.  You, my child shall be called the prophet of the Most High.

In what seems like a lifetime ago, I attended college in Saint Paul, Minnesota.  I went to The University of Saint Thomas, a Roman Catholic university.  While I was there, I was part of Saint John Vianney Minor Seminary.  What’s a minor seminary, you ask?  A minor seminary is like a house of formation for men discerning the call to the priesthood.  During my time there we attended daily Mass, we were encouraged to attend Morning Prayer, we met monthly with a spiritual director.  In those years we formed a rule of life that included regular prayer and study.  Those life skills I learned back then have served me well over the years. 

One summer As part of my formation experience, I found myself serving as the Roman Catholic chaplain for a Boy Scout camp in northern Wisconsin.  This part of the state is a very thick pine forest.  The entire time I was there I would see open sky that was free of trees only once a week.  It was when I would drive the Catholic junior camp counselors into the town of Rhinelander to attend Saturday evening Mass, do laundry, and to have dinner.  It was a world almost the exact opposite of the city of Saint Paul. 

In the Roman Catholic version of Morning Prayer, one prays The Canticle of Zacharia every morning.  So, for me, this canticle is like an old friend who I’ve known and lived with for a very long time. 

Please bear with me as I pray it one more time.  As I read the canticle, I invite you to close your eyes and pay attention to what words or images strike you.

Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel; *

he has come to his people and set them free.

He has raised up for us a mighty savior, *

born of the house of his servant David.

Through his holy prophets he promised of old,

that he would save us from our enemies, *

from the hands of all who hate us.

He promised to show mercy to our fathers *

and to remember his holy covenant.

This was the oath he swore to our father Abraham, *

to set us free from the hands of our enemies,

Free to worship him without fear, *

holy and righteous in his sight

all the days of our life.

You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, *

for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way,

To give his people knowledge of salvation *

by the forgiveness of their sins.

In the tender compassion of our God *

the dawn from on high shall break upon us,

To shine on those who dwell in darkness and the

                 shadow of death, *

and to guide our feet into the way of peace.

The sentence, You, my child shall be called the prophet of the Most High., always strikes me.  Now, tradition holds that when Zacharia was saying these words he was proudly gazing at his newly named son, John, and praising God and prophesizing with the words.   But for me, these words strike me as a commission, a call to action for me and to all those who call themselves Christian.  I believe we, all God’s children, are loved by a very proud father/mother God. I believe we are called to be God’s prophets, to bare witnesses to that love. I believe prophets bring hope to the world. 

Malachi preached to the people of Israel around the time of Ezra-Nehemiah.  As Ezra and Nehemiah were rebuilding the temple at the time of the exiles return from Babylon, Malachi prophesized to to bring about reform of the priests that would serve in this temple.  He spoke of God scrubbing away of impurities of the priesthood as a loving parent would scrub out a road rash injury their beloved child received from a fall off their bike.  A painful but necessary cleaning that brings about healthy life.  I suspect all of us here today have at one time experienced this healing power of God.  I believe we are called bear witness to this kind of restorative love.

If one looks for N.T. Wright’s commentaries on Paul’s letter to the Philippians, one finds it in the section entitled, Paul, the Prison Letters.  Scholars believe Philippians, along with Ephesians, Colossians, and Philemon were most likely authentic Pauline letters because he wrote them while he was imprisoned in Rome awaiting his execution.  In these letters, Paul near the end of his life, bears witness to God’s lifegiving, forgiving love.

In the days when Paul was in prison, the government provided no food for the prisoners.  The family of the imprisoned provided food for the prisoner.  If there was no family, the prisoner starved.  Since Paul was unable to continue his tentmaking business from prison he would starve.  The Philippians had sent him money to be able to feed himself.  Paul wrote this letter to the Philippians to thank them for sending money him food money. I believe the Philippians prophesized; they bore witness to Jesus when they sent money to feed poor unemployed imprisoned Paul.  For in the kingdom of God the poor are fed and the imprisoned are visited.

I submit that Luke, the great storyteller, prophesized about the kingdom of God Jesus was about bring in.  One commentator I read this week suggested Luke listed these important names of people of the day to show that Jesus, the Messiah, was about to turn everything people expected Messiah to be on its head.  Instead of the Good News coming from the important people of the day, the message first came from someone the world would describe as a lowly unimportant person.  In this story, Luke prophesized what the Kingdom of God would look like. 

So, how do we who are living in the time of Covid, in the time of great social, political, and economic uncertainty prophesy about God’s love for the world?  We get vaccinated.  We build a garden, raise food, and donate it to a food pantry.  We donate to the MAM toy drive.    We take part in the Christmas Market.  We greet people we do not know at the grocery store; we make a point to greet a person who doesn’t look like ourselves.  In a group of people, we look for those who are alone and engage that person.

My friends, I suspect we have at one time, or another felt the mercy, the forgiveness, and the love of God in Jesus.  I invite us all to look at all others as people loved by God as he has loved us and go prophesy about it.

November 24, 2021

Thanksgiving Eve

The Rev. Clint Brown

Thanksgiving Day has its origin in the year 1621 in a harvest feast shared by the newly arrived English colonists of Plymouth and a local native tribe called the Wampanoag. It seems to have all started when a few of the Englishmen went out to do some “fowling,” that is, bird hunting, possibly for turkeys but more probably for geese and ducks, which were much easier prey. As the colonists began to roast what they had bagged, 90 or so Wampanoag emerged from the woods. I’m sure the only 50 or so colonists were not a little unnerved by this sudden appearance of so many strangers at their gate, but over the next few days the two groups socialized without incident. For their part, the Wampanoag contributed venison and fish, vegetables and beer. In between meals, it is recorded, the men competed at target practice, foot races, and drinking contests. Everyone struggled, of course, to communicate in broken English and Wampanoag, but all in all, one could say, that despite being thoroughly disorderly it was a good-natured affair, and it helped to cement friendly relations between the two groups for over fifty years. 

The New England colonists had a tradition of regularly setting aside days of prayer like this to thank God for God’s many blessings. When the Constitution was ratified, the Continental Congress proclaimed for the former colonies, now federated states, a day of thanksgiving. But Thanksgiving did not become an annual holiday with a fixed day until Sarah Josepha Hale, the editor of a popular women’s magazine, campaigned for one to promote unity during the Civil War. And so, on October 3, 1863, just three months after the greatest bloodletting this continent has ever seen at Gettysburg, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of thanksgiving to be celebrated on the last Thursday in November.

Over the years, as the country became more urban and families began to live farther apart, Thanksgiving became an important time for regathering. Thanksgiving Day football games became a tradition, beginning with Yale versus Princeton in 1876. Towards the end of the century, parades of costumed revelers became common, and so it was only to be expected that, in 1920, the Gimbel’s department store in Philadelphia should stage a parade of about 50 people, with Santa Claus at the rear of the procession, to tap into the holiday spirit and give the happy crowd a good reason to come downtown and spend their money. In New York City, Macy’s followed suit not long after in 1924.[1] And we all know what Thanksgiving looks and feels like today. How remarkable, then, that standing behind all this is the story of some colonists and natives who overcame their suspicions to celebrate the earth’s bounty and give thanks in one another’s company.

For we Episcopalians, however, none of this should seem new to us. Over the years we have grown more and more comfortable letting strangers in at the gate and being pleasantly surprised at the result. But most importantly, gathering to give thanks is, for us, the very definition of church, because the word for thanksgiving in Greek is eucharistía. Every Eucharist at which we gather is an act of thanksgiving. When we come together to hear scripture, to pray, to praise, and then partake of holy communion, we are simply performing the needful task of remembering and then responding to all that has been done for us. Thanksgiving is the context in which Christians gather to share the Body and Blood of Christ. And so, as you leave here tonight, know that the excuse for gathering may have been because Thanksgiving Day is tomorrow, but remember that we are actually no strangers to the work of thanksgiving.

[1] The history of Thanksgiving Day summarized here is drawn from Encyclopedia Britannica, s.v. “Thanksgiving Day,” accessed November 23, 2021, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Thanksgiving-Day.

November 28, 2021

1 Advent 

Jeremiah 33: 14-16; Psalm 25: 1-9; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21: 25-36

The Rev. James M.L. Grace

In the Name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  AMEN. 

In the psalm appointed for today which is psalm 25, we hear some incredible verses, the first of which I want to read again here – you can follow along in your order of service if you would like – I am going to read the first three verses: “To you, O Lord, I lift up my soul.  O my God, in you I trust; do not let me be put to shame; do not let my enemies exult over me.  Do not let those who wait for you be put to shame; let them be ashamed who are wantonly treacherous.”

This is very clearly the prayer of a person in great distress, a person perhaps dealing with insurmountable fear or uncertainty, something none of us can relate to at all, right?  If only.  There is an interesting line in those verses, the line where the author of the psalm says “do not let those who wait for you be put to shame.”  That is another way of saying “God, please don’t frustrate the people who are praying to you by not answering their prayers.”  If you have ever received no answer from God to your prayers, you understand how frustrating that experience can be.

Every week I have a conversation with a person who expresses to me their frustration at their seemingly unanswered prayers.  I field questions all the time like “Why is God silent?  Why are the prayers I have offered for months seeming to fall upon deaf ears?  Does God even care?” 

Of course I don’t have adequate answers to any of those questions.  All I can offer is my own experience, bereft as it often is. 

And my experience of seemingly unanswered prayers to a non-responsive God is more robust than I would wish.  I used to get real frustrated, like the author of the psalm.  “Answer my prayer, God – do not put me to shame!”  And then, something changed inside me, and I awakened.  I had a spiritual awakening, a spiritual experience, where I started to get some clarity, and that clarity led me to see that actually God was hearing and answering my prayers, all along. 

What led me to this discovery was not God behaving any differently, but rather a change inside me that allowed me to become more aware.  I learned that unanswered prayers are impossibilities, as all prayers are answered.  It’s just that the prayers I thought were going unanswered instead just weren’t being answered the way I wished they would be. 

It is probably a sign of spiritual maturity to maintain trust in God when things don’t go your way, and when your prayers are not answered the way you would like them to be.  This experience, though often frustrating, and even humiliating, is actually good for our well-being.  Priest and author Richard Rohr writes that he expects to have one humiliation daily.  A daily humiliation doesn’t sound very fun does it?  But what wondrous things that daily dose of humility does for our relationship with God.

Over time, one of the gifts humility gives us is that it expands our consciousness, and we begin to see more and more.  Enough humility expands our vision to recognize paradox and we see things we didn’t see before, and things we have always seen begin to look different to us.   Prayers that we thought unanswered for years take on a new appearance, and beauty, with our new vision, we see those beautiful unanswered prayers as they really are: radiant, gleaming, and answered.  AMEN.

November 14, 2021 - 7:30am & 9am

Proper 28

1 Samuel 1:4-20; 1 Samuel 2:1-10; Hebrews 10:11-14 (15-18) 19-25; Mark 13:1-8

The Rev. Jeff Bohanski

In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

Most Sundays after the 7:30 Service someone in the group asks me to tell them a story from my first-grade class.  This person’s spouse has lovingly dubbed this story time as “a Tale from the Crypt.”  My friends, consider this my “tale from the crypt” for this morning. 

A few weeks ago, we celebrated Halloween.  At our school we observed the day by having a “Character Day.” The children were invited to come dressed as their favorite book character.  They were also asked to bring the book their character was in.  We had lots of Spidermen and Transformers and one Hulk.  We found ourselves in the company of a few Elsa’s from Frozen, a few princesses and one very creative unicorn.

If I had thought through the idea more thoroughly, I would have come dressed as a Who and brought my copy of Dr. Seuss’ book, How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  If you don’t remember who a Who is, a Who lived in Who-ville, and they liked Christmas a lot.  The Grinch who lived just north of Who-ville did not.  He hated the Whos and the whole Christmas season.  He especially hated the thought of them hanging their mistletoe wreaths and their stockings.  But most of all he hated their noise, their feasting and especially their singing! It was then he hatched a fiendish plot to stop Christmas from coming. The Whos inspire me.  They inspire me because they knew who and what they were doing.  The Whos had faith that no Grinch could stop.  The Whos knew what Christmas was about. They knew they were a people who when united would bring light and love to their world.  I should’ve been a Who.

As you probably know, I love a good story of many different genres.  How the Grinch Stole Christmas is a great story.  So, it’s no wonder I’ve been enjoying the readings we’ve been hearing these last several weeks.  For the last few weeks, we’ve been hearing the colorful intriguing story of Ruth who at the beginning of her story had nothing.  By the end of the story, she was the great-grandmother of King David.  Ruth, who was in the midst of chaos, in the midst of turmoil believed God loved her and God was and would be with her.  Ruth was a woman of faith.

In the first reading we heard this morning; we heard the story of Hannah faithfully ask God for a son and promised to one day return him back to God in thanksgiving.  Hannah prayed so diligently for her son; her lips moved.  She was accused of being drunk.  In our response to this reading, we prayed Hannah’s powerful prayer of rejoicing for her son.  It was this prayer that many scholars believe was used to format the Magnificat sung by Mary in Luke’s Gospel.  It was this son of Hannah’s son who one day would be the one to find and anoint Ruth’s great-grandson as King of Israel from whose line Jesus, Emanuel – God is with us – would one day be born into.  Hannah, who in the midst of chaos, in the midst of turmoil believed God loved her and God was and would be with her.  Hannah was a woman of faith. 

Then we come to today’s Gospel story.  Jesus comes out of the temple and his disciples are marveling at the stones of the temple.  They don’t get it.  Now, I think it is important at this point in my message to recall, that Mark’s Gospel was probably written just before or very close to the time the Temple was destroyed by the Romans.  Mark’s community was living in the midst of turmoil and chaos.  I believe Mark has a message here for his community.  I believe his is the message of Ruth and Hannah.  Have faith.  Turmoil and chaos are coming, it may be here.  But have faith in God.  Have faith Jesus, Emanuel – God is with us.   I think the message of Mark is the same for us today.  Believe. God is with you.  God is with us. Find your strength in and God’s love for you.  Believe, have faith like Ruth and Hannah had faith.

In a few minutes Tony will speak about Stewardship.  I invite us all to listen.  Have faith of Ruth and Hannah.  I have found Saint Andrews to be a place where I find God’s love.  I have found it a place where I am free to grow into the person God created me to be.  I ask you to have faith, believe, do what you feel called by God to do.  I invite you to be a person of faith like Ruth and Hannah.

Later this morning, during the 11:15 Service people of faith will stand up in front of Bishop Fisher to profess their faith, to renew their faith.  I invite you as a member of Saint Andrew’s Community to come back at 11:15, represent this congregation to bear witness to their faith, to your faith, to our faith and to show support for these new members of God’s community.

Like Ruth and Hannah, I invite us all be people of faith in Jesus, Emanuel – God is with us.  Believe in the midst of turmoil.

November 7, 2021

All Saints’ Day

The Rev. Clint Brown

Early in the second century, the Roman governor of the province of Bithynia in Asia Minor, a man by the name of Gaius Plinius Secundus, also known to history as Pliny the Younger, wrote to the Emperor Trajan about his problems. He had the usual troubles of a governor: workers’ strikes, municipal scandals, political disaffection, but also religious unrest. Many of the temples, he reported, were becoming more and more deserted, many services had been discontinued, and the trade in the buying and selling of animals for sacrifice for the health and well-being of the god-emperor had dropped off considerably. It was all the fault of some troublemakers that his informants had identified called Christians. They were a secret society that could be up to no good and who were almost certainly disloyal to the emperor. So a number of these Christians were rounded up and brought before Pliny for a trial. It turned out that upon examination there was insufficient evidence pinning them to any criminal activities. They were religious zealots and cranks, perhaps, certainly obstinate and inflexible, but, on the whole, more of a nuisance than a threat.

In the course of his examination, Pliny found out something about the practices of these Christians, what they did when they came together. They were accustomed, he learned, to meet on a fixed day of the week very early in the morning to sing hymns responsively to Christ “as to a god,” and to bind themselves by a solemn oath, not to some nefarious crime or seditious plot, but simply an oath to keep the moral law. Later they took a harmless meal together and then went home. All this was naturally confusing to Pliny, what Christians actually did when they met on Sunday, but all of us have no difficulty in recognizing some of the elements of what is now called a Communion service, and, as I speak, there are millions of Christians just like us engaged in just such a service of worship right now.[1] And so it has been for all the centuries, Sunday after Sunday, without fail, in great cathedrals, in country churches, or wherever two or three could gather. We have never stopped coming together to remember.

History is an important value to Christianity. Our faith does not rest on a set of philosophical principles but on a relationship with a person – a historical person – what he did, who he was. We, therefore, are trying to continuously make present what is past, continuously holding up in front of us the reality of the Incarnation. God became flesh and dwelt among us, in time, as a part of history. Our insistence that we read from the Bible connects us to the past. The fact that our bishops are ordained in the apostolic succession connects us to the past. Our recital of creeds and ancient songs connects us to the past. The forms of our prayers and even some of the very words that we speak in our liturgy are often traceable to the very earliest documents that record such things. Yes, we Christians are very interested in maintaining continuity with our past, and so it makes sense that we would devote a Sunday each year to all the saints, remembering the heroes of the faith.

In the Book of Hebrews there is a remarkable passage in which the unknown Jewish-Christian author is writing a word of encouragement to an unknown group of Christians. After citing numerous notable examples of faithful men and women in the Old Testament, the writer reflects, “All these won a glowing testimony to their faith, but they did not then and there receive the fulfilment of the promise. God had something better planned for our day, and it was not his plan that they should reach perfection without us” (Hebrews 11:39-40, J. B. Phillips translation). What that means is that the faithfulness of those faithful men and women of old is only completed by our willingness to pick it up and carry it forward. If we do not do our part, their efforts will have been in vain. That is why we cannot forget the past or the heroes of the faith. We depend on them; they also depend on us. So as you kneel at the altar rail today and carry forward for one more week that sacred act of memory that we Christians have been doing since the beginning, take notice of the saint to your right and to your left, but also see the rail extending into eternity on either side with all the saints bowing with you in one great act of communion and know that the past has been made present once again.

[1] All of the above is a paraphrase of C. H. Dodd, The Founder of Christianity (London: Collins, 1971), 3-4.

October 31, 2021

Proper 26

The Rev. Clint Brown

Assist us, O Christ, to know you; and in knowing you to love you; and in loving you to grow increasingly into your likeness. Amen.

Theme: Law and stewardship

Rules. We don’t much like rules in our culture. We like rebels. Our favorite stories are not of men and women who accept what is, but those who dare to color outside the lines. We are a nation founded on rebellion. The men and women who first arrived on our shores were either restless adventurers seeking fame and fortune, or religious dissidents who were seeking a new land in which to practice their faith far from the prying eyes of the authorities. We fought a revolution in order to assert the basic human right to self-govern. Throughout our history, whenever there was trouble, we could always move further West. The grit and independence and audacity of the pioneer is in our DNA. And so it is that we prefer the underdog story, the little guy taking on the big guy, David versus Goliath. If David or Rosa Parks or Robin Hood had listened to the prevailing wisdom, if they had conformed to the rules, in other words, we would never have heard their name. It’s the bad boys and girls who write themselves into history much more often than the teacher’s pet.

So let’s start by granting that rebellion does have its place. And some of the most important work we can do is to question the reasonableness and justice of laws and constraints and to push against them. This is the American genius. But before assuming that freedom requires the casting off of every restraint, let us look to Scripture for a counterpoise. For we read in Scripture that God is actually very interested in Law. God establishes a relationship with Abraham, at the very beginning of our history, based on a contract or covenant. Abraham is expected to do certain things and so is God. Fast forward to the Exodus, and Yahweh again meets his people, making fully explicit that to be his people they must follow a code of conduct, the Ten Commandments, that will define who they are and what they are to do. This presents us with the other side of the law coin. Laws are not always arbitrary, meaningless, or burdensome restraints. The psalmist says that it is in God’s law where true freedom is to be found, and this is because God’s commandments are always purposeful, protecting us, defining for us what fullness of life looks like. Like any set of rules, they are a code for what we value.

And so we come to the great teaching from our Gospel lesson today. A man asks Jesus what are the rules to build a life on – what is essential – what is nonnegotiable. “‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength’…and, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself’” (Mark 12:29-31). Neither commandment was an innovation of Jesus. They are both found in the Torah, in the Book of Deuteronomy and the Book of Leviticus, respectively.[1] The demand these commandments place on us is to give our whole selves. We are to offer our whole selves to God – mind, heart, soul, and strength – and our whole selves to one another. These rules are sacrificial. They are a self-offering. And therefore, as offerings, they are costly. We are to submit ourselves to them at the cost of accepting limitation and constraint. Like Ruth, we allow duty and obligation to take precedence over whatever benefit we might have expected to gain from complete liberty.

And it is worth mentioning, as we are in the season of stewardship, that stewardship follows this exact same sacrificial logic. To pledge 10% of your income – or whatever you finally discern to give during this year’s campaign – to commit to giving anything is an exercise in bumping up against God. “But God” is the steam that makes the wheel of sacrifice turn. I could keep all my money, but God is owed a part. I could stay home on Sunday morning, but God is owed my time. I could ignore all my responsibilities and think only of myself, but God expects more of me. I could vilify the person who voted differently from me for President in the last election, but God loves them just as much as me and requires me to love them in the same way as I love myself. Right now, as you sit in your seat, there could very well be a part of your life that you are withholding from God – from God’s scrutiny or judgment – but God asks for that, too. All these things represent sacrifice, bumping into the reality that God has a claim on our lives.

“Whosoever will come after me, let [them] deny [themselves], and take up [their] cross, and follow me (Mark 8:34, KJV). That’s the final word for Christians. It’s what we’ve signed up for. At our baptism we committed to the cruciform life – the life shaped not by success, not by possessions, not even by the right, we would say, to define ourselves – but by the cross. We submit to Christ’s Lordship because we recognize that we are no longer our own. We were bought with a price (1 Cor 6:20; 7:23). Of course, we chafe a little from time to time under the burden of Christ’s law, of always having to function within its constraints, of having to love our neighbor, live unselfishly, give and give again. Christ’s law is not easy; its demands are great. But for us there is no choice, for we dare not accept the benefits of our Lord’s Passion without also accepting its cost.  

[1] Deuteronomy 6:4; Leviticus 19:18

October 24, 2021

Proper 25

Mark 10:46-52

The Rev. Francene Young

Before a sermon, I spend hours reading other sermons and looking for ideas.  I usually have some direction, but sometimes it is hard to flush out.  When reading other sermons, the idea or sermon that brings tears to my eyes, is the one I focus on.  Based on a sermon by the Rev. Brett Blair, I offer the following reflection:

Blair starts out talking about Helen Keller.

“Helen Keller, so brave and inspiring to us in her deafness and blindness, once wrote a magazine article entitled: Three days to see."

In that article she outlined what things she would like to see if she were granted just three days of sight. It was a powerful, thought provoking article. On the first day she said she wanted to see friends.

Day two she would spend seeing nature.

The third day she would spend in her home city of New York watching the busy city and the work day of the present.

She concluded it with these words: "I who am blind can give one hint to those who see: Use your eyes as if tomorrow you were stricken blind.'

As bad as blindness is in the 21st century, it was so much worse in Jesus' day. Today a blind person at least has the hope of living a useful life with proper training. Some of the most skilled and creative people in our society are blind. But in first century Palestine blindness meant that you would be subject to abject poverty. You would be reduced to begging for a living. You lived at the mercy and the generosity of others. You were an outcast and considered blind due to some sin or punishment of your parents or you. 

Little wonder then that one of the signs of the coming of the Messiah was that the blind should receive their sight.

When Jesus announced his messiahship, he said: “The spirit of the Lord is upon me. He has sent me to recover sight to the blind."

The story this morning of the healing of blind Bartimaeus would suggest to us that there are three kinds of blindness. Let’s briefly examine each one.

The first kind of blindness is represented by the beggar sitting by the road leading to Jericho. Mark tells us that his name was Bartimaeus.  His name means son of Timaeus.  Makes me wonder if Timaeus was known in the community and because his son his blind, son of Timaeus is considered an outcast and sits by the side of the road, begging.  Just a thought?  But we really know nothing much about him:  his age, length of blindness or what caused his infirmity. Nothing is said of his family, or friends if he had any.  We know him only as blind Bartimaeus.

I cannot begin to imagine physical blindness. I remember taking a tour of the Buffalo Bayou Cistern on Sabine Street not too far from here.  It was a special exhibit.  Before going in (pre-covid) they warned you of the initial total darkness.  But I had no concept of total darkness.  Once inside, and the lights went out, I remember looking around in all directions but my eyes were totally useless.  I could not see my hand when I held it up to my face. I actually felt a little nauseous, at first.

Those brief moments of total darkness in the Cistern were the closest I ever came to complete blindness.  Not seeing anything!

When Jesus came down the roadside, surrounded by his disciples, “body guards” as Jimmy referred to them during our Bible Study, Bartimaeus sought his help.

Yet, that day, even in his blindness, he saw more clearly than did the crowd. Bartimaeus saw more clearly than Jesus’ own disciples. He knew who Jesus was by calling him “Son of David”.  He knew that Jesus could release him from the prison darkness. He knew that faith in Jesus could restore his sight. He was blind but he saw more than those with physical sight.

Day after day the world passed by Bartimaeus not really seeing him, not really caring about him. He heard the sound of camels, the shouts of children, the gossip of the women, the business talk of the men but he saw not a thing.. So he simply sat there. Day after day. Until one day he cried out: Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me.

While reading about Bartimaeus and his calling out to Jesus, I kept humming to myself  “Pass me not O Gentle Savior.”  I was pleased to find that Blair referenced this in his sermon.  Who wrote it?  I researched and found that Fanny Crosby, blind white woman poet and writer who worked in missions in NYC, while physically blind Fanny wrote the words: “Pass me not O Gentle Savior, hear my humble cry. While on others thou art calling, do not pass me by. Savior, Savior, hear my humble cry.  While on other thou art calling, do not pass me by””

Jesus, hearing the cry of Bartimaeus, STOOD STILL.  Called out to the crowd that earlier tried to silence him and said “Call him to me.”  Jesus asked him “Want do you want me to do for you?”  The same question he asked The Sons of Thunder last week who sought power. 

Bartimaeus asked only to” let me see AGAIN.“ Jesus said: “Your faith has made you well.”

The first blindness then is represented by Bartimaeus. It was a physical blindness.

The second kind of blindness in the story relates to those who followed Jesus; his own disciples. When Jesus began his way into Jerusalem, he told the twelve of the dreadful things that would soon befall all of them. It was not the only time he spoke of the coming agony. Three times, Luke records, that Jesus tried to warn them. On the first occasion Luke writes: But they understood none of these things. On the second occasion he writes: But these sayings were hid from them. On the third occasion Luke records: But they did not grasp what he had said.

Thus the disciples suffered from a kind of blindness as to the nature and person of Jesus. They loved him passionately, but they did not understand him. They were spiritually blind. They had sight, yet they were unable to FULLY see. They were blind as to the meaning of the events that were happening around them.

The first blindness was that of Bartimaeus. Physically he could not see.  The second blindness was that of the disciples before the resurrection. Their eyesight was alright, but they could not see the true nature of Christ.

And there is a third kind of blindness is ours.  It is the blindness of you and me. Bartimaeus lacked eyes. The disciples lacked knowledge. But we have both and we still are sometimes unable to see. This third type of blindness, Blair calls the  blindness of taking for granted blindness.

If we are not careful, we can to take life and all we have for granted.  If we are not careful, we can become blind to the preciousness of life, we can become blind to the preciousness of our loved ones until it is threatened or curbed for us. If we are not careful, we can lose sight of Jesus in our lives.

Whether publicly known or not, we all have a cloak, like Bartimaeus that needs to be shed so we can get up, callout to Jesus, Son of David, do not pass me by!  And When Jesus asks, What do you want me to do for you, we need to be ready to reveal the answer that he already knows. 

As imperfect humans what do we need to own and hand over or shed (like Bartimaeus’s cloak).  Is it a strained relationship, guilt, shame, envy, greed, anger, unresolved emotional wound?  You name it.  Are we too proud, too independent ( I can do this myself)!

Whatever it is we can cry out like Bartmaeus  “SON of DAVID have mercy on me and we can pray like Fanny Crosby “pass me not O Gentle Savior.”  

We can ask Jesus to not pass us by, but hear our cry, however loud or faint.

SO for those of us who are blind and acknowledge our blindness, there is hope.

For Jesus came to heal the blind. It happened to Bartimaeus. It happened the disciples. It can happen to us.

How do we go about it? All that is necessary is that we cry out as did the blind beggar centuries ago: Pass me not O Son of David, hear my humble cry.  While on others you are calling, do not pass me by so that from you, Lord, I may receive my sight, again.

Amen.

October 17, 2021

Pentecost – Proper 24

Job 38: 1-7, 34-41; Psalm 104: 1-9, 25, 37b; Hebrews 5:1-10; Mark 10:35-45

The Rev. James M.L. Grace

In the Name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  AMEN

Many years ago, I went to Las Vegas - that bustling city of virtue and proper moral behavior – entered a casino and sat down at a blackjack table.  I pushed a $25 chip onto the table as my bet before the cards were dealt, and, I am embarrassed to say, I said a prayer: “God, if I just win this hand, I will give all the money to charity.”  The cards were dealt, and I lost my $25.  Did God answer my prayer?  You bet.  The answer was – don’t ask me to bend the rules for you.  Life is not, and never will be fair. 

Earlier this week I had a conversation with a parishioner here who recently retired and is now in the hospital.  This person told me, through tears, about their frustration with the fact that they had worked decades, done everything right, and now upon retirement, are finding themselves in a hospital dealing with an array of medical issues.  Who would want such an outcome?  Who among us would say “I can’t wait to work my whole life towards retirement so I can spend it in a hospital room?”  No one.  This person said, “why me?”  The answer to that question, this person already knew, was “why not me?”  Why should the rest of the world suffer, but I get a free pass?

            The reality that life is not fair, and that unexplainable suffering exists in the world are two primary themes from our reading in Job this morning.  For those who are not familiar with the story of Job – I will offer a summary.  Job is a virtuous man, a wealthy landowner, and the patriarch of a large family.  In a moment, Job loses everything he has: his health, his possessions, his family – everything is lost.  Job is at a loss as to why this happened to him, unaware that behind-the-scenes God has allowed Satan to cause all this hardship on Job, as a means of testing his faith. 

Job, still at a loss to explain or understand the meaning behind all this hardship, demands an explanation from God.  God does not explain the meaning of Job’s suffering, but instead challenges Job with a series of questions that lead Job to see a larger picture than his own suffering.  The purpose of God’s questions to Job that we read today, are to draw Job outside of his own suffering.  Job learns a tough lesson here – Job learns that even though life is not fair, and suffering not always explainable, God is still good, and God is still trustworthy. 

This is not an easy lesson to learn – to love and trust God even while your life is falling apart – but it is a lesson that once learned, changes our lives.  Once we learn to trust God through unfairness and sickness and sadness, we are no longer spiritual infants – we have matured into spiritual adults. 

In my conversation with that same parishioner earlier this week, this person said, “I think I know what God is telling me – suck it up.”  The parishioner laughed when they said it.  Perhaps that is what God is saying to Job – but I think there is more.  It’s not just “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” but it is more like God saying – look beyond yourself and your own suffering, see beyond it – and your suffering will lessen.

If preaching a sermon on suffering and unfairness isn’t your cup of tea, probably my conclusion this morning won’t be, either.  I close with a word on our stewardship campaign, which beings next Sunday.  I have good news.  Before this year’s campaign even formally kicks off, fourteen people have already pledged online.  Among those who have pledged include: seven vestry members, three staff members, and four other parishioners who wanted to get a head start.  The total of their fourteen pledges is over $100,000 towards next year’s budget.  This is good news.   If you want to get your pledge in early, visit the giving tab on our website and you can pledge safely online. 

And that’s all: stewardship, suffering, and Job – everybody’s favorite sermon topics!  AMEN.

October 10, 2021

Proper 23

The Rev. Clint Brown

Assist us, O Christ, to know you; and in knowing you to love you; and in loving you to grow increasingly into your likeness. Amen.

Theme: “Take all that you have and be poor.”[1]

There is a Jewish folk tale about a rabbi who thought to test the honesty of his disciples, so one day he called them together and posed the question: “What would you do if you were walking along and found a bag of money lying in the road?” The first disciple answered, “I’d return it to its owner,” to which the rabbi thought, “This one answers too quickly; I must wonder if he really means it.” The second disciple said, “I’d keep the money if nobody saw me find it.” And the rabbi thought, “This one has a frank tongue, but a wicked heart.” Finally, the third disciple said, “To be honest, I believe I’d be tempted to keep it. So I would pray to God to help me resist the temptation and do the right thing.” “Aha!” thought the rabbi. “Here is the man I would trust.”

Like this story, there is a distinct note of truth-telling in our readings today. Job, the Psalm, are hardly giving us a view of things through rose-colored glasses. We are confronted with the many-sidedness of life, especially its unpleasant, more bitter aspects. To live bravely, we need this, to do the work of getting square about the way things really are. So it is that we hear Job acknowledging just how fraught and inexplicable we often find life to be, how we would plead our cause to God if only God would show up to the inquest. Psalm 22, quoted by Christ Himself on the cross, captures, in a way to which we can all relate, the despair and downright confusion that pervades our experience of life and its undeserved trouble. With its contrasting hues of light and dark, alternating between hope and hopelessness, it paints, in an unvarnished way, how the life of faith is an unsettling and far from straightforward affair.

Because faith is challenging and problematic in a precarious and hostile world, most of us have found a shortcut. We have found a way to carefully define, circumscribe, compartmentalize our religion. We know that we are better off for having it, but it doesn’t pay the bills or put food on the table, does it? When it comes to who to trust with my life, my ultimate trust for my security and my protection lies with me, and, in that respect, I am just like the rich young ruler. I am basically a good person. I keep the commandments. I treat others decently. I do the best I can with what I’m given. When I come to Jesus, I feel pretty sure that the good rabbi will give me an A+ for my efforts. After all, look at how shiny and well put together I look. But Jesus, looking at me, loves me and sees right through me, and says, “You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor…” (Mark 10:21). Jesus confronts me with the devastating truth of why am I even coming to him if I don’t actually believe I have need of him?

One of the cardinal truths of the spiritual life is that the more we tighten our grip on whatever guarantees security in this world, the more of real value slips away. No wonder, then, that Christ cautions us about the danger wealth poses to our spiritual health. The law of love, by contrast, says that the more we give away ourselves and our things, the more and better we thrive. Another story illustrates the point. The story is told that the great Phillips Brooks once visited a church that had burned, leaving the congregation feeling hopeless and demoralized. When asked what he would do in these circumstances, the great Bishop replied—“The first thing I would do would be to take up an offering for foreign missions.” That is not what I expected, and yet there is something very right, isn’t there, about this? The obvious concern was not the most important concern. And so it is for us. I – you – we – each of us are our most obvious first concern, and yet Christ would have us call that into question, our instinct for self-preservation, and deny ourselves, and see to the needs of others before our own.

“Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said, ‘You lack one thing; go, sell all that you own and give the money to the poor.” But then he continues, “and you will have treasure in heaven…come, follow me’” (Mark 10:21). If we stopped at the first part, we would only know and feel miserable about what we are losing and miss the great gain. Christ’s challenge to us is a mercy, not meant to deprive us but to enrich us. We are asked to confront the bankruptcy of our position, that the way we are living – armored up with stuff, living small and scared – is no way to live at all. The poet Wendell Berry has written, “Take all that you have and be poor.” If you were to ask me, What is the best way to relate to all the many privileges I have? then I would sum it up in the words, “Take all that you have and be poor.”    

[1] Wendell Berry, “Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front,” from The Country of Marriage (Berkeley: Counterpoint, 2013), 14.

October 3, 2021

Proper 22

Mark 10: 2-16

The Rev. Canon Joann Saylors

I know of people who avoid church on the day this Gospel lesson is read. And I get that. I doubt there is anyone here who has not been touched by divorce in some way. I myself am the daughter of divorced parents; I have a sibling, stepsiblings, and cousins who have been divorced. And having to hear a sermon, or even a scripture, about being an adulterer because you are divorced is hardly a way to learn that God loves you.

But you came [or tuned in] today – maybe you just didn’t know what was coming – so I hope you haven’t already tuned out. I am sorry for whatever pain divorce has caused in your life, even if it was the necessary and right thing to happen. Because sometimes it is. Regardless, at some level, there is always pain in divorce. No one says on their wedding day, “Boy, I hope I get divorced someday.” Endings are hard. This passage has been used at times to constrain marriage to heterosexual couples, to judge people whose marriages have ended, and to pressure people to stay in abusive relationships. But this passage isn’t about those things. It is actually about compassion.

The very first words in the text: “Some Pharisees came, and to test Jesus they asked, ‘Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?’” The Pharisees are not looking out for anyone’s well-being; they are trying once again to trip Jesus up. Jesus does what he often does. First he refers them back to Torah, and then he shows that the bar for how we treat one another has been raised. He does this over and over in the Gospels. The law of Moses instructs us to forgive; Jesus calls us to forgive 70 times seven times (Matt 18:21-22). The Old Testament defines justice as reciprocity – an eye for an eye – but Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek instead (Matt 5:38-40). The 10 Commandments instruct us not to murder, but Jesus says unrighteous anger is just as bad (Matt 5:21-26). Here, with regard to divorce, Moses offers a certificate solution; Jesus says just don’t do it.

In fact, any law of Moses has to be followed or expanded in the context of the new commandments to love God with all of our being and to love one another as Jesus loves us. And so we look at divorce, but let’s look at it in the way it would have been seen in the first century. Marriages were usually arranged by the parents of the couple, partly because of the couple’s young age and partly because of the large sums of money and goods that changed hands. Total fidelity was demanded of the wife in marriage. If she was caught with another man, both could be put to death. But note the husband was not so tightly bound: if he had an affair with a single woman, that was not adultery. Divorce would be another possibility if a wife was accused of adultery, especially where the evidence was not clear cut. In this case the woman would forfeit her dowry. False accusations were not unknown, where men wanted the goods but had no interest in the woman, who would likely return in disgrace to her parental home. Women had no means of initiating a divorce, regardless of the husband’s behavior.

So it is in this context that we see what Jesus does. Where the Pharisees are challenging Jesus’ knowledge and interpretation of the Law, Jesus turns the conversation towards God and towards God’s nature of gathering humanity into communities. We, of course, often, do the opposite. The new Creation which Jesus initiates is not brand new, but a return to the original creation of God’s world. Divorce is an example of our turning away rather than gathering, but the ending of a marriage is only one example of a wider problem. Jesus calls himself the bridegroom, and our sin, our turning away, is a form of divorce.

Throughout Jesus’ ministry he preaches and teaches and models the message that we are meant to be reconcilers, healers, and gatherers. Not only of those within our own tribes, but of neighbors, strangers, enemies. Of everyone, in all the nations of the world. Never does he say instead that we are to build walls, or separate ourselves, or connect only to those we look like or agree with.

Bishop Doyle writes, “God is drawing people who are different together and Jesus is clear that we are the ones who defile these relationships. We defile marriage relationships and we defile communal relationships. We do this by turning away from the "other." We are drawn away from the "other" into relationships that boost our power, our voice, and our authority. We engage in relationships that diminish the "other" with whom we are bound.” i

That is the real pain from divorce, as it is with so many of our relationships. Not the divorce itself – that is simply the grave marker when a marriage has died – but our behavior. We act in ways that push us further apart from our spouses, but also from others that we love and from others with whom we vehemently disagree.

How many times have we heard about the increasing divisions and demonizing in our culture? How toxic levels of conflict seem to arise around any topic where not everyone gets their own way? We talk about the decline of civil engagement, endlessly, but that isn’t the only division in our public lives. Division is also about people who steal from another for their own gain, kill another out of spite or revenge, and enslave another for profit. Sure, that’s those other people, those criminal types, but we all play a role in increasing divisions.

We bully one another in hopes of making ourselves look better. We stop speaking to each other over petty or even major disputes rather than opening ourselves to staying in relationship. We stop listening to one another in conversations because we are too busy planning ahead what we will say. We move into increasingly segregated and gated communities to achieve an illusion of safety or exclusivity. We stereotype, painting whole groups of people with a broad brush, instead of recognizing that no group is monolithic and celebrating our differences by engaging with individuals. We stay inside our churches and engage in ministries that benefit ourselves first, instead of going out to see the other places God is already at work and joining in. We don’t prioritize getting to know our neighbors and their needs.

It is no accident – it is never an accident – what follows next in Mark’s Gospel. It is a concrete example of what Jesus is saying. We sometimes hear that text and think it is meant to show us how a gentle Jesus tends the sweet little child, but that idea softens the radical nature of what Jesus is actually saying. Our modern understanding can confuse us, because the translation seems to indicate Jesus switching the subject somewhat abruptly away from divorce to focus on children. But we are thinking of children as we know them, members of the family even before they are born. Remember, though, that things were different back in the first century, when children ranked lower than that of women. For Mark’s listeners, children would have been regarded as non-persons, or at least not-yet-persons, possessions of the patriarch of the household. As Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry writes in his article, “How Christianity Invented Children,” “High infant mortality rates created a cultural pressure to not develop emotional attachments to children. This cultural pressure was exacerbated by the fact that women were more likely to develop emotional attachments to children — which, according to the worldview of the day, meant it had to be a sign of weakness and vulgarity.” ii Children didn’t contribute much to the family’s economy, couldn’t offer honor or respect in the way someone of higher status could, and couldn’t increase a family’s prestige. So they were ignored, abandoned, exploited, enslaved, and abused.

Gobry continues, “Christianity's invention of children — that is, its invention of the cultural idea of children as treasured human beings — was really an outgrowth of its most stupendous and revolutionary idea: the radical equality, and the infinite value, of every single human being as a beloved child of God. If the God who made heaven and Earth chose to reveal himself, not as an emperor, but as a slave punished on the cross, then no one could claim higher dignity than anyone else on the basis of earthly status.” iii

Jesus is making what would have been an unbelievable statement that children are just as beloved to God as everyone else is, and thus should be just as beloved to us. Women, children, all those who are overlooked and abused and exploited and treated as less than human are welcome in God’s Kingdom and should be welcome in our kingdoms, as large as our nations and as small as our hearts.

Children are not born prejudiced; it is something they learn. Before they internalize the messages, conscious or not, of hierarchy and exclusion between those who are different, such divisions are meaningless. They see and point out differences – most of us have had or seen the experience of a child asking an awkward question at full volume in a public place – but it is in innocent curiosity, not hatred. Like children, we are meant to revel in diversity within God’s greater unity that is the Kingdom of God. We enter God’s Kingdom by building relationships, by joining our lives to one another across difference, overcoming scorn, anger, and hatred.

Jesus prayed for his disciples that we might all be one, as he and the Father are one. We are called, then, to explore what “unity in Christ” means, and how we can be people of faith in the midst of a divided and demonizing culture. How can we bring water to the fire instead of gasoline? How does “agreeing to disagree” affect our ability to proclaim the gospel, heal, and reconcile? How can we call on the teachings of Jesus to model risky, compelling, and deep conversations that do not end in division? I don’t have ready answers to those questions, but it is necessary that we ask them.

Faith insists we do that. “What God has joined together, let no one separate.” What Jesus says here also completes our rite of marriage. If those whom God has joined together are the whole of Creation, let us not only avoid putting them asunder, but actively knit them back together. Let us be faithful citizens in the reign of God. AMEN.

i C. Andrew Doyle, “Some Thoughts on Mark 10:2-16,” Hitchhiking the Word, Saturday, July 24, 2021, https://hitchhikingthebible.blogspot.com/2012/10/proper-22bordinary-27bpentecost-19.html, accessed September 28, 2021. ii Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, “How Christianity Invented Children,” The Week, April 23, 2015. https://theweek.com/articles/551027/how-christianity-invented-children, accessed September 29, 2021.

September 26, 2021

Pentecost – Proper 21

Esther 7:1-6, 9-10; 9:20-22; Psalm 124; James 5:13-20; Mark 9:38-50

The Rev. James M.L. Grace

In the Name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  AMEN

By the age of nine or ten, I had learned how to make off color remarks and judgmental statements of others that today I find embarrassing at best, horrifying at worst.  I don’t remember what my nine-year-old self said to my Jewish neighbor, but it was offensive enough for my her to tell her grandmother, and soon, the grandmother of my Jewish neighbor to whom I had espoused an ignorant, stupid, and anti-Semitic statement was standing at our front door. 

I panicked, out of embarrassment, tried to run away, but there was no escape.  I had to face her. I was so afraid.  I sat down next to her, and she rolled up the sleeve of her blouse.  On her forearm I saw a series of numbers which she explained were a form of identification she received as a young woman at the Auschwitz concentration camp, the largest in Europe.  She told me her story, a story I never knew, and I apologized for what I had said.

If a historian were to ask what had inspired the kind of anti-Semitic hatred as seen in Europe during the time of World War II, the answer would be simple.  (1) The Christian church and its embarrassing history of hate-filled violent acts against Jewish people.  As evidence, look no further than a popular propaganda poster from 1933 which featured the great Catholic reformer Martin Luther with a swastika behind him and an inscription which read “Hitler’s fight and Luther’s teaching are the best defense for the human people.”[1] But the church cannot take the credit for fueling Nazi zeal to eliminate Jews alone.   Hitler also drew inspiration from his study of American history and the genocide of indigenous people in America, as well as such elements of American history like manifest destiny and slavery.[2]

This brings us to the book of Esther.  Shamefully we hear only one small part of this book, and so my homework for you is to read the entire book today – it’s ten chapters, and worth your time.  Esther is a story of a dynamic strong woman of Jewish faith.  She finds herself in a foreign land and manages to prevent the annihilation of her people.  She is like other Jewish heroes in the Bible who find favor in foreign courts, such as Joseph who serves under pharaoh in Egypt, or Daniel who serves under Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon.  Unfortunately, Esther’s heroism isn’t fully examined in today’s reading, and we miss much of her story with just the little we hear today.   

However, there is a happy ending – Esther subverts Haman’s evil plan to annihilate the Jews in Persia, and instead he suffers a tragic end, while Esther becomes Queen of Persia.  It is a happy ending, no doubt, but is it historical?  Is Esther true?  I would say that yes, Esther is true, but maybe not historically accurate, which might describe more of the Bible than any of us might be truly comfortable with. 

Ignorance, misinformation, and biased hatred have existed for centuries, and sadly, exist within us.  But so also does Esther’s strength, her courage, and most importantly – her faith.  To close I suggest one more book to you to read – it should be required reading – “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl.  In this book he describes, profoundly, his experience as an Auschwitz survivor, and the hope he was able to find there.  I believe the hope he found in Auschwitz and the hope Esther found in Persia were the same.  That same hope is within you.  Read Esther to find it.  AMEN.

[1] https://www.facinghistory.org/holocaust-and-human-behavior/chapter-5/protestant-churches-and-nazi-state

[2] https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/04/30/how-american-racism-influenced-hitler

September 19, 2021

Proper 20

Proverbs 31:10-31; Psalm 1; James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a; Mark 9:30-37

The Rev. Jeff Bohanski

Christ stands before you and peace is in his mind.

Christ stands before you and love is in his eyes.

Christ stands before you and strength is in his hands.

At some point this week I read somewhere, something like, as one reads the Bible, the Bible should be in one hand and the newspaper should be in the other hand. I take that to mean that one should bring the Gospel – the Good News – with them into one’s world.  So, it was with me this week as I prepared for this homily.

Last Sunday evening I laughed when I read these readings.  I laughed because, of course this first-grade teacher would have these words of Mark to preach on.  These words where Jesus tells the twelve “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.”

After reviewing the readings, I mapped out my week.  Monday and Tuesday evening I would work on my online class all first-grade teachers across Texas are required to take this year. Wednesday I would finish the assignment and thus on Thursday I would have a free and restful day off.  I went happily to bed confident that my plans for my week had been neatly mapped out.

Monday morning, I woke up and learned things had changed.  I heard tropical storm Nicholas was now expected to turn into Hurricane Nicholas and it was headed straight for Houston.  Victor and I quickly reviewed our hurricane ready list.  When I got to work, I learned I would still have half my class missing because these missing children were still in quarantine due to a Covid-19 exposure from the previous week.  At that point I clearly saw that even my lesson plans for the week were going to have to change.  It was then I remembered and gave thanks for having found this verse a few weeks ago:

Christ stands before you and peace is in his mind.

Christ stands before you and love is in his eyes.

Christ stands before you and strength is in his hands.

Tuesday morning around 1:30, we were awakened to the sound of a great big BOOM!  With great disgust we watched the ceiling fan slowly grind down to a halt.  We saw this because our backyard neighbor’s patio lights were still on and were shining brightly through the cracks in our blinds.  I rolled over, put the pillow over my head and as calmly as I could I recited my verse in my head and went back to sleep.

The next morning, I realized that with no electricity I wasn’t going to finish my online class.  So, I decided to work on this homily instead.  I reread our reading from Mark.  This time, the words “…and when he was in the house, he asked them, ‘What were you arguing about on the way?’” drew my attention.  I visualized Jesus in the house with the twelve asking that question.  I wondered what it was like in that house that day.  It was then the words of my verse popped into my head.

Christ stands before you and peace is in his mind.

Christ stands before you and love is in his eyes.

Christ stands before you and strength is in his hands.

With these words in my head, I once again reread the Gospel.  As I read, I could see in my mind’s eye this Jesus, the Christ, with peace in his mind, love in his eyes and strength in his hands, teaching the twelve.  He was teaching them the difficult lesson about how he will one day be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.  I could see this Jesus who was peacefully, lovingly, strongly teaching them the difficult lesson that those who want to lead must put others first and serve as he serves. 

I could see this Jesus pick up the child and look longingly at the twelve, hoping for them to receive his peace that he knew they will one day need, look longing at them wanting them to feel the love he had for each of them even though they could not see it, longing for them to feel the strength he had in his hands that he knew one day would be punctured by nails. 

My friends, I invite you to embrace this Jesus who I believe longed for the twelve that day.  Embrace this Jesus who also longs for each of us.

Today I hear many voices in the world that don’t embrace this peace giving, loving bestowing strength sharing Jesus who was in that house with the twelve.  There are voices who say people who don’t look like you are out to get you, people who don’t think like you are stupid, people who don’t speak like you are out to take your job, people who don’t vote like you should be denied the vote, people who don’t love like you should be cast out, people who don’t pray like you aren’t going to heaven, people at the border looking for a better life should be walled out.

My friends, I invite us all not to listen to these voices.  I invite us to instead look at people who don’t look like us, who don’t think like us, who don’t speak like us, who don’t vote like us, who don’t love like us, who don’t pray like us as people who are also worthy of that peace, love, and strength I believe Jesus brought into that house where he was with the twelve that day. 

This week did not go according to my plans.  This week I learned that many of my problems of the week won’t go away if I embrace Jesus.  This time we lucked out with Hurricane Nicholas.  We survivors of the winter storm and of Hurricane Harvey know there will be more storms where we won’t luck out.  I know my online class will be a stress that won’t go away until it’s completed in May.  But I also know if I embrace the peace giving, loving, and strong Jesus who was with the twelve in that house that day, the Jesus who longs to bring me peace, who longs for me to know he loves me, who longs to share his strength with me, I know my problems will be easier to bare. 

Christ stands before you and peace is in his mind.

Christ stands before you and love is in his eyes.

Christ stands before you and strength is in his hands.

September 12, 2021

Proper 19

Proverbs 1: 2--33; Psalm 19; James 3: 1-12; Mark 8:27-38

The Rev. James M.L. Grace

In the Name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  AMEN

On most days, I like to read Forward Day by Day, which is a small daily reader for the Episcopal Church that offers a daily reflection.  When I read it this past Thursday, the reflection was all about the Martyrs of Memphis.  The Martyrs of Memphis were a small group of brave individuals who cared for the sick and the dying in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1878.  During that year, 1878, a pandemic of yellow fever spread through Memphis.  When the order to quarantine was issued, reports indicate that half of the population fled.  Of those who remained in Memphis, nearly ninety percent became infected and five thousand people in the city of Memphis died. 

 A group of Episcopal nuns and priests remained to tend to the sick.  They included Sisters Constance, Thecla, Ruth, and Frances and the Revs. Charles Parsons and Louis Schuyler, among others.  The author of the reflection I read wondered about the courage of this group – how did they have the strength and the fortitude to honor their call to risk even death to offer love and care to those dying from yellow fever?  Despite their selfless and noble efforts in bringing comfort and care to the sick, each nun and each priest caught the fever, and died. 

Yet, their death was not the last word.  Today a chapel dedicated in their honor stands as part of St. Mary’s Cathedral in Memphis.  The chapel stands not as a monument to their courage – although it is obvious that none of the Martyrs of Memphis were deficient in that area.  Rather it is a reminder to all of us that God calls us to do the same.  Many were the nurses and doctors who gave their lives trying to save those with Covid.  There is not a chapel dedicated to their selfless acts of service – yet. 

Jesus called the crowd with his disciples and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.”   A cynic might argue that the Martyrs of Memphis and all the deceased nurses and physicians who contracted Covid just lost their lives.  Yes, that is true – they lost their lives.  But I would submit that they lost them for Jesus’ sake.  They lost their lives trying to save others.  Is there any cause more noble, or more holy than that?    

Nowhere in the Bible does Jesus promise us that taking up our cross to follow him will be easy or safe.  Also, nowhere in the Bible does Jesus ever promise material gain for our faithfulness.   What Jesus promises is abundant life.  Abundant life does not mean a life of comfort, ease, or financial security, as the lives of the Memphis Martyrs clearly demonstrate.  Abundant life is rather the kind of life you get when you put the needs of others in front of your own. Abundant living is achievable only when you pick up your cross and follow Jesus. 

Here again our cynic friend might say “what is abundant about working in horrible conditions, fighting disease and death with no end in sight?”  The cynic is right – in the world’s view, there is nothing abundant about this.  The world tells us to lay down our crosses and get comfortable in our recliner chairs instead.  But in God’s eyes – the person who is courageous enough to take up their cross daily – that is living abundantly.  When you take up your cross, you won’t get what you deserve.  You will get something much better.  You’ll get God’s mercy.  AMEN.

September 5, 2021

Proper 18

The Rev. Clint Brown

Exactly 529 years ago this week, an observer from outer space, roving over the North Atlantic with their telescope, would have spied (without being terribly impressed, I would imagine) three small sailing ships beating a westward tack somewhere to the west-southwest of the Canary Islands. We know that Columbus’s little fleet of caravels – the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria – were at that moment on a collision course with destiny, but if our space observer had stopped to remark about them at all to a companion, there would have been no reason to think they carried any special significance. They would not have known that, in the history of the world, never before had any ships yet attempted what these three were attempting, nor would they have been able to appreciate how consequential this would be for the subsequent history of planet Earth. In our minds, Columbus’ first voyage is the quintessential story of discovery, of braving the unknown despite the prevailing wisdom of the age. For us it is an object lesson for how without risk there is no reward, and how when nothing is ventured, nothing is gained. This is the way discovery has always worked. 

And I mention this because I want to ask the question, “Where is Jesus?” in our Gospel lesson today. It turns out that, he too, is in uncharted waters, both in a literal and figurative sense. Figuratively, he has just shown his willingness to step outside the bounds of tradition, by challenging the scribes and Pharisees. Last Sunday, he debated with them about what constitutes cleanliness and asked, rightfully, what do the exacting and oppressive rules of tradition, the mere forms of religion, have to do with what really matters – the disposition of the heart? Jesus is opposing the tried and true and calling it to account, and, in so doing, staking a claim as a reformer. Like an explorer, to be a reformer is an uncomfortable place to be. Like an explorer, you find yourself far from home.

And now, in our passage today, we shift from the figural to the literal. We are told that Jesus has journeyed outside familiar territory to somewhere in the region of Tyre, gentile territory, a ways away from home base, so to speak, in order to have a little R&R; but what ends up happening, of course, is that “he could not escape notice” (v. 24), and now, in this place far from home, Jesus finds that he himself is the learner challenged by the faith of a foreigner, a Syro-Phoenician woman. Literally and figuratively, then, Jesus has stepped outside the known borders, and this reminds us again that dislocation is what sets the conditions for discovery.

And why is that? Why is finding that we are not in Kansas anymore so beneficial? Because dislocation makes us uncomfortable, and discomfort, as any educator will tell you, is the necessary ground for learning. To be a good teacher you have to push your students out of their comfort zone. You have to introduce enough stress that they are challenged and stretched, but not so much that they can’t cope with it and they give up. Learning happens at that place where you are forced to bend but not break.

As we study Scripture, this ought to be happening to us all the time, because the priorities and values of God’s Kingdom should feel foreign to us. If left to our own devices, they are unlike the ones we would choose. Did you hear the challenge of James today, when he called us out on our instinct – and “instinct” is the right word because it is like second nature to us – our instinct to show deference to the rich and powerful among us, paying more attention to the one wearing gold rings and fine clothes than to the poor man sitting under the overpass? Doesn’t it make more sense to pay attention to the one from whom I might expect some kind of return for my effort? I recognize myself in that calculus; I hope you do, too. But James is clear, isn’t he? The poor are richer because theirs is a faith that is sure of its need for God, and that is the true riches.

This disconnect between my values and my behavior is something that makes me uncomfortable…and that is the point. To achieve new understandings, I have to be brought to new spaces and places, and nowhere is this better captured than in the words of another famed navigator, seaman, and explorer, Sir Francis Drake, to whom there is attributed this marvelous prayer, with which I’ll close. It is called, appropriately, “Disturb us, Lord.”[1]

Disturb us, Lord, when

We are too well pleased with ourselves,

When our dreams have come true

Because we have dreamed too little,

When we arrived safely

Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when

With the abundance of things we possess

We have lost our thirst

For the waters of life;

Having fallen in love with life,

We have ceased to dream of eternity

And in our efforts to build a new earth,

We have allowed our vision

Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,

To venture on wider seas

Where storms will show your mastery;

Where losing sight of land,

We shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back

The horizons of our hopes;

And to push into the future

In strength, courage, hope, and love.[2]

[1] This prayer is notoriously difficult to pin down in terms of its authorship. For more on these difficulties, see Joshua Horne, “Francis Drake’s Prayer: Fact or Fiction?,” Discerning History (blog), November 22, 2014, accessed September 3, 2021, http://discerninghistory.com/2014/11/francis-drakes-prayer-fact-or-fiction/.

[2] Text drawn from Joshua Horne, “Francis Drake’s Prayer: Fact or Fiction?,” Discerning History (blog), November 22, 2014, accessed September 3, 2021, http://discerninghistory.com/2014/11/francis-drakes-prayer-fact-or-fiction/.

August 29, 2021

Proper 17

Song of Solomon 2: 8-13; Psalm 45:1-2, 7-10; James 1:17-27; Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

The Rev. James M.L. Grace

In the Name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  AMEN

            In the book of James today we hear these words: “Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above.”  This morning I want to talk to you about giving – more specifically – I want to talk about stewardship.  I know, what a terrible way to begin a sermon, right?  We have a Hurricane brewing in the gulf, we have the tragedy of lives lost in Afghanistan, not to mention Covid – and I want to talk stewardship.  Just how tone deaf am I? 

            Yes it seems very tone deaf to talk stewardship at a time like this, but I would also say that if global stability and peace were a necessary prerequisite for us to talk about contributing money to St. Andrew’s, we would likely never have that conversation.  And, the issues I referenced – Hurricane Ida and Afghanistan are stewardship issues.  What I mean is that we are taking a collection today – all cash donations today will be split.  One half will go to Hurricane Ida response, wherever it lands, and the other half will go to Afghan Refugee resettlement in Houston.  You may also write a check – notate “Afghanistan” or “Hurricane Ida” in the memo, and we will send the funds out this week.  So, give generously. 

            I have just three things I want to say about stewardship this morning and then I promise you I am done.  The first is this: each of us has been given an amazing and miraculous gift from God.  What is this wonderful gift you might be asking?  What is so amazing and wondrous that God has given to us?  Our lives.  Inside each of our bodies is a heart that is estimated to pump blood through our bodies 2.5 billion times during our lifespan.  To put that into some context, during the time that you have been in church this morning, your heart has already beat some two thousand times.  Remarkable, isn’t it? 

            My second point on stewardship is this – an appropriate response to the gift we have received, is gratitude.  How many of you woke up this morning feeling grateful that you were alive?  Did you say “good God, another morning” or did you say “Good morning, God!  What can I do for you today?”  Gratitude is essential.

            So, the first two points on stewardship: (1) God has given us a miraculous gift – our lives.  (2) Our response to God’s gift should be gratitude.   My third, and final, point on stewardship is this – gratitude is why we give.  We don’t give out of obligation, or because we feel that our arm is being twisted – we give because we want to. 

            Earlier this week, I was asked by a person if the church would be able to pay the September rent on their apartment for reasons I don’t need to get into.  I was able to say yes to this person, and to pay the rent, because you all have given dollars to something called a Rector’s Discretionary Fund which I get to use to fund requests like this.    

            In the coming months ahead, all of us will hear, in no uncertain terms, about the importance of financial stewardship to St. Andrew’s.  What that means is that each year, St. Andrew’s budget starts at $0.  As the finance committee budgets, they do so based on what you all prayerfully discern will be your financial pledge to St. Andrew’s for next year. 

            That’s all – three points on stewardship: (1) God has given us a miraculous gift.  (2) Our response to God’s gift is gratitude.  (3) We express gratitude by giving away freely what God has given us.  Financial stewardship is not an obligation, it is an opportunity.  AMEN.