An Allegorical Wedding

From Matthew 25.1-13, Jesus’ parable of the ten bridesmaids:

Then the kingdom of heaven will be like this. Ten bridesmaids took their lamps and went to meet the bridegroom. 

The kingdom of heaven is likened by Matthew to the most celebratory of events: a wedding banquet.  In this parable, the groom is returning home with his bride, who is not mentioned.

It is the job of the bridesmaids to await and greet them, to be ready whenever the wedding party arrives.  They are an integral part of the festal procession.

The story continues:  Five of them were foolish, and five were wise.  When the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them;  but the wise took flasks of oil with their lamps.  As the bridegroom was delayed, all of them became drowsy and slept. 

The point is perhaps obvious to us, but not so in Matthew’s time: Jesus’ return is taking much longer than expected and no one knows when he will return.  But return he will.

The problem here is not about falling asleep – both the wise and the foolish slept.  Perhaps as a precursor to Jesus’ experience in the garden with his disciples, this makes sense: Jesus was disappointed in his followers for their inability to remain awake with him through the night, but they were still his followers.

Jesus continues,   But at midnight there was a shout, ‘Look! Here is the bridegroom! Come out to meet him.’  Then all those bridesmaids  got up and trimmed their lamps.  The foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’  But the wise replied, ‘No! there will not be enough for you and for us; you had better go to the dealers and buy some for yourselves.’  

Here, then, is a moment of decision for all the bridesmaids: the wise ones must choose whether to share; the foolish ones whether to stay or go in search of more oil.

When asked to share, the wise ones say no.  We can judge their seeming callousness harshly.  Are we not taught to share even to our hurt?  So how is it ‘wise’ to say no?

Perhaps if we focus here on the plight of the fools, we miss the point.  Maybe the point is the return of the groom with his bride.  Maybe the story is not about us, but about God: what we do, we do not for our own sake nor our own glory nor even our own benefit, but rather for the glory, the welcome, of God.

Now the wise ones could have given their lamps to the fools as an act of merciful grace, but that would be a different parable with a different point.

And while they went to buy it, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him into the wedding banquet; and the door was shut.  Later the other bridesmaids came also, saying, ‘Lord, lord, open to us.’  But he replied, ‘Truly I tell you, I do not know you.’  Keep awake therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.

What or who is the door and who does the shutting?  A traditional view is that the door is very gateway to heaven itself.  Perhaps.

But a door has two sides and this door is as present to those on the outside as to those on the inside, as aware of the persistent knocking from outside as of the festivities on the inside.

The door is witness.  And even if it is a portal, it is a portal from life to life.

Those on both sides of the door live, one side bereft, the other fulfilled.

Maybe it wasn’t about the oil choice, but rather about the leaving choice.  Maybe the fault of the foolish bridesmaids was not so much in their lack of preparedness, but about their panicked decision to leave just when the groom came.

Telling this story, Jesus is sitting on the Mount of Olives with his disciples, who had come to him in private to ask him when the day of reckoning would come and what would be the signs of his coming, of the end of the age.

Maybe being ready is about what we do in the meantime, not in terms of ourselves, but in terms of others: if I have no light within me, I cannot light your path.

Or maybe, just maybe, it’s a reminder that waiting is a drag, but oh my, what a party there will be – so maybe Jesus is reminding us that the drag of waiting has its own glorious end.

And that is something worth waiting for.

The Lens of Love

Matthew 22.34-46 (NRSV)  When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.  “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?” He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’  This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”   Now while the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them this question:  “What do you think of the Messiah? Whose son is he?” They said to him, “The son of David.”  He said to them, “How is it then that David by the Spirit[d] calls him Lord, saying, ‘The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at my right hand, until I put your enemies under your feet”’?  If David thus calls him Lord, how can he be his son?”  No one was able to give him an answer, nor from that day did anyone dare to ask him any more questions.

The Lens of Love

In Matthew 21, Jesus enters Jerusalem triumphantly . . . goes straight to the temple and overturns the tables of those who would sell access to God . . . heals and cures those in great need . . . and is confronted in anger by the religious leaders of the day.

Thus does the conflict come out into the open . . .

The religious leaders challenge Jesus’ authority and he challenges their integrity.

At the core, the disagreement, the fight, about the very identity, integrity, and nature of God’s own self, which God’s people are to reflect with their own lives.

Cynicism has clouded the leaders’ eyes; self-interest their judgment – for this Messiah comes with a different message.

What is the greatest command of all? he is asked.

The command of love.  It is the command by which all others are to be understood: Love God; love each other.  Love with everything you’ve got.  

The exchange is epic.  Some get it.  Some don’t.

The difference, I suspect, is the lens of love.

If we look at Jesus, if we look at each other, through the lens of the law unfiltered by the lens of love, we reduce God’s ways to a checklist.  Do this, don’t do that, and you’re in.  Fail and you’re out.

The problem is that a checklist, while easy, misses the hard work, the gritty get-down-in-the-mud doing, the walking-with messiness of loving.

Jesus does not cure the sick because they are good.  He cures them because they need a cure.

Jesus does not condemn the leaders because they’re bad.  He condemns them because their righteousness has made them blind and unkind.

Jesus does not close the doors of heaven tight against the unworthy; he flings them open for all.

The lens of love is the only way to understand the law for what it is – a means of navigating life in ways that help rather than harm humanity.

Take a law and make of it a rule and impose it to the point of harm to another human being and we miss the lens of love and make of the law an idol – substituting the law for the one who gifted it to us.

Thus does Jesus mourn for those who would so worry about who gets to be with whom in heaven that they would miss the enormity of the resurrection promise: the dead now live!

Thus does Jesus shake his head when leaders worry that paying taxes to Rome (which takes them by force) means you’ll go to hell.

Thus does Jesus, when asked about his authority, ask whether we can see God’s authority when it stands before us, always with the lens of love, deep compassionate love, love that cares and does not count the cost, love that witnesses the true nature of God, love that admits freely it does not know everything, needs much, has much to learn, and errs, always, on the side of the ones humanity so easily dismisses, erases, ignores.

Thus does Jesus turn away from the wise leaders to look directly into our eyes – the eyes of his followers – and say – gently, ever so gently, now you see?  Now you understand?  

Now you go – go and do likewise.  Heal the sick.  Welcome the outsider.  Walk with the outcasts.  Dine with the lonely.  Do what the impulse to Love would have you do.

And remember – if it is not of Love, it is not of me.

On Baptisms, Babies & Such

Scripture Reading   Luke 18.16-17:  People were bringing even infants to him that he might touch them; and when the disicples saw it, they sternly ordered them not to do it.  But Jesus called for them and said, “Let the little children come to me; and do not stop them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.  Truly I tell you: whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”

On Baptisms, Babies and Such

Think back to the births you remember . . . babies don’t remember, but mammas and pappas do . . . the waiting time, the getting ready time, the he’s coming now time . . . they remember it all . . . sorrow and joy and laughter and pain all mix in together and they remember . . . so remember now, won’t you . . . a happy birth . . .

Babies being born are holy ground places . . . And no matter what station they are born into, no matter who their parents are, no matter, even whether they live to ripe old age or leave us far too soon, God greets them all . . .

The older I get, the more God’s voice, at least in my head, sounds like Dr. Seuss . . . Can’t you just picture it . . . you are born . . . people are gathered . . . and God whispers in your ear . . . and even as a baby, you’re surprised that God is reciting Dr. Seuss’s Oh! the Places You’ll Go . . .

Congratulations!

Today is your day.

You’re off to Great Places!

You’re off and away!

You have brains in your head.

You have feet in your shoes.    

You can steer yourself any direction you choose.

You’re on your own. And you know what you know. 

And YOU are the guy [or gal] who’ll decide where to go.

This journey, this child, began literally as an idea . . . his parents may be tempted to believe that he began as their idea, but we know better – every child begins as God’s idea . . . a grand thing, really . . .he’ll do, oh yes, he’ll do very nicely indeed . . .

God knows even better than we parents . . . you’ll always be happy . . . except when you’re not . . . you’ll always be perfect . . . except when you aren’t . . .

And thus the mothering God of Isaiah and Hosea bends down to embrace . . . and to comfort . . . and to raise this new child of creation to the divine cheek and whisper . . . hush . . . of course you failed . . . I always knew you would . . . you’re all right now . .. Shh . . . shhh

And then there are the waiting times . . . waiting for the magic day to come is a waste of time . . . and waiting for things to ‘get better’ is magical thinking . . . and waiting for Godot is but an amusing interlude to a life that’s meant to be lived, not waited for . . .

But . . . but . . . not all waiting is a bad thing . . .

Within the circle of God’s embrace, there is the waiting for the Lord . . . and like all of us, this child will have plenty of that . . .

It’s hard, this waiting on God thing . . . and we’re not very good at reading the signposts . . .

. . . but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint. . . The Isaiah promise is for us all . . .

Waiting for fish or kites is silly . . . waiting for God is holy . . . and renewing . . . and joy-filled . . . Waiting for people or the ship to come is wish-filled nonsense . . . waiting for God is holy . . . and beautiful . . . and frustrating . . . and spirit-filling . . . Waiting for God is not the staying-stuck kind of waiting at all . . .

And sometimes other people, other Christians especially, will try to convince you that your baptism was all about repentance . . . about being sorry . . . about piling ashes on your head . . . about being a bad boy . . . a lucky bad boy, but a bad boy, nevertheless . . .

Don’t you believe them. . . not for an instant . . . The God who created you called you not just good, but very good . . . God smiled when you were born . . .

And it doesn’t matter one little bit to God whether you’re famous or infamous . . . or just plain old you to the world . . . you will always be a rock star in God’s eyes . . . and a very loved rock star at that . . .

A long time ago, there was a man baptizing folks in ‘John’s baptism’ . . . the baptism of repentance . . . and another fellow named Paul came along and said, ‘what are you doing?

This won’t do at all . . . don’t settle for John’s repentance baptism, a sorry thing indeed, when you can have Jesus’ baptism . . . the baptism that brings fire to your belly and purpose to your life . . . the baptism that brings God’s very own Holy Spirit to live in your house all the days of your life . . . that’s the baptism for you, Owen, my boy! . . . and for us all . . .

But it won’t all be a bed of roses . . . not in this life . . .

But even when when your feet get tangled up and you find yourself lying flat on the ground . . . we will be there . . . and even when we aren’t there . . . even when we let you down . . . because we won’t . . . except when we do . . . even then, child of God, even then, God will always be with you . . .

Today you come to God as a little child . . .

And all of us come with you, the little children that we still are . . .

We come and lift up our faces to feel the wind of God’s Spirit blowing upon us . . .

We come at the invitation of the Most High God, as “The Spirit and the bride say, “Come.”  And let everyone who hears say, “Come.”  And let everyone who is thirsty come.  Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.”

Looking back and looking forward . . . we come . . .

In joyous expectation . . . we come . . .

In proclamation of God’s own gospel good news in our lives and yours, we come . . .

God’s promise is for this baby . . . and for us all.

Won’t you reclaim it today?

Let’s stop being sorry, shall we?  And start being happy!  Joyous!  Free!

For we are all God’s own good news.  And that is good news indeed.

Down to the Hard Work of Reconciliation – Part 4

There is great responsibility to being a follower of Jesus Christ – the responsibility of binding

and loosing, the responsibility of heaven itself.  Yet this responsibility comes with an accompanying promise: the very presence of Christ himself.

In one of the most evocative verses on what it means to be church, Jesus tells his followers that when even a very few – as few as two or three – are gathered in his name, there he is among us.

Jesus has just been speaking of gathering in the cause of restoration where there has been sin and now he speaks of being there with ‘them’ – even with the one doing the breaking . . . as in my body broken – for you . . .

Now we are come full circle to the beginning – at the start of Matthew 18, the disciples are quibbling about who will be the greatest in the coming kingdom of heaven.

Jesus replies that the change that must happen is to become as children and admonishes his followers not to put a stumbling block before another – and perhaps this has been his point all along – after all, Jesus is speaking to his disciples – to the ones he entrusts to carry his gospel message to all the world.

It’s a big job, being a disciple.  It is crucial that they, that we, get it right.  Jesus makes clear what it is not about:

It is not about getting the first prize blue ribbon in some sort of race and if they/we insist on thinking of it that way, they/we would do better to try for last place rather than first.

It is not about being recognized for one’s power and dignity of office – it’s more like being a little kid with nothing to offer.

It is not about setting up gates and entrance exams and tests and setting bars higher and higher to get in.

It is not about setting ourselves as the example unless we are prepared to be the perfect example.  It is about pointing always and only to Jesus, who actually is – the perfect example.  

It is not about valuing station, position, or wealth.  It is about seeking the lost.  Always.

Maybe Jesus was speaking about as well as to the weak ones standing right in front of him, full-blown sinners themselves.  Maybe he was reminding them that their squabbles about who gets in first are just nonsense – harmful nonsense.  Maybe he was telling them that they had to first work this out among themselves before they had anything of value to bring to the world.

Maybe he was reminding them that their journey – our journey – is one of humility, where they, where we, must always be prepared, no matter how old, how advanced, how knowledgeable in bible studies, how closely aligned to Jesus himself, they, we must always be more prepared to be corrected than to correct . . . to be chastised as to chastise . . . to be put right as to put right.

Maybe he was teaching them that correction is a gentle thing that takes great care of the one being offered the correction.

Maybe he was suggesting that when sin and sinners and sinning come up, the one in the room I must first be concerned with is myself.

Maybe he was suggesting that if a sinner be ejected, we’d better leave too. 

Maybe he was suggesting that if a penalty needs to be paid, I should be willing to pay it for you, because we are family and brothers and sisters always take up for each other.

Maybe Jesus was suggesting that unity looks like family – sloppy, messy, mistake-making, feeling-hurting, wrestling-til-we-get-it-right family.

Maybe Jesus wants us to come to those who have done wrong as Christ comes to us – in humility rather than in judgment . . . in great desire for their good rather than for our right . . . in the willingness to take on the burden of their sins as our own that they might be reclaimed.  

Maybe.

Down to the Hard Work of Reconciliation – Part 3

Regardless of the precise meaning of Jesus’ instructions on how to progressively confront the unrepentant sinner in the body of believers, we are still left with the tax-collector-gentile conundrum: what on earth does Jesus mean when he says to treat the unrepentant one as a tax collector or Gentile?
The traditional interpretation over the centuries is that Jesus is instructing his followers to shun, to have nothing to do with, the one who will not repent.  

Is this what Jesus means?

Consider earlier in Matthew, as in Matthew 11.19, where Jesus is reproached, accused of being a drunk and a glutton who was a “friend to tax collectors and sinners” and in Matthew 9.10, where it is noted that “many tax collectors and sinners” came and ate with Jesus and his followers.  The Pharisees objected and Jesus replied, “those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.”

Maybe treating the unrepentant has nothing to do with shunning. 

It seems to have to do with expecting more rather than less from fellow believers (as we do with family).

But to treat the unrepentant as ‘tax collectors and Gentiles’ might well mean to treat them more gently rather than less. . . especially if we consider Jesus’ earlier statement that they are to be viewed as the ‘sick’ – as those with additional need for care, as those who require the help of a physician rather than the condemnation of a judge.

In practical terms, it might mean that you don’t put that person in a leadership position simply because they’re not up to the job.  But at the same time, you do continue to care for them. . . for as long as it takes – just like we do with the one who suffers a serious illness.

In 12-step programs, members learn a helpful slogan: I’m not a bad person trying to get good; I’m a sick person trying to get well.  Maybe Jesus is talking about going the distance with someone in great need of him – someone whose need is so great they cannot see it for themselves.

And maybe there does come a time when someone must be ejected from the fellowship with the hope that such an extreme measure will bring them to their senses, turn them around.

But I keep coming back to the witness of the desert fathers and mothers – early Christians who went into the desert and away from the cities in order to pursue more closely the life Jesus had called them to live.  Their stories are stories of extreme living, extreme sacrifice, extreme love – extreme Jesus.

Consider the time when a brother who had sinned was turned out of the church by the priest.  Abba Bessarion got up and went out with him, saying, "I, too, am a sinner."

In one monastery, if any committed a fault, many of the other brothers would seek the offending brother’s permission to take the matter to the abbot and to accept both the responsibility and the punishment.  When the abbot found out that his disciples did this, he inflicted easier punishments, in the knowledge that the one punished was actually innocent.  And he made no effort to discover the real culprit.

One brother leaves with the sinner, knowing himself to be a sinner too.  Others take on the punishment for the offender – like brothers and sisters do for each other all the time.

Maybe the tax collector-Gentiles among us are not the ones kicked out, but rather the ones held all the more tightly to, the ones we walk with because we recognize ourselves in them.

Maybe they’re the ones we make room for at the table for we are them.

Maybe as Jesus sees us, so we are to see them.  

Down to the Hard Work of Reconciliation - Part 1

Matthew 18.15-20 (NRSV)   If a brother (or sister) sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the brother (or sister) listens to you, you have regained that one. But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses.  If the brother (or sister) refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.  Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.  Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.  For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.

Down to the Hard Work of Reconciliation – Part 1

Throughout scripture, it is recognized that sin, the breaking with or turning away from God, is a harming, real, lasting, living thing that brings with it . . . broken relationships, broken people, hurt within and hurt without . . .

In this passage from Matthew, Jesus is recognizing the impact of that broken being on the body of believers as a whole.  In a very real sense, this is about unity.

The Genevan fathers read this text as a command from Jesus that within the body, we strive for agreement rather than seek for revenge.  It is the recognition that wrongs will happen even within the body and that we must address them.

We are not to simply do nothing, to pretend as if nothing happened, allowing our wounds to fester.  We are not to plot out our own course of getting even.  We are not to withdraw our affection and support from another within the body because they wounded us.

We are to make the effort to restore right relationship between us. And the responsibility rests as much with the one wronged as it does with the one doing the wrong.

This, then, is the Jesus twist: the one wronged has as much responsibility for dealing with the wrong as the one having done the wrong.

The reason is obvious: if it’s about unity rather than about staying even (what we think of as justice) – if it’s about unity, it does not matter who makes the first move.  

What matters is that the move – the move towards restoring relationship – be made.

In Leviticus 19.17-18, God instructs as to what the unity of family – the kind of unity Jesus speaks of – looks like:  You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself.  You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.

When it comes to family, I don’t know about yours, but in mine, we are seldom, if ever, all in the same place at the same time.  In fact, most of the time we’re so out of step with each other that we couldn’t even walk in a parade together.

But that’s all right, because family isn’t about that.  It’s about the quicker ones waiting for the slower ones because we were made to walk together . . . it’s about knowing ourselves to be linked across time and space . . . it’s about welcoming each other home . . . every time . . . it’s about simply being – in family, you don’t have to prove who you are or that you belong – you simply are.  Some families are better at it than others, some are worse.  But no family looks at you standing at the door and asks who you are.

In Matthew 18, Jesus’ use of kinship language of brother (and sister) is important – it matters to these ‘rules’ and how they work.  This is a family affair.  

When it comes to family, we approach each other with an intimacy seldom found anywhere else.  Jesus’ point is that this level of intimacy – the closeness of what we call family – is to be found in the gathering, in what we call church.

Reconciliation: The Fruit of Forgiveness

2 Corinthians 5.17-21: . . . anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. . . All this comes from the God who settled the relationship between us and him, and then called us to settle our relationships with each other. God put the world square with himself through the Messiah, giving the world a fresh start by offering forgiveness of sins. God has given us the task of telling everyone what he is doing. . . God uses us to persuade men and women to drop their differences and enter into God’s work of making things right between them. We’re speaking for Christ himself now: Become friends with God; he’s already a friend with you.  (The Message)

Reconciliation: The Fruit of Forgiveness

Forgiveness is

1. A gift – it is not deserved or earned.  It is given.

2. A sacrifice – forgiveness costs the giver.

3. A humbling – to receive forgiveness is to be humble.  So too giving forgiveness can be humbling.  Hubris will not do it.  Pride cannot receive it.

4. A work – something we do rather than something we think.

Knowing what forgiveness is – a sacrificial gift humbling to receive, costly to give, the work and the will together, the question remains, what is the fruit, the result, of forgiveness?

We forgive and receive forgiveness, is because God has so commanded.  This is obedience.  Have no doubt about it: if you are refusing to forgive, you are disobeying God.

Next, we forgive because it is in our own best interests to do so.  In his Yom Kippur sermon, a rabbi spoke about the importance of forgiveness – of seeking it and granting it: “Jewish law requires a person to ask for forgiveness three times—it must be genuine, heartfelt and inspired by true remorse. If the wronged individual does not forgive after three sincere attempts, then the person who did the wrong is forgiven and the one not forgiving becomes guilty and now needs to ask for forgiveness for not forgiving.”  Forgiveness is so important, so crucial, to the community of humanity, that to refuse to extend it when asked for is to take on the sin of the one seeking the forgiveness.

We forgive and are forgiven because it is in the interests of the one doing the harm to be forgiven.  It is an act of freeing from bondage and captivity – theirs as well as ours.

Ultimately – the very reason God commands forgiveness, is that we may be reconciled – to God, to ourselves, to the world.

Forgiveness is the agency of reconciliation –  cosmic rather than individual or even collective –  the work of heaven and all creation.

We are creatures made to live with others.  God has created all of this in such a way that what we do affects heaven as much as what heaven does affects us.

We are all in this universal boat together.  Reconciliation, the fruit of forgiveness, is the essential grease to the machinery of our lives together.  Without reconciliation, someone’s going to get kicked out of the boat.  Equilibrium is lost.  And the boat sinks.

Sometimes reconciliation looks like two estranged people coming back together into a relationship better than ever before.  Sometimes it means mom and dad stay divorced, but they quit fighting and start caring about the feelings, needs and desires of the other parent as much as their own.

Sometimes reconciliation means visiting the one who murdered your loved one in prison.  Or loaning your most bitter enemies money in order to rebuild their countries, as in the Marshall Plan following World War II.

Sometimes reconciliation means sharing your very best secret deer stand with the brother who never shared a single toy with you.  And being glad to do it.

It isn’t easy.  But it’s necessary.  Our world is crumbling in on itself for the want of some reconciling hands reached out in the hope, the dream, that things might be otherwise.

Beginning with ourselves, recall basic commonalities to all the possibilities of reconciliation:

1. Reconciliation means seeing the other person as a human being who is as loved and cherished by God as are you and treating them – broken, hurt and hurting them – accordingly.

2. It means being open to the possibilities of a new relationship beyond your wildest imaginings – which also means being open to the possibility of being hurt again.

3. Reconciliation means understanding, accepting and even embracing as good that we are all in this boat together and that we are all essential to the boat’s not sinking – none are expendable, not even those who have done me the most harm.

4. Reconciliation means living in to the reality that redemption is the way – the only way – for humanity to survive and thrive on this planet.  As Abraham Lincoln once famously said, “a house divided against itself cannot stand”.  To be unreconciled is to live in a permanently divided house, which is to say, no house at all.

As Paul reminds us in 2 Corinthians, we are made new . . . we have been given a fresh start . . . that start comes with a challenge: don’t bring the old hurts, the old wounds, the old grievances with you into this new life. . .

God has entrusted God’s message of reconciliation to us!  It is an extraordinary gift.

Isn’t it time and past time to drop our  differences . . . roll up our sleeves and get busy doing the work – the work of making things right between us?

That, after all, is why we are here.

On Seeking Forgiveness

God forgives us.  We forgive ourselves.  We allow ourselves to be forgiven by others.

Matthew 5 (The Message): This is how I want you to conduct yourself . . . If you enter your place of worship and, about to make an offering, you suddenly remember a grudge a friend has against you, abandon your offering, leave immediately, go to this friend and make things right. Then and only then, come back and work things out with God.  

What The Message calls ‘making things right’ is usually translated as “be reconciled”.  Seeking and receiving forgiveness are biblically understood as reconciliation, a restoration of something that was lost.

Hence the practice of the passing of the peace taking place before coming to the communion table arose in the very early church – passing the peace is not merely a handshake or greeting among friends – it is the opportunity to restore one’s self to fellowship with someone wronged.

As noted in the Pulpit Commentary: “Our Lord is insisting that it is so important to lose no time in seeking reconciliation with a person whom one has injured, that even the very holiest action must be put off for it.”

There is a sense of urgency about the importance of seeking out forgiveness from someone we have wronged.  It requires Honesty, Haste and Humility.

Our job is to do the work of seeking out that forgiveness. But how?  Today’s passage suggests some obvious, clear, simple – not easy, but simple – steps:

(1) acknowledging/admitting that we have done something that needs forgiving

(2) asking the person or persons wronged to forgive us

(3) doing what we can to make amends

(4) leaving the decision to forgive to the person from whom we seek forgiveness

(5) making this a priority in our lives

1. Acknowledging that we have done something that needs forgiving.  It’s about getting honest – with God, with ourselves and with the other person.  It means saying it out loud.  It is an act of humility to admit we’ve done wrong by someone, leaving out all the self-justifications, reasons, and resentments. It’s no accident that Jesus speaks of ‘remembering’ what we’ve done wrong while we’re at the altar.  Where better to be reminded of our wrongs than standing before God? Thus, when we are reminded of something we’ve done that hasn’t been addressed, we might do well to also remember who reminded us.  If God’s Holy Spirit is bringing something to our attention, chances are it’s because the matter needs our attention.  Whether the other person has a part or not is irrelevant to your apology, your admission, your acknowledgment.  Their part is just that – theirs.  When seeking forgiveness, seek it.  Don’t shift the blame.  Don’t rehearse all your justifications.  You’re caught.  Live with it.  Admit it.  Seek to redress it.  Period.  Anything else takes you away from the land of honesty as well as humility.

2. Asking the person or persons wronged to forgive us Here’s the really humbling part: ask to be forgiven and walk away.  Don’t demand it.  Don’t beg for it.  Don’t wheedle, whine, carp or nag for it.  Simply ask and leave it at that.  Maybe they’ll need to think about it.  Maybe they’ll forgive you right away.  Maybe they’ll even have forgotten what you’re talking about.  In seeking another’s forgiveness, grace would suggest that we give them the space to do their work.  After all, we’ve been thinking about this for some time.  Shouldn’t we give them the same opportunity?

3. Doing what we can to make amends Reconciling, making things right between us really means making things right between us.  If I have wronged someone, it’s not their job to erase the debt – it’s mine.  And that may well include some form of recompense.  I may not be able to do it all at once, in which case I outline what I am going to do – and then, and this is most important, do it.  There is no credit here for my good intentions if they remain nothing but intentions.  Sometimes there really is nothing we can do to make up for what was done.  But we can refrain from repeating the same mistake.  We can change.

4. Leaving the decision to forgive to the person from whom we seek forgiveness The person we’ve harmed has the choice to make once we have sought their forgiveness whether to forgive or not.  What they should do is not up to us to decide.  We have to be willing to risk being told no, as in ‘no, I cannot or I will not forgive you.”  Once we honestly know we have done our part, we simply have to leave it at that and trust God’s Holy Spirit to begin a work within the their hearts just as was done in ours.  We must accord the one harmed the same freedom given to us – the freedom to say no.  That, too, is grace.

5. Making this a priority in our lives  What the Holy Spirit brings to your heart requires your response – now.  It is so urgent that Jesus speaks of literally walking out of church in order to go and seek the person out.  “Lose no time.”  The act of reconciliation is more important to God than what we might think of as the most holy act of worship.  How we are with each other, then, we might understand as a form of worship itself.  How do we worship God?  By seeking the forgiveness of those we have harmed.

We do this work in the constant companionship of God’s own self, God’s Holy Spirit, who begs us to remember and act, that nothing, not even ourselves, might separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

Amen.

On Being Forgiven

To forgive ourselves is to step in to God’s reality . . . to relax in to God’s grace . . . to know ourselves to be forgiven by God Almighty and to accept that truth in every aspect of our lives.

That said, how do we forgive ourselves?  Or allow ourselves to be forgiven?

1. Take a good hard look at ourselves.  1 John 3.19-21 (The Message):  My dear children, let’s not just talk about love; let’s practice real love. This is the only way we’ll know we’re living truly, living in God’s reality. It’s also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it. For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves.  And friends, once that’s taken care of and we’re no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we’re bold and free before God!  If we’re carrying guilt, we need to take the time to face head on where the guilt is coming from – is it because we haven’t taken care of something we need to take care of?

2. Acknowledge that we are in need of forgiveness – this is confession – the admission that we have fallen short.  Leviticus 5.5 (NRSV)  When you realize your guilt, you shall confess the sin that you have committed.  To whom?  12-step programs recommend that we admit our specific failings to (a) God; (b) ourselves; and ( c ) another human being.  The point is to get honest – honest with God, honest with ourselves and lest we hold back with God or ourselves, that we lay it all before another trusted human being – someone who will hold us accountable in love

3. Open ourselves to receive God’s forgiveness.  2 Corinthians 5.17 (ESV)  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. Our job is to open ourselves to receive this truth and having received it, to live it, by not holding ourselves captive to the things we have done and by opening ourselves to a new way of living.

4. Expiation – the act of making amends for the wrongs we have done.  Numbers 5.6 (NRSV)  Speak to the Israelites: When a man or a woman wrongs another, breaking faith with the Lord, that person incurs guilt . . .  Biblically understood, guilt is that which requires payment to satisfy the wrong.  What does expiation or an amend look like?  It depends.  Sometimes it’s repayment.  This is the eye-for-eye mode of justice.  In day-to-day life, however, we are not often in the land of offering up our eyes.  But neither are we in the land of pretending nothing ever happened.  Our wrongs require our effort to restore to the other what was lost. The most genuine amend is the evidence of change – of not doing the thing again. Thus restorative justice has two parts:  (1)  as to the past, we restore to the other person what was lost, by apology, by returning to the extent we can what was taken, and so on; and (2) as to the future, we commit to a new way of being so the thing is not done again. [A side note: making amends always requires that we do no more harm than we already have.]

Expiation is the means by which we enter in to God’s redeeming grace in the day-to-day – not to earn our way into God’s good graces – we’re already there.  We really are already forgiven.  No – we expiate our sins, that is, we make amends for them, in order that we may become that new thing God created us to be.  Expiation is our co-work with Christ – Christ made us new from the cross; by daily making amends when we fall short, we live out the reality of our new-ness.

Guilt is a healthy thing – it is the immediate price we pay for having wronged others.  But it is not a penalty.  Rather, our feelings of guilt exist in order to prompt us to change – to redress the wrongs we have done and to foreswear doing them again. Guilt has a purpose.  Once the purpose has been met, the guilt goes away – when we are healthy.  When we cling to unhealth, we hold on to guilt long past the time when it serves its purpose.

To forgive ourselves or to fully embrace our God-given forgivenness, we have work to do – not to earn the forgiveness.  Rather, we atone, we make amends, precisely because we already were forgiven.  It is an act of ultimate gratitude, of thankfulness to God, that we can enter in to God’s grace that we would seek to make right that which we have done wrong.

How do we forgive ourselves?  How do we enter fully in to God’s forgiveness?  We do the work – we take a good, long, hard look at ourselves . . . we admit where we’ve fallen short – we admit it to God, we admit it to ourselves and to keep us honest and accountable, we admit it to another human being.  Then we make amends as and where we can, doing no harm to anyone else in the process.  And we surrender our guilt to God having done the very best we could, in thankfulness for Jesus’ own sacrifice that makes it possible for us to be forgiven in the first place.

God's Forgiven-ness

God forgives.  God is a forgiving God.  Forgiving is what God does because forgiving is who God is.  The two – identity (what we might call character or nature) – identity and action are inseparable in God.  Who God is is what God does and what God does is who God is.

And God is a forgiving God . . . hence God forgives.  Simple as that.

The problem – the issue, if you will, is our understanding (or our lack of understanding) and even more, our acceptance (or lack of acceptance) of this reality.

Perhaps we would do well to begin with asking what, exactly, is forgiveness?

There is no single answer in scripture.  Forgiveness is variously understood as . . .

1. Healing – as in Jesus’ healing of the paralytic in Mark 2.8-12, where Jesus proclaims him forgiven and the man immediately begins to walk.          –and–

2. A life-changing slate wiped clean as in Acts 5.29-32, when Peter preaches Christ to the High Council, “God set [Jesus] on high at his side, Prince and Savior, to give Israel the gift of a changed life and sins forgiven.” –and–

3. Restoration to right relationship with God, as in Matthew’s recounting of the last supper, “During the meal, Jesus took and blessed the bread, broke it, and gave it to his disciples: Take, eat. This is my body. Taking the cup and thanking God, he gave it to them: Drink this, all of you. This is my blood, God’s new covenant poured out for many people for the forgiveness of sins.” –and–

4. Life itself, as in Romans 5.20-21, where Paul proclaims, “All that passing laws against sin did was produce more lawbreakers. But sin didn’t, and doesn’t, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace. When it’s sin versus grace, grace wins hands down. All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that’s the end of it. Grace, because God is putting everything together again through the Messiah, invites us into life—a life that goes on and on and on, world without end.”

Forgiveness, then, is a healing . . . a life-changing slate wiped clean . . . a second chance . . . and a third . . . and, and, and . . . a restoration to right relationship with God . . . and life itself.

The best word, I think, to define what God means by forgiveness, is grace – God’s gift to human beings of relationship to God in the absence of any earthly, human reason to do so.

Because God is forgiving, we are forgiven.

God’s forgiving is not consequence free.  Scripture is rife with examples of those who were forgiven but who nevertheless experienced the consequences of their actions.  What they did not experience – the ultimate consequence – was loss of relationship with God.

As Isaiah says (Isaiah 55.6-7), God’s forgiveness is a lavish thing.  It is also a costly thing.  The twist, if you will, is that the cost of forgiving is borne by God’s own self in the person of Jesus the Christ, who, in his life and in his dying, took on the sins of the world for the benefit of all humanity.  Remember, it wasn’t from the cross, but from the wilderness where John baptized all comers that he saw his cousin Jesus walking towards him and shouted, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”  (John 1.29).Because God is a forgiving God . . . because in Christ, that forgiving divine nature beheld you and proclaimed you good . . . because God forgives, what you are in Christ . . . is forgiven (Colossians 2.11-15).

The challenge, perhaps, is accepting this enormous thing, this gift, this grace, this reality.

Week in and week out at church, we gather, we chat, we catch up with our neighbors, we settle in, we sing, we laugh, we weep, we pray, we listen, and we experience ourselves forgiven anew.  Every week our forgiveness in Christ is proclaimed.

Why do you suppose we have to do it every week?  Is it because we’re such bad people that we have to catch God up on what we’ve been up to this week?  Perhaps.

But maybe, just maybe, we hear our forgiveness proclaimed every week because we’re a forgetting people, who need reminding again and again and yet again that we are a forgiven people and just what that means.

Does it mean we get to declare a relieved ‘whew’ – avoided-hell-again boy-was-that-a-close-one exclamation of relief – good for another week?  Maybe.  I doubt it, but maybe.

But perhaps it is so much more than that.  Maybe we do this proclaiming of forgiveness every week so that we can recall with greater ease the great love God has for each and all of us . . . the sheer delight God has in each and all of us. . . the divine image God sees every second of every minute of every day in each and in all of us . . . in you and you and you and in me.

Because God forgives . . . you are forgiven . . . know this . . . and rejoice.

Amen.

Sower, Seed & Soil - Part 2

A parable of my own: When my son Ben lived with me, there came a time when I begged him to plant some tomato and pepper plants for me.  Ben is a good gardener – he inherited his Grandmother’s thumb.  He absolutely refused: I will not waste a moment of my life on planting anything for you, Ma. 

Imagine my hurt when I asked him why.  Because you won’t do the necessary work and we both know it.  You’ll ignore it and leave it to its own devices and it will die.  I won’t do it.  And you can’t make me.

That’s how I remember it, anyhow.

All the conditions were excellent for a good crop: good soil, plenty of sunshine, an easy source of nearby water in the form of the water hose; a willing and able sower, good seed.

What was missing was a gardener – someone to nurture and tend what was sown.

And without a good gardener, the crop would fail.

People are like the plants I wanted to plant but had no interest in maintaining: telling someone the Good News, preaching at them about what they should do, without being willing to go the distance with them, without being willing to do the hard work of persisting throughout their ‘season’, they have virtually no chance.

We cannot preach someone to heaven.  We have to walk alongside those – including ourselves – in need of God’s Word.

For how long?  For as long as it takes.

Just like Jesus.


___________________

Ben was right, of course – I would have been too unmindful to even drag the garden hose the few feet necessary to water my imaginary plants.  It’s not easy when the son becomes the teacher, let me tell you.

Sower, Seed & Soil (Part 1)

Matthew 13 (NRSV):   “Listen! A sower went out to sow.  And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up.  Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil.  But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away.  Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them.  Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.  Let anyone with ears listen! . . . When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart; this is what was sown on the path.  As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy;  yet such a person has no root, but endures only for a while, and when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, that person immediately falls away. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the lure of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing.  But as for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”

***

Sower, Seed & Soil (Part 1)

In Jesus’ parable, we are left with three ‘groups’: 1.  The sower; 2.  The seeds; and 3.  The soil.

The trick of the parable, perhaps, is to recognize that we ourselves, as well as God, can play any or all of these roles.

We operate as the sower when we bring the Word of God to others, whether with our words or with our deeds.

We operate as the seeds when the Word of God works (or doesn’t work) upon us.

We operate as the soil, offering ground fertile or infertile – that is, the space in which God’s Word either finds root or does not – for ourselves and for others.

Some things to know about sowers:

1. We are all sowers.  We are all proclaimers of God’s Word.  We are a priesthood of believers, each and all of us called and charged with the gift and responsibility of sharing what we know with others.  There is no professional priesthood that gets laypeople off the hook.  It is not my job; it is ours, this proclaiming business.  It is ours.

2. The sower’s job is to sow the seed – that is to proclaim God’s Word with our words and most importantly, with our lives.  The response of the seed is not within our control – when we sow, we do the best we can and leave the rest to God and the other person.

3. A sower sows.  A sower does not tell the soil it is unworthy of the seed.  A sower nurtures the soil if nurture it needs.  A sower clears the soil of rock before sowing rather than complaining that the soil is rocky when seed fails to take root.  A sower works with rather than against the soil.

4. Sowers persist.  A sower knows that sometimes the seed simply will not take root and germinate.  The results are not within the sower’s control.  Sowers sow.  It is the seed which must do the growing.  This is why a sower does not abandon tomatoes as a crop merely because of one bad year for tomatoes.

5. A sower knows that depending on the crop, he may never live to see the fruits of his labor; yet the sower trusts that fruits there will be.

Some things to remember about the ground, dirt, soil that we are:

1. Sometimes soil stays the same; mostly it doesn’t.  Wonderful beds of soil have been made or lost over time to due changing weather patterns, changing river ways, to management and mismanagement.

2. What lays under the top soil isn’t obvious.  You’ve got to do some digging to find out about the true value of the land.

3. Sometimes only time will tell when it comes to what we put in the ground – sometimes you just have to wait and see what will grow.

4. Soil is often affected by things beyond its control – chemical pesticides, weather (wind and rain) caused erosion, the formation of gullies (which travel uphill rather than down).

Finally, seeds might do well to remember that:

1. The germ of life lives within you.

2. The desire to respond to good soil and water and sun – to nourishment – is innate to who you are – you are a seed – you were made for growing.  And like the caterpillar, who you are now looks nothing like who or what you will become.

3. You are a crop seed, which means that when you grow, it will not be – or not only be – for your own glory, but for the nourishment, the sustaining, of others.

As followers of The Way, we are all sowers, soil and seeds – sometimes for ourselves, sometimes for others.

Being a sower means being patient, diligent and persistent. . . and knowledgeable about the soil and seed. The farmer who quits the first time a crop fails isn’t much of a farmer.  Likewise, a sower of God’s Word who gets discouraged at the first rejection isn’t going to be much of a sower.

A good farmer is one who understands the particular seed he works with, knowing in what conditions it will best grow, understanding the soil he’s dealing with.  Likewise, a good sower doesn’t beat the soil or condemn the seed.  Rather, the good sower does all he can to nourish the soil, remove the rocks, establish a rich top soil to give the seed the best possible chance to grow.

And being the seed is just doing that which we were created to do: grow.

The Ascension: Going Up?

In Acts 1.1-11, we read that Jesus ‘goes up’ to heaven.  When I hear this, all I can hear is an elevator

Dali's Ascension - a ground's eye view

operator asking, ‘going up’?  It just seems so . . . ridiculous. This ‘going-upedness’ of Jesus, lifted into the sky on a God-cloud, seems . . . so . . . silly . . . as if Jesus were Superman or better, Lois Lane, being flown into the sunset . . . it . . . is . . . ridiculous . . . isn’t it?

But the author of Ephesians has it more right than I do when he prays that the people of God’s church may ‘see with the eyes of your heart’.  That helps . . . a little.

The eyes of the heart and the words of Barbara Brown Taylor help me to understand a bit better what this ascension thing is all about:  “It was not enough that through him God was born into the body of the world; that was just his Christmas gift to us. His ascension gift was that through him the body of the world was borne (carried) back to God. . . Jesus has not only brought God to us; he has also brought us to God.”

John Calvin says, “Since Christ entered heaven in our flesh, as if in our name . . . in a sense, we already sit with God in the heavenly places in [Christ].” Thus does Jesus open the way to the heavenly kingdom, by which Calvin means that without Jesus, you and I just can’t get ‘there’ from ‘here’.

Using my elevator image, we might say Jesus ‘went up’ in order that we won’t ‘go down’.  By opening the gates of heaven, Jesus closes the gates of hell forever.

Brown Taylor puts it this way, “It was almost as if he had not ascended but exploded, so that all the holiness that was once concentrated in him alone flew everywhere, flew far and wide, so that the seeds of heaven were sown in all the fields of the earth.”

Silly as it sounds . . . We do worship a flying Jesus . . .

But it’s a bit like an airplane . . . no matter how well crafted it is, it can’t fly simply because it ‘decides’ to . . . [This might be a good time to make your own paper airplane and try to fly it to heaven.  That’s what we did in church today, anyhow.]

What is astonishing is that neither could Jesus . . . Jesus didn’t decide to go to heaven . . . Jesus didn’t fly ‘there’ on the power of his own might or even the power of his own decision . . . Jesus didn’t go to heaven . . . Jesus was taken to heaven . . .

Grace is the word we use to understand this simple, crucial truth . . . of our own power, we can do nothing.  Yes, we have work to do.  But if we are not very careful, it is oh so easy to believe that the work, and not God, is our pathway to heaven.

Like paper airplanes, human beings who try to fly themselves to heaven will always fall back to earth.

Think of it as the difference between the grateful and the guarded.  The grateful share what they have . . . it wasn’t theirs to begin with, so what’s the big deal?  The guarded live their lives like characters on apocalyptic television shows, willing to kill to protect their bread from starving others . . .

The guarded always have a plan . . . the grateful simply trust, for they know their plans mean nothing . . . they’ve failed too often not to know.

The guarded know how much work they have done and how much pay they’re entitled to for the work . . . the grateful simply offer thanks for whatever they get, knowing they didn’t earn a bit of it . . .

The guarded think in terms of ‘mine’ and ‘yours’, for they have earned what is theirs and expect that you should do likewise. . . the grateful know there is no earning all the bounty they have received, so they simply say ‘thank you’.

The guarded are often angry at the injustices done to themselves by others . . . the grateful are angry with the injustices done to others . . .

The guarded are productive and hold those who are not in contempt . . . the grateful are not productive and so are free to love others simply because they are, and not because of what they do . . .

The guarded are jealous of the successes of others . . . the grateful rejoice in them . . .

The guarded compete . . . the grateful cooperate . . .

The guarded believe good fences make good neighbors . . . the grateful know good fences make only good fences . . . and that a good neighbor is made from being invited in, not being kept out . . .

The guarded believe the path to heaven is a ladder they must perpetually climb lest they be left behind . . . the grateful know the path to heaven is an elevator and their ticket was bought for them by Jesus a very, very, long time ago.

Going up?

Some Snippets on John 14

“Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Believe in God, believe also in me.  

At the time of their last gathering, when Jesus has washed the feet and the meal has been had and Judas has run off to do his dirty work, Jesus (1) tells his disciples he’s leaving and they can’t go with him and then (2) gives his followers their last and most important marching orders: Love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.  By this [loving] everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

After pointing out how the grand claims to love will ring empty (Jesus’ prediction that Peter will betray him three times) Jesus’ very next words are but don’t worry about that.  Just believe.  Believe God.  Believe me.


In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.  

Jesus speaks of relationship with God as a home place – a place already ready and waiting . . . a place for you . . . where the sheets are clean and the bed already turned down, where your name is set in a place of honor . . . where you will be made not merely welcome, but at home . . .
.

And you know the way to the place where I am going.”  Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?”  Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. 

I am . . . the way . . . the truth . . . the life . . . Jesus could just as well have said I am your way, your truth, your life . . . walk as I walk . . . live as I have lived . . . proclaim as I have proclaimed . . . this is your journey and your destination, all wrapped in to one . . . do not worry, for you really do know . . . you have seen me and in seeing me, you have seen the face of God and lived . . . keep seeing me and you will keep living, keep loving . . . for the fact is, you really do know the way because you know me.


No one comes to the Father except through me.  If you know me, you will know my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”

This is not a creedal statement of our faith; rather, this is Jesus’ statement about his own identity.  This is Jesus’ own proclamation that he is The Divine.  Jesus is making it as clear as he can to his disciples that they have seen God (the Father) because they have seen Jesus.  They are one and the same.  Philip’s question and Jesus’ answer make that even more clear:


Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and we will be satisfied.”  Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you all this time, Philip, and you still do not know me? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?  Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own; but the Father who dwells in me does his works.  

The very voice of God speaks now directly to Philip: Here I am, standing right before you.  Philip, I’m right here.  Right here, right now, you can be satisfied, made whole, filled . . . for right here, right now, I am.


Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; but if you do not, then believe me because of the works themselves. 

To make this be about miracles is too limited, too small, a claim.  Jesus is speaking here to one of his disciples, one who has lived, eaten, walked alongside, slept with, listened to, this Jesus.  Philip has seen the private face as well as the public one and thus is uniquely qualified to know Jesus through and through.  This is about knowing.

This isn’t about faith.  This is about understanding – about knowing the nature, the character of God . . . of knowing what kind of god God is.

And there is God, standing right in front of Philip and declaring, here I am, your exhibit A – know me and know what kind of God I am . . . know me and be comforted . . . know me . . .

This, perhaps, is the most surprising thing about the entirety of the New Testament: God is a god who wishes to be known.  Like you know your best friend known.  Like you know your lover known.  Like you know your husband or wife of 50 years+ known.  Like you know every crevasse of your baby’s body known.  Like you know the back of your own hand known.

There is a poignancy to this plea of God’s, this almost begging desire to be seen, to be understood, to be known.

And there, in that exchange with Philip, is the sum of our faith: behold your God . . . see your God . . . in the face, in the words, and especially in the doing, know Jesus, know your God.


Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these, because I am going to the Father. 

And in this seeing, in this knowing, there is an unleashing of great things where wonder walks the earth . . . and maybe, just maybe, he speaks of miracles and wonders . . . and maybe, just maybe, we were made to heal and also to upset the social order the way Jesus upset tables . . . maybe, just maybe, we were made to preach and proclaim and also to care about and from our caring feed the thousands as he did . . . maybe, just maybe, we were made to tell stories and also to sweat out our prayers like blood and pray reality into existence as he did . . . and maybe, just maybe, we, like Jesus, are here to love and in our loving, to make the God who so desires to be known be obvious to a world looking so hard for a little love.


I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.

Whether we say so or not, all that we do, we do in his name, under his authority, his claim upon our lives.  All that we claim, we claim in his name, under his authority, his claim upon our lives.

Jesus answers for us because we are his.  Simple as that.

This life we live, these things we do, we live and do not on our own behalf, but on behalf of the one in whose name we come.

And so do we pray in Jesus’ name not as a magical incantation, as if stamping Jesus’ name on the end of our prayers guarantees their answer to our satisfaction.  Rather do we act in Jesus’ name in recognition that what we do and how we do it, which includes our prayers, we do only within the identity of Jesus as the Risen One, as God’s very self.  Thus do we merge into the God that God is, becoming one as God and Jesus himself are one.

It is an incredible gift and an incredible responsibility.

And it is all wrapped up in one simple sentence: my house is yours.  Where I live, you live.  Where I go, you go.  Where I am, you are.

Amen.

Sermon Cliff Note: It Was Evening When He Came

It was evening when he came . . . and they, well, they were afraid – hiding behind locked doors – dreading every sound, hearing every creak upon the stairs as the threat to their existence that it was . . . they were next – simple as that . . .

It was there . . . behind the locks and the doors . . . in the foggy dimness of twilight . . . in a room filled with the stench of fear . . . that Jesus stood, as if he had been there all along . . . and calmly pronounced the accompanying reality of God’s own peace to a group of people who could barely imagine such peace let alone feel its accompanying presence . . .

And then the risen Jesus does this extraordinary thing . . . as part of his divine sending, he breathes the Holy Spirit into them . . . God has come to become their very breath . . .

And thus what happens in that room is the very Genesis act of creating and recreating . . . God breathes . . . we live . . .

As one translation of God’s creation of humanity in Genesis has it, “And Yahweh God fashioned the humanity of the dust of the ground, and breathed into its nostrils the breathing of life, so the humanity became a living breath”. . . because God breathed, we became . . . a . . . living breath . . .

Medieval scientist, nun, theologian, poetess, chastizer of popes and bishops, and songwriter, Hildegard of Bingen, once wrote, “My new song must float like a feather on the breath of God.”

Every  breath we take is infused with God . . . every song, every word, every shout, every cry . . . floats on the breath of God . . .

God’s breath is like an ocean surrounding us and infusing us . . . how very silly we must seem to God as we spend so much time unaware that we are filled with and in the midst of God’s life-giving, life-saving ocean of breath. . . an ocean of love lifting and holding us up . . . safely floating us to our destination while we, unaware, dream we are swimming . . . or worse, nightmare we are drowning . . . when God’s life-sustaining breath is there all along . . .

Understood this way, perhaps we can see Jesus and ourselves as God’s breath . . . inhaling . . . taking into God’s very self all that is wrong and broken and bad in our world . . . and in us . . .// and exhaling . . . breathing into us and through us, into the world, as God’s gifting all that is of God . . . God’s goodness . . . God’s wholeness . . . God’s health . . . God’s peace . . .

For Jesus’ words convey clearly that what God sent him to do, Jesus sends them, sends us to do on his behalf . . .

And what is that thing for which Jesus was sent?  It is that simple and oh-so-hard-in-the-doing thing we call forgiveness . . . the better translation of the Greek is release, as in set free from bondage . . .

As Jesus says, it’s quite simple, really: If you forgive others, they are forgiven . . . this is the work I am sending you out to do . . . everywhere . . . with everyone . . . for if you do not do this, then . . .

Well, the usual translation is that if you don’t forgive, they’re unforgiven, which most interpret to mean Jesus’ followers are invested with the divine ability to forgive . . . or not . . .

The ‘or not’ is problematic when considered with the entirety of the gospels . . . recall Jesus’ own words in his Sermon on the Mount: forgive others if you yourself would be forgiven . . .

Jesus is not setting forth a menu of choice for his followers; rather, Jesus is reminding them that forgiveness, setting free, is the very center, the heart, of what he came to do and teach us to do . . . the Greek makes it a bit more clear by saying essentially if you do not let them go, then they are held . . . The Message translates it thusly:   “If you forgive someone’s sins, they’re gone for good. If you don’t forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?”

Precisely: if we don’t forgive, if we don’t set ourselves and others free with God’s forgiving word, then what?  What will we do instead?

This Jesus, resurrected from a cross . . . spent not one moment on how he got there or who put him there . . . forgiveness . . . the real-time demonstration of freedom from the bondage to the past . . . is Jesus’ central gospel theme . . . and thus it must be ours . . .

When he sent the disciples, investing them with the priestly power to proclaim forgiveness, this, then, is what he came for . . .

And notice what he did not do . . . he did not proclaim them forgiven . . . what he did was actually even more extraordinary – he gave unto the ones in desperate need of forgiving the very power to proclaim forgiveness . . . after all, who better?

The only question left is . . . Are we going to live out his gospel or our own?  His forgiveness or our refusal?  His release from bondage or our insistence on enslavement?  His joy or our bitter condemnation?  His grace or our justice?

Thus every day do we choose . . . locked doors . . . fear. . . guilt . . . shame . . . or freedom . . . joy . . . grace . . .

Here then is the Good News in a nutshell:  breathe in God’s spirit
and the only thing you can breathe out is peace . . . God’s own delivering, releasing, freeing . . . peace . . .

The fear-filled trembling followers hiding out behind locked doors, so frightened were they of what was to come, became faith-filled believers, betting everything on God and letting it ride.

The question for us is a simple one: do we want to be that kind of follower?  If so, pray for it - pray for the kind of faith that will give you the miracle of giving it all away.