Thomas gets a bum rap, being labeled as “doubting” Not that he didn’t doubt, but his doubting wasn’t unique—the other disciples doubted too. Thomas’ doubting, as told by John in today’s Gospel, just gets more airtime, being read the second Sunday of Easter every year. But there’s plenty of doubt in the other Gospels. In the 24th Chapter of Luke, when Jesus appears to the others in the locked upper room on Easter night, he asks why “doubt has arisen” in their hearts? In these early days of Easter doubt isn’t the sole property of Thomas.
Doubt isn’t a bad thing, it’s just a human thing.
Doubt isn’t denying, it’s not condemning. It’s a time of bewilderment, a time of question---doubt comes when things aren’t clear---when all the evidence isn’t yet in or all the evidence hasn’t crystallized in our brains yet. Doubt is common when all that we know to be—the order of our world---is shattered.
When I lived and worked as a psychotherapist in suburban Chicago I served on a disaster response team. Our job was to mobilize in natural and human made disasters, being among the first responders to the scene. One Labor Day evening we were called out to a railroad crossing in a nearby village. A last blast of summer festival had been going on and a group of high school kids were hanging out by the railroad crossing when an express Amtrak train came down the track, striking and killing a local high school sophomore. I had the difficult task of informing the girl’s mother of her death. When given the terrible news, the mother calmly looked at me and said, “No that’s impossible, she was at the movies.” In that instance she was denying reality---then it hit her and she fell to the ground, sobbing. For those first few moments, she doubted the message I had delivered. She doubted that anything this horrible could possibly happen, but soon her brain began to assimilate it and the tragic truth became clear.
But it’s not only bad news that can be met with doubt, good news can be equally difficult to fathom.
Whether it’s the people on tv who’ve won the publishers’ clearinghouse, or finding out you’ve gotten the job of your dreams or hearing that the cancer is gone----good news can take some time to sink in.
Doubt buys us time for the joy to fully engage, it buys us time to gird ourselves against the bad.
Doubt gives us time to catch up to the reality of our lives.
And in those first few hours, those first few days following the crucifixion, the reality of the disciples’ life wasn’t pretty. The king they loved they denied, the rulers they feared they defied. It wasn’t a good time to be one of Jesus’ followers…so when they hear from Mary Magdalene that Jesus is alive do they run out looking for him carried by this thrilling and joyous news?
No, they remain paralyzed by their doubt, immobilized by their fear, stuck in their shame. Remember they had abandoned and denied Jesus. They had let him down in his greatest hour of need. And now he was alive? Uh oh. Human nature would dictate that the disciples must have feared that Jesus’ would be MAD. The disciples while thrilled that Jesus was alive, may have had some trepidation about seeing him again. But this time the disciples could not run and hide. For even while huddled behind locked doors, Jesus appears, not in anger or disappointment but in Peace and Love. He doesn’t say How could you? He says Peace Be With You. He doesn’t re-hash their failings of the past week, but commissions them to go out and spread the Good News of Peace to the world. Jesus accepts their failings and loves them. Jesus rejects their fear and loves them. This is radical. This is shocking. This can take some getting used to!
And even though they had heard it hundreds of times before, even though we hear it, week in and week out, this simple message of love peace and forgiveness is really difficult to understand; it can be difficult to accept.
Thomas, along with the other disciples, needed to see the reality of Jesus’ resurrection before they could "get it." Their doubt wasn’t a lack of faith, it wasn’t that they didn’t believe, they just didn’t understand.
Thomas’ doubt bought him time to comprehend all that had happened, so that, when he saw Jesus for himself he could proclaim, “My Lord and My God.” Thomas’ doubt led his faith to a place of understanding. Thomas, given time, Got It.
Today, the emotional roller coaster of Holy Week is over, we’ve proclaimed Christ risen, we’ve shouted Alleluia, we’ve rejoiced in the new light of Christ.
Today we sit back, along with Thomas and the other disciples, fully aware of what we are capable of---killing God in the flesh—and aware of what God is capable of: peace and forgiveness. This astonishing realization of what we can and sometimes do and what God always does, is shocking and takes some getting used too.
So today we begin the process of clearing the doubt from our hearts and minds and embracing the Truth as given to us through Jesus Christ. The truth that we’ve been entrusted with the same task Jesus gave the disciples: to go out into the world seeking and serving Christ in everyone we meet. To offer peace and forgiveness to everyone: those we may not understand, those we may not even like and even those who may scare us. Today, as Jesus sends his disciples out into the world, I am reminded of what brought me through the doors of this Cathedral church nine years ago: the promise that this place offered hospitality healing and hope. It is promise that you fulfilled and a promise I know you will continue to fulfill. It has been a joy to be among you as a parishioner and it has been an honor and privilege to serve you as priest. Thank you.
AMEN.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Sunday, April 4, 2010
Easter Vigil 2010
+Some of you have heard me mention that, several years ago, a 9 year old girl asked me why we go through Holy Week every year. After all, she said, we know it works out in the end! Of course we do know how the story ends and tonight we stand at the dramatic and glorious climax of the Holy Week Drama—an empty tomb, a risen Christ—but, as I told that young lady a few years ago---we must walk through the drama of Holy Week each and every year because although the story doesn’t change, we do. We need the reminder, we need the journey. To paraphrase a history professor I had years ago, why does history repeat itself? Because people change. We need the same old story to guide us in the new varied and divergent paths our lives take. We change, God doesn’t. We forget, God remembers. We stray, God remains steady.
And so we journey….from the triumphal march into Jerusalem, to the loneliness and despair of the garden, the bitter trial, the agony of the cross, the silence of death and finally, the joy of resurrection. What a walk!
Tonight we heard the story of salvation. From the first glimmer of new light we heard of God’s saving efforts throughout the ages, from the Red Sea to the dry bones, from Bethlehem to Jerusalem, from Gethsemane to Calvary, from life to death and life again.
Tonight we have been given in clear and certain terms: A New Life in Christ. In a few moments, Elijah Michael Cumbo-Burris will, through his baptism, be sealed as Christ’s own forever. And through this sacrament of Baptism each of us will renew our commitment to Christ as well as our commitment to see Christ in all whom we encounter. How easy it is for us to lose our way. How easy it is for us to forget.
So, how does Elijah, as he begins his life in Christ, remember the promise of Easter amidst the inevitability of Holy Week. How do any of us keep an Easter faith in our own personal Holy Weeks, our own moments of doubt, despair loneliness and fear?
Elijah will do well if he remembers the lessons of Holy Week throughout his life. I think we all would do well to remember what we’ve learned through this Holiest of weeks.
Palm Sunday: triumph has different meanings. I don’t think anyone really knew what to expect when Jesus marched into Jerusalem. No doubt many of the disciples thought that in Jerusalem, Jesus would topple the civic and religious structure of the day. I’m not sure any of them thought victory could come from the cross and the tomb. Elijah, don’t expect that the victory of your life will always look how you think it will. Sometimes victory comes swaddled in rags, born in a barn and killed like a common criminal.
Maundy Thursday. It’s important to take time for fellowship. Sit with family and friends—break bread together. The bonds formed over the dinner table are fierce and will hold, come what may. Sometimes, words are not needed. Sometimes those we love simply need someone to sit with them, to bear witness to the pain they are enduring. We can’t take pain away from others, but we can be a silent witness. Elijah, never underestimate the power of your presence.
Good Friday: There will be times when your beliefs will be challenged, when you will be tempted to deny what you believe to be true and right because it isn’t popular or it’s too scary to stand up for what you know to be true. Elijah, stand up for what is right as best you can, and when you falter remember that God stands at the ready, waiting for you—for all of us-- to come home where forgiveness always reigns.
Holy Saturday. Where is God? As Benedictine nun and author Joan Chittister says: “The importance of Holy Saturday lies in its power to bring us to the kind of faith the spiritual masters call “mature.” Holy Saturday faith is not about counting our blessings; it is about dealing with darkness and growing in hope”
Elijah, there will be days when you will feel utterly alone and bereft. Know that deep within that sadness, at the very bottom of the well of loneliness there’s a small still voice weeping with you and for you, sharing in your pain. You may not feel it, but know that it is there and that you can count on it. None of us is ever alone, no matter what.
Easter—the Resurrection— Just as quickly as you find yourself in the depths of despair you will find yourself relieved and released from the pain. Suddenly it will be gone. The sadness will lift and joy will again reign. For as you journey through your Christian life Elijah, you will have ups and down. You’ll have your share of Easter joys and Good Friday losses. But---and this is the most important lesson any of us can take from our Christian journey----Holy week always ends in Easter, Darkness always gives way to light, and sin always loses out to grace and truth and love. Alleluia, Elijah and Alleluia to all of us--The Lord is Risen Indeed!
+
And so we journey….from the triumphal march into Jerusalem, to the loneliness and despair of the garden, the bitter trial, the agony of the cross, the silence of death and finally, the joy of resurrection. What a walk!
Tonight we heard the story of salvation. From the first glimmer of new light we heard of God’s saving efforts throughout the ages, from the Red Sea to the dry bones, from Bethlehem to Jerusalem, from Gethsemane to Calvary, from life to death and life again.
Tonight we have been given in clear and certain terms: A New Life in Christ. In a few moments, Elijah Michael Cumbo-Burris will, through his baptism, be sealed as Christ’s own forever. And through this sacrament of Baptism each of us will renew our commitment to Christ as well as our commitment to see Christ in all whom we encounter. How easy it is for us to lose our way. How easy it is for us to forget.
So, how does Elijah, as he begins his life in Christ, remember the promise of Easter amidst the inevitability of Holy Week. How do any of us keep an Easter faith in our own personal Holy Weeks, our own moments of doubt, despair loneliness and fear?
Elijah will do well if he remembers the lessons of Holy Week throughout his life. I think we all would do well to remember what we’ve learned through this Holiest of weeks.
Palm Sunday: triumph has different meanings. I don’t think anyone really knew what to expect when Jesus marched into Jerusalem. No doubt many of the disciples thought that in Jerusalem, Jesus would topple the civic and religious structure of the day. I’m not sure any of them thought victory could come from the cross and the tomb. Elijah, don’t expect that the victory of your life will always look how you think it will. Sometimes victory comes swaddled in rags, born in a barn and killed like a common criminal.
Maundy Thursday. It’s important to take time for fellowship. Sit with family and friends—break bread together. The bonds formed over the dinner table are fierce and will hold, come what may. Sometimes, words are not needed. Sometimes those we love simply need someone to sit with them, to bear witness to the pain they are enduring. We can’t take pain away from others, but we can be a silent witness. Elijah, never underestimate the power of your presence.
Good Friday: There will be times when your beliefs will be challenged, when you will be tempted to deny what you believe to be true and right because it isn’t popular or it’s too scary to stand up for what you know to be true. Elijah, stand up for what is right as best you can, and when you falter remember that God stands at the ready, waiting for you—for all of us-- to come home where forgiveness always reigns.
Holy Saturday. Where is God? As Benedictine nun and author Joan Chittister says: “The importance of Holy Saturday lies in its power to bring us to the kind of faith the spiritual masters call “mature.” Holy Saturday faith is not about counting our blessings; it is about dealing with darkness and growing in hope”
Elijah, there will be days when you will feel utterly alone and bereft. Know that deep within that sadness, at the very bottom of the well of loneliness there’s a small still voice weeping with you and for you, sharing in your pain. You may not feel it, but know that it is there and that you can count on it. None of us is ever alone, no matter what.
Easter—the Resurrection— Just as quickly as you find yourself in the depths of despair you will find yourself relieved and released from the pain. Suddenly it will be gone. The sadness will lift and joy will again reign. For as you journey through your Christian life Elijah, you will have ups and down. You’ll have your share of Easter joys and Good Friday losses. But---and this is the most important lesson any of us can take from our Christian journey----Holy week always ends in Easter, Darkness always gives way to light, and sin always loses out to grace and truth and love. Alleluia, Elijah and Alleluia to all of us--The Lord is Risen Indeed!
+
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Sermon for Lent 4c: God's Prodigious Love
Today’s Gospel begins with Jesus being harangued by the Pharisees…so what’s new, right? They’re ticked off because he’s been cavorting with sinners, hanging out with the wrong people, doing things he shouldn’t have been doing. According to the social mores, as established by the Pharisees, Jesus was breaking all the rules. Like I said, what else is new?
And, as is his custom, Jesus answers the charges with a parable.
The parable of the prodigal son is said to be the most famous. This is no surprise really--- we all know this guy don’t we? We all have a sibling, co-worker, neighbor or friend who is just like the Prodigal Son. A pain in the youknowhat.
But, Methodist pastor and author Grace Imathiu (“imayathu”) reminds us of prodigal’s actual definition. Prodigal doesn’t mean problem and prodigal doesn’t mean loser. Prodigal means to give or yield profusely and extravagantly. A prodigal person is someone who does things in a BIG way. Prodigal is the root for prodigious as in, “the rest of the country thinks Buffalo gets a prodigious amount of snow, when we know that Syracuse is really the Prodigious Snow Capital of the New York.” This young man did his rebellion prodigiously.
But, back to these prodigal people we know—you know, the person who squanders their money, their good will, their responsibilities….all to the chagrin of you and me. We’re like the elder brother aren’t we? We do things the right way. We take care of business. We follow the rules, do what’s expected of us and when these prodigals saunter in and out of our lives we’re resentful, bitter, exasperated…maybe even whiny. It’s annoying-- they get the party don’t they? They get the fatted calf, the jewels, the nice clothes….the hugs.
Many of us here today are thinking about the prodigals in our lives. A few of us are even admitting— to ourselves-- that we, at times, are the prodigal.
Regardless of whether we are the lost who has been found or the always here and feeling taken for granted, we have a place in this story.
Barbara Brown Taylor has written a number of reflections on this parable. One is entitled the Prodigal Father. Other folks have written about the Prodigal Elder brother. It seems people have different interpretations of who is the recklessly extravagant one in the story.
The father, according to Taylor is the reckless one. After all, in ancient middle eastern society, the father did not run after a wayward son, meeting him on the road---where everyone could see—and lavish him with love before the boy could even utter the most base of apologies. A father in Jesus’ time did not forgive without penance. It just wasn’t done. But in this story it was done. Because that’s how Jesus’ parables go---they take what is expected and do the unexpected.
Others have referred to this as the parable of the Prodigal elder brother who is reckless in his rejection of his younger brother and abundant in his resentment of his father. This older brother has a prodigious amount of resentment, hurt feelings and disappointment.
And of course we have the younger brother, the original Prodigal who so boorishly grabs what isn’t his to grab and goes off to live a life of fast living and lousy investments, only to find himself sitting in the actual and spiritual filth of a pigs.
But, in the end, he hits rock bottom, he “comes to himself.” In 12 step lingo this is called “admitting you are powerless and your life has become unmanageable.” You see, in the practice of the 12 steps one cannot move forward with recovery until one has sat in that hog slop, has come to realize the complete mess our life and then -- ever so slowly-- ask for help. Our prodigal son does just this. And in the wisdom that comes when you have nothing left to lose, he knows this help will be his for the taking if he simply goes home and asks for forgiveness.
Now it can be debated whether the prodigal was really sorry---perhaps he was really hungry, really tired and really scared—but was he really sorry? We don’t know. We’re not told.
Because it doesn’t matter. In this parable, in the 12 step groups and in our life with God, amendment of life doesn’t begin with awareness of how sorry we really are. No amendment of life begins with admitting that we’re powerless, that our way hasn’t gotten us where we want to—should be. Our way has gotten us in our own version of a pig sty envious of the food given to the hogs and sure of only one thing: that we’re NOT where we want to be. So we trudge home, ready to beg for forgiveness, not because we really mean it, but because we really NEED it.
And lo and behold, what happens? What happens to the Prodigal in our story? He, before he can utter his well rehearsed apology, before he can beg his father to at least give him an opportunity to be one of his slaves, his father races out to meet him, lavishing him with kisses and brings him home to a fancy robe, beautiful jewelry and a sumptuous feast.
This is not as uncommon as we may think. When that AA member attend their first meeting, full of shame and fear, before they can even tell their tale of woe and despair they hear it in the stories of the others sitting around that table. So without uttering a word, they are given a cup of coffee a smile, a hug and are told: it’s ok, you’re safe now. Welcome home.
And you know what happens when we stray and become lost, finally returning to trudge up the steps of this Cathedral and settle into a pew? We hear the words of the Prodigal Father who says to the Prodigal Elder Brother--the one who doesn’t quite understand or like that his wayward brother is being treated like a prince---- “he was lost and now he is found”—we hear that we’re loved, our sins forgiven and we’re invited to join in the feast of our Lord, where we hear: “Now there is rejoicing in heaven, for you were lost and now are found, you were dead and are now alive in Christ Jesus our Lord”(BCP pg 451, The Reconciliation of a Penitent) .
For all of us have and will get lost. And each of us can and will be found. And when we are? That’s when the party begins. +
And, as is his custom, Jesus answers the charges with a parable.
The parable of the prodigal son is said to be the most famous. This is no surprise really--- we all know this guy don’t we? We all have a sibling, co-worker, neighbor or friend who is just like the Prodigal Son. A pain in the youknowhat.
But, Methodist pastor and author Grace Imathiu (“imayathu”) reminds us of prodigal’s actual definition. Prodigal doesn’t mean problem and prodigal doesn’t mean loser. Prodigal means to give or yield profusely and extravagantly. A prodigal person is someone who does things in a BIG way. Prodigal is the root for prodigious as in, “the rest of the country thinks Buffalo gets a prodigious amount of snow, when we know that Syracuse is really the Prodigious Snow Capital of the New York.” This young man did his rebellion prodigiously.
But, back to these prodigal people we know—you know, the person who squanders their money, their good will, their responsibilities….all to the chagrin of you and me. We’re like the elder brother aren’t we? We do things the right way. We take care of business. We follow the rules, do what’s expected of us and when these prodigals saunter in and out of our lives we’re resentful, bitter, exasperated…maybe even whiny. It’s annoying-- they get the party don’t they? They get the fatted calf, the jewels, the nice clothes….the hugs.
Many of us here today are thinking about the prodigals in our lives. A few of us are even admitting— to ourselves-- that we, at times, are the prodigal.
Regardless of whether we are the lost who has been found or the always here and feeling taken for granted, we have a place in this story.
Barbara Brown Taylor has written a number of reflections on this parable. One is entitled the Prodigal Father. Other folks have written about the Prodigal Elder brother. It seems people have different interpretations of who is the recklessly extravagant one in the story.
The father, according to Taylor is the reckless one. After all, in ancient middle eastern society, the father did not run after a wayward son, meeting him on the road---where everyone could see—and lavish him with love before the boy could even utter the most base of apologies. A father in Jesus’ time did not forgive without penance. It just wasn’t done. But in this story it was done. Because that’s how Jesus’ parables go---they take what is expected and do the unexpected.
Others have referred to this as the parable of the Prodigal elder brother who is reckless in his rejection of his younger brother and abundant in his resentment of his father. This older brother has a prodigious amount of resentment, hurt feelings and disappointment.
And of course we have the younger brother, the original Prodigal who so boorishly grabs what isn’t his to grab and goes off to live a life of fast living and lousy investments, only to find himself sitting in the actual and spiritual filth of a pigs.
But, in the end, he hits rock bottom, he “comes to himself.” In 12 step lingo this is called “admitting you are powerless and your life has become unmanageable.” You see, in the practice of the 12 steps one cannot move forward with recovery until one has sat in that hog slop, has come to realize the complete mess our life and then -- ever so slowly-- ask for help. Our prodigal son does just this. And in the wisdom that comes when you have nothing left to lose, he knows this help will be his for the taking if he simply goes home and asks for forgiveness.
Now it can be debated whether the prodigal was really sorry---perhaps he was really hungry, really tired and really scared—but was he really sorry? We don’t know. We’re not told.
Because it doesn’t matter. In this parable, in the 12 step groups and in our life with God, amendment of life doesn’t begin with awareness of how sorry we really are. No amendment of life begins with admitting that we’re powerless, that our way hasn’t gotten us where we want to—should be. Our way has gotten us in our own version of a pig sty envious of the food given to the hogs and sure of only one thing: that we’re NOT where we want to be. So we trudge home, ready to beg for forgiveness, not because we really mean it, but because we really NEED it.
And lo and behold, what happens? What happens to the Prodigal in our story? He, before he can utter his well rehearsed apology, before he can beg his father to at least give him an opportunity to be one of his slaves, his father races out to meet him, lavishing him with kisses and brings him home to a fancy robe, beautiful jewelry and a sumptuous feast.
This is not as uncommon as we may think. When that AA member attend their first meeting, full of shame and fear, before they can even tell their tale of woe and despair they hear it in the stories of the others sitting around that table. So without uttering a word, they are given a cup of coffee a smile, a hug and are told: it’s ok, you’re safe now. Welcome home.
And you know what happens when we stray and become lost, finally returning to trudge up the steps of this Cathedral and settle into a pew? We hear the words of the Prodigal Father who says to the Prodigal Elder Brother--the one who doesn’t quite understand or like that his wayward brother is being treated like a prince---- “he was lost and now he is found”—we hear that we’re loved, our sins forgiven and we’re invited to join in the feast of our Lord, where we hear: “Now there is rejoicing in heaven, for you were lost and now are found, you were dead and are now alive in Christ Jesus our Lord”(BCP pg 451, The Reconciliation of a Penitent) .
For all of us have and will get lost. And each of us can and will be found. And when we are? That’s when the party begins. +
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Sermon for Lent 2C
**this sermon is based, in large part, on an essay written by Kae Evensen in the 2.23.10 issue of The Christian Century
+I am no astronomer but I do know that the night sky, the beautiful wash of stars we see above are actually the stars as they existed thousands and in some cases millions of years ago, The light which emanates from these stars, most of which are millions of miles from earth can take many thousands of light years to reach earth. Now be careful…if you are anything like me, trying to wrap your brain around this information may make you dizzy. The bottom line is, the light produced by the stars Abram gazed upon? It quite possibly has not reached earth yet. The light, which holds that promise of God, has yet to arrive. God’s promise is still unfolding!! God was and is and is to come, and just when we think we’ve gotten a handle on what this whole God thing means to us, we hear something like the speed of light and what that means about the sky we think we are seeing as it is RIGHT now, and our whole perspective is blown to bits.
Homiletics professor and Lutheran pastor Kae Evensen says that the light of that sky, the sky of Abram and Sarai, the sky of Genesis, the sky of that promise, that first covenant of God, is the promise of things to come. All that has happened from Abraham and Sarah to Mary and Joseph to all our ancestors, to all those who have walked before us, fuels what is to come.
Even the doubts.
Abram, a man of deep faith who clearly had found favor with God, had doubts. The world, as he experienced it, was often overwhelming. We hear it today, after his encounter with God, when Abram falls into a deep sleep and a “deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him.” Abram was scared out of his wits. Abram, was having a dark night of the soul. A night so dark, that even the promise of God couldn’t keep the fear at bay.
Oddly, I find this comforting. That all of who have come before, even the greatest prophets of all, had doubts. Jesus himself had doubts. The human condition promises that we’ll doubt, we’ll fear, that we’ll have our share of dark nights and terrifying dreams. And so, like many who have come before us, and, I’m sure, those who will come after, we try very hard to keep those fears and doubts ---which lurk just around the corner of our consciousness—at bay.
And we do this by being busy, by keeping the volume of our lives turned way up. We do this by avoiding silence, by resisting the quieting of our souls.
The nature of our humanity is to fear the silence, to resist the dark and to recoil from the reaching out of God’s embrace. But, as one author has put it: God’s habit is to draw near. God does not want to and will not stay out of reach in the heavens.
While it may be difficult for us to fathom the extent of God’s love for us, I think the metaphor of mother hen, which is used several times in scripture and is referenced by Jesus in today’s Gospel, is helpful. For whether you are a mother, or have witnessed the love a mother has for her children , this image rings true. Have you ever gotten in between a mother and her chicks, cubs, pups, child? Have you ever mistakenly suggested to a mother how she may better parent her child? Have you ever, whether inadvertently or not, ticked off a mother?
It isn’t pretty.
Because a mother’s love for her child is an instinctual gut level love. There isn’t anything intellectual about it. It just is.
God’s love for us is the same: God desires nothing more than to gather us—each of us---under the loving expanse of God’s wings, protecting us from harm, holding us close.
It’s warm under those wings, cozy….but before you know it, that warmth, that coziness begins to stifle, our own reach feels stymied and we struggle to break free and to wander out on our own. And God, like any loving parent, let’s us go because God knows that is just what we need to do….for God also knows that one day, when perhaps we’ve wandered just a tad too far and we no longer feel sure, when we’re engulfed in a deep darkness, when we no longer feel safe, we’ll come running back, eager to scurry under those outstretched wings, ready to feel the comforting embrace of our creator.
Jesus’ use of this image comes as he laments all that Jerusalem has seen all that Jerusalem has done, and all that has yet to happen there to him. Jesus cries this lament with his face firmly turned toward that city of his forebears, that city which destroys prophets, that city which has rejected God’s love time and time again. I don’t know how much Jesus knew about his fate in Jerusalem. Yes, he knew that he would be martyred there, and perhaps he even knew that his friends would abandon him one by one. But I wonder, did Jesus realize how much all of that would hurt? Did Jesus realize how painful abandonment is, how scary loneliness is, how dark the night would become in Gethsemene?
Did God know how much all of this would hurt Jesus? Did God know how much that hurt would pain Him?
Does any parent?
This vulnerable flesh and bones incarnation of God had a dark night. This God in the person of Jesus, felt the terror of Abram. Jesus felt the loneliness of an existence where God can seem so far away, so absent. And Jesus, this God made man, knew how terrifying silence could be. But Jesus also walked through that dark night. Jesus endured that silence and came out the other side. Jesus dove into the depths of death, emerging from it so that we, no matter how lost we may feel, no matter how scared we may be, no matter how mad we may act, can look into the night sky and remember that no matter how far we feel from God, God is, always has been and always will be right here. Sometimes we just have to get quiet enough, still enough and sometimes, scared enough, to notice.
In the darkest of nights, we need only look to the stars and realize that the light we see from those stars is the light of Abraham, it is the light of our ancestors. No matter how lost we may feel, how lonely it might seem how long and hard the road is, we have the company of all those who have gone before us, all those who, themselves, had many a dark and lonely night. And somewhere, through the darkness, they, too were warmed by the light of those who had gone before. +
+I am no astronomer but I do know that the night sky, the beautiful wash of stars we see above are actually the stars as they existed thousands and in some cases millions of years ago, The light which emanates from these stars, most of which are millions of miles from earth can take many thousands of light years to reach earth. Now be careful…if you are anything like me, trying to wrap your brain around this information may make you dizzy. The bottom line is, the light produced by the stars Abram gazed upon? It quite possibly has not reached earth yet. The light, which holds that promise of God, has yet to arrive. God’s promise is still unfolding!! God was and is and is to come, and just when we think we’ve gotten a handle on what this whole God thing means to us, we hear something like the speed of light and what that means about the sky we think we are seeing as it is RIGHT now, and our whole perspective is blown to bits.
Homiletics professor and Lutheran pastor Kae Evensen says that the light of that sky, the sky of Abram and Sarai, the sky of Genesis, the sky of that promise, that first covenant of God, is the promise of things to come. All that has happened from Abraham and Sarah to Mary and Joseph to all our ancestors, to all those who have walked before us, fuels what is to come.
Even the doubts.
Abram, a man of deep faith who clearly had found favor with God, had doubts. The world, as he experienced it, was often overwhelming. We hear it today, after his encounter with God, when Abram falls into a deep sleep and a “deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him.” Abram was scared out of his wits. Abram, was having a dark night of the soul. A night so dark, that even the promise of God couldn’t keep the fear at bay.
Oddly, I find this comforting. That all of who have come before, even the greatest prophets of all, had doubts. Jesus himself had doubts. The human condition promises that we’ll doubt, we’ll fear, that we’ll have our share of dark nights and terrifying dreams. And so, like many who have come before us, and, I’m sure, those who will come after, we try very hard to keep those fears and doubts ---which lurk just around the corner of our consciousness—at bay.
And we do this by being busy, by keeping the volume of our lives turned way up. We do this by avoiding silence, by resisting the quieting of our souls.
The nature of our humanity is to fear the silence, to resist the dark and to recoil from the reaching out of God’s embrace. But, as one author has put it: God’s habit is to draw near. God does not want to and will not stay out of reach in the heavens.
While it may be difficult for us to fathom the extent of God’s love for us, I think the metaphor of mother hen, which is used several times in scripture and is referenced by Jesus in today’s Gospel, is helpful. For whether you are a mother, or have witnessed the love a mother has for her children , this image rings true. Have you ever gotten in between a mother and her chicks, cubs, pups, child? Have you ever mistakenly suggested to a mother how she may better parent her child? Have you ever, whether inadvertently or not, ticked off a mother?
It isn’t pretty.
Because a mother’s love for her child is an instinctual gut level love. There isn’t anything intellectual about it. It just is.
God’s love for us is the same: God desires nothing more than to gather us—each of us---under the loving expanse of God’s wings, protecting us from harm, holding us close.
It’s warm under those wings, cozy….but before you know it, that warmth, that coziness begins to stifle, our own reach feels stymied and we struggle to break free and to wander out on our own. And God, like any loving parent, let’s us go because God knows that is just what we need to do….for God also knows that one day, when perhaps we’ve wandered just a tad too far and we no longer feel sure, when we’re engulfed in a deep darkness, when we no longer feel safe, we’ll come running back, eager to scurry under those outstretched wings, ready to feel the comforting embrace of our creator.
Jesus’ use of this image comes as he laments all that Jerusalem has seen all that Jerusalem has done, and all that has yet to happen there to him. Jesus cries this lament with his face firmly turned toward that city of his forebears, that city which destroys prophets, that city which has rejected God’s love time and time again. I don’t know how much Jesus knew about his fate in Jerusalem. Yes, he knew that he would be martyred there, and perhaps he even knew that his friends would abandon him one by one. But I wonder, did Jesus realize how much all of that would hurt? Did Jesus realize how painful abandonment is, how scary loneliness is, how dark the night would become in Gethsemene?
Did God know how much all of this would hurt Jesus? Did God know how much that hurt would pain Him?
Does any parent?
This vulnerable flesh and bones incarnation of God had a dark night. This God in the person of Jesus, felt the terror of Abram. Jesus felt the loneliness of an existence where God can seem so far away, so absent. And Jesus, this God made man, knew how terrifying silence could be. But Jesus also walked through that dark night. Jesus endured that silence and came out the other side. Jesus dove into the depths of death, emerging from it so that we, no matter how lost we may feel, no matter how scared we may be, no matter how mad we may act, can look into the night sky and remember that no matter how far we feel from God, God is, always has been and always will be right here. Sometimes we just have to get quiet enough, still enough and sometimes, scared enough, to notice.
In the darkest of nights, we need only look to the stars and realize that the light we see from those stars is the light of Abraham, it is the light of our ancestors. No matter how lost we may feel, how lonely it might seem how long and hard the road is, we have the company of all those who have gone before us, all those who, themselves, had many a dark and lonely night. And somewhere, through the darkness, they, too were warmed by the light of those who had gone before. +
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Life Happens in the Valley TranSfiguration Sunday 2010
Today is a day of bookends. With the Transfiguration of Christ we have a glimpse-- along with Peter, James and John-- Christ’s glory, to be fully revealed on Easter morning. But with the Transfiguration and God’s proclamation that this Jesus is His Chosen and we are to listen to him reminds us of God’s anointing of Jesus at his baptism. On this last Sunday in Epiphany, the season of Christ manifested in the world, on this Sunday before Lent, our 40 day journey to Calvary; we look ahead, we glance behind and we take stock of where we are in our own faith journeys, considering how Christ’s glory is manifested in our daily lives.
Episcopal priest Adam Thomas, writing in a recent issue of the Christian Century magazine, says that the Transfiguration isn’t so much about the change in Jesus’ appearance, or about the appearance of Moses and Elijah, or even about the proclamation of God in the cloud. …instead, says Thomas, the Transfiguration is about how a glimpse of the Holy, an experience of the Divine, transformed the disciples, and how it can transform us. There is no doubt that exposure to the Holy, to the Divine, casts a physical change—Moses’ skin shone, Jesus’ face and clothes glisten with a whiteness beyond description—but the real change, the everlasting change, is what happens internally, spiritually, when one confronts the sacred--is in the presence of the Holy. What matters is how that experience changes us, how we carry that experience with us in our day-to-day lives.
According to Biblical scholar Fred Craddock, mountain top experiences are fine and dandy , but where the rubber really meets the road is what happens when we come down off the mountain, when we enter the valley; where the light has faded, the sheen dulled and the dirt and grime of daily life takes over.
Craddock and Thomas are on to something here…because Christianity isn’t about mountaintops, it’s about valleys. If it was about mountaintops then Jesus wouldn’t have been born in a barn, to peasant parents from a backwater town. If our faith was about mountaintops Jesus would not have been executed like a common criminal, hung on a tree, mocked and scourged. If our faith was all about mountaintops Jesus’ followers wouldn’t have been a doubting band of disciples who fell asleep at a drop of a hat, doubted at the slightest turn of fortune or denied their teacher in times of greatest need. No this faith of ours is definitely the faith of the valley. This faith of ours gets lived out in our day-to-day lives because Christianity is less about fancy and more about simple.
Unfortunately we often forget that even down here in the valley, sacred things happen all the time. The Holy can pop up anywhere.
The retired Bishop of Maine, Chilton Knudsen, recently posted an article about her visit with Rev. Fernande Sanon Pierre-Louis, the only woman priest in Haiti, principal of Holy Trinity School and a survivor of last month’s earthquake. Bishop Chilton visited Mother Fernande in Montreal where she is recuperating at her son’s home. Chilton remarked that, while visiting this woman of grace and courage, she felt as if she should remove her shoes, for surely, to quote Bp Chilton, it was Holy Ground where this simple unassuming woman of God walked. The sacred isn’t usually glamorous and the Holy needn’t be in some transfigured glory. Usually, God is just right here, walking with us on our journey through the valley of life.
But, who can blame Peter for wanting to erect tents, to freeze the moment of glory atop the mountain, to linger in the wisdom and wonder of Elijah, Moses and Jesus? That’s far more appealing than going back down among the demanding, misunderstanding crowds. Peter must think—this is it…Jesus will be crowned King and soon all the oppressors, the high priests, the governor and the emperor will be brought down to their knees and they, this rag tag band of tentmakers, fishermen tax collectors and women will rise to glory, led by the King of Kings. Once again Peter says the right thing but then does the wrong thing. Because Peter, just like all of us, sees the Transfiguration but fails to feel the transformation.
Everyone has experienced this in one form or another---we have some momentous experience—a moment when we feel that we have been truly touched by God and we swear, we swear that this is it, we will change our ways, we’ll never forget this, we’ll turn over a new leaf…but it doesn’t last. It doesn’t last because the high of that moment, the amazing moment of awareness that shining moment of enlightenment cannot be sustained. It can’t be sustained because it isn’t on the mountaintop where life happens, it’s down in the valley.
That’s why our Gospel reading today is so long. The designers of our lectionary allow us to end the Gospel reading just as Jesus James John and Peter are heading down the mountain, but today we keep going, we listen to the “rest of the story. “ They arrive at the foot of the moment to a throng of people, especially a father crying out to Jesus to heal his demon-afflicted son. A healing the other disciples had been unable to achieve.
And it is here, at this point of our Gospel lesson, that the true meaning of transformation becomes clear. All the experiences of the Holy, all the sacred feelings, all the Transfigurations will not heal this world. What heals this world is a people who do as God directed on the mountain, to Listen to His Son, his Chosen One. We are to love one another as he loves us, we are to love our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind. We are to find the sacred in the mundane, we are to find the holy in the ordinary and we are to be transformed by the routine. For our faith is not the faith of royalty, it is the faith of peasants. Ours is not the faith of the powerful, it is the faith of the weak and it is not the faith of the mountaintop it is the faith of the valley.
So today we put our alleluias away for awhile and we live into the fullness of the incarnation as we journey with Jesus to Jerusalem, the cross and the tomb. Today we climb off the mountaintop of the nativity and the Epiphany to walk this walk in the valley, not a walk of despair and hopelessness but a walk of faith, faith that we are following the Chosen One and that we, along with him, are God’s beloved.
Amen
Episcopal priest Adam Thomas, writing in a recent issue of the Christian Century magazine, says that the Transfiguration isn’t so much about the change in Jesus’ appearance, or about the appearance of Moses and Elijah, or even about the proclamation of God in the cloud. …instead, says Thomas, the Transfiguration is about how a glimpse of the Holy, an experience of the Divine, transformed the disciples, and how it can transform us. There is no doubt that exposure to the Holy, to the Divine, casts a physical change—Moses’ skin shone, Jesus’ face and clothes glisten with a whiteness beyond description—but the real change, the everlasting change, is what happens internally, spiritually, when one confronts the sacred--is in the presence of the Holy. What matters is how that experience changes us, how we carry that experience with us in our day-to-day lives.
According to Biblical scholar Fred Craddock, mountain top experiences are fine and dandy , but where the rubber really meets the road is what happens when we come down off the mountain, when we enter the valley; where the light has faded, the sheen dulled and the dirt and grime of daily life takes over.
Craddock and Thomas are on to something here…because Christianity isn’t about mountaintops, it’s about valleys. If it was about mountaintops then Jesus wouldn’t have been born in a barn, to peasant parents from a backwater town. If our faith was about mountaintops Jesus would not have been executed like a common criminal, hung on a tree, mocked and scourged. If our faith was all about mountaintops Jesus’ followers wouldn’t have been a doubting band of disciples who fell asleep at a drop of a hat, doubted at the slightest turn of fortune or denied their teacher in times of greatest need. No this faith of ours is definitely the faith of the valley. This faith of ours gets lived out in our day-to-day lives because Christianity is less about fancy and more about simple.
Unfortunately we often forget that even down here in the valley, sacred things happen all the time. The Holy can pop up anywhere.
The retired Bishop of Maine, Chilton Knudsen, recently posted an article about her visit with Rev. Fernande Sanon Pierre-Louis, the only woman priest in Haiti, principal of Holy Trinity School and a survivor of last month’s earthquake. Bishop Chilton visited Mother Fernande in Montreal where she is recuperating at her son’s home. Chilton remarked that, while visiting this woman of grace and courage, she felt as if she should remove her shoes, for surely, to quote Bp Chilton, it was Holy Ground where this simple unassuming woman of God walked. The sacred isn’t usually glamorous and the Holy needn’t be in some transfigured glory. Usually, God is just right here, walking with us on our journey through the valley of life.
But, who can blame Peter for wanting to erect tents, to freeze the moment of glory atop the mountain, to linger in the wisdom and wonder of Elijah, Moses and Jesus? That’s far more appealing than going back down among the demanding, misunderstanding crowds. Peter must think—this is it…Jesus will be crowned King and soon all the oppressors, the high priests, the governor and the emperor will be brought down to their knees and they, this rag tag band of tentmakers, fishermen tax collectors and women will rise to glory, led by the King of Kings. Once again Peter says the right thing but then does the wrong thing. Because Peter, just like all of us, sees the Transfiguration but fails to feel the transformation.
Everyone has experienced this in one form or another---we have some momentous experience—a moment when we feel that we have been truly touched by God and we swear, we swear that this is it, we will change our ways, we’ll never forget this, we’ll turn over a new leaf…but it doesn’t last. It doesn’t last because the high of that moment, the amazing moment of awareness that shining moment of enlightenment cannot be sustained. It can’t be sustained because it isn’t on the mountaintop where life happens, it’s down in the valley.
That’s why our Gospel reading today is so long. The designers of our lectionary allow us to end the Gospel reading just as Jesus James John and Peter are heading down the mountain, but today we keep going, we listen to the “rest of the story. “ They arrive at the foot of the moment to a throng of people, especially a father crying out to Jesus to heal his demon-afflicted son. A healing the other disciples had been unable to achieve.
And it is here, at this point of our Gospel lesson, that the true meaning of transformation becomes clear. All the experiences of the Holy, all the sacred feelings, all the Transfigurations will not heal this world. What heals this world is a people who do as God directed on the mountain, to Listen to His Son, his Chosen One. We are to love one another as he loves us, we are to love our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind. We are to find the sacred in the mundane, we are to find the holy in the ordinary and we are to be transformed by the routine. For our faith is not the faith of royalty, it is the faith of peasants. Ours is not the faith of the powerful, it is the faith of the weak and it is not the faith of the mountaintop it is the faith of the valley.
So today we put our alleluias away for awhile and we live into the fullness of the incarnation as we journey with Jesus to Jerusalem, the cross and the tomb. Today we climb off the mountaintop of the nativity and the Epiphany to walk this walk in the valley, not a walk of despair and hopelessness but a walk of faith, faith that we are following the Chosen One and that we, along with him, are God’s beloved.
Amen
Sunday, January 17, 2010
The Exquisite Love of God, Bursting Out All Over Epiphany 2 Yr C
Mom. C’mon. Stop It. Mom, just leave me alone. It’s a familiar drill. A young adult accompanies his mother to a family event—Thanksgiving, Christmas, a funeral, a wedding---and mom wants junior to show off for the guests. …..the mom is proud as can be and wants the world to know. The son is mortified, preferring to remain in the background, to do his familial duty and then get out of there. Conflict ensues. It’s a drama played out over and over again in our lives.
The Wedding in Cana is no different. Mary feels for the host, who has run out of wine and sees a perfect opportunity for Jesus to reveal his glory and help the host save face. A fully human family conflict played out within the Holy Family.
This story of water being turned into wine is one in a series of Epiphany tales, beginning with the visit of the magi and ending with Jesus’ transfiguration on the mountaintop. Each of these stories point toward one truth of Jesus’ nature—his divinity…but today’s Gospel does something more-- it also discloses his humanity. Jesus responds to his mother with the irritation common in most young adult-parent relationships. While the miracle aspect of this story garners the most attention, the wedding in Cana also serves as a post script to the nativity story, proof that Jesus was fully human as well as fully divine.
Besides today’s Gospel, another familiar story illuminates the fullness of Jesus’ humanity within the fullness of his divinity: the Boy Jesus in the Temple. You remember that story---Jesus and his family travel to the temple for the Passover . As the family heads for home, Mary and Joseph realize Jesus isn’t with them,. Three frantic days later they find him sitting among the teachers, discussing and asking questions. Jesus is incredulous when his mother rebukes him for worrying them feeling that her hysteria was an over-reaction. A typical adolescent response to the worry of a parent.
So, while becoming aware of Jesus’ divinity---the promised messiah--is the usual task in Epiphany, we musn’t forget his humanity.
Since Advent we’ve been told that this was going to happen, a boy, born of a woman would come among us as the Son of God. Fully God, Fully Human.
But hearing this and “getting it” are two different things.
And, that’s what epiphanies are all about ---getting it.
Getting that Jesus is God in the flesh. Getting Jesus feels all that we feel, experiencing the world as a human , while also, through his divinity, transforming us into something altogether new.
And that’s where the miracle at the wedding comes into play. That’s when this miracle—this sign as John calls it---shows us that through the very human person of Jesus, God has chosen to dwell among us, to experience his creation first hand. At a wedding.
But, the wine is running out and the wedding host is in danger of being shamed in a very public way. Although Jesus doesn’t feel that his time has arrived, he acquiesces and saves the day.
But, the miracle at Cana isn’t done simply to save the wedding day….it’s done to show us that this Son of God is here to save us in a completely new way.
The water used in the miracle is in large stone jars used for Jewish rites of purification---a cornerstone of the old covenant… From the restrictions of the old emerges the hope and joy of the new.
Much like new wine bursts old wineskins, God, through Jesus bursts out of the old in a big, abundant and extravagant way. It wasn’t that Jesus created a few extra bottles of wine out of water. Jesus created gallons and gallons of wine---exquisite, fabulous wine, out of those stone jars. This first miracle of Jesus is not just a little something. It’s a whole lot of something big. It’s abundant and it’s bursting out all over.
Because that’s what God gives us. Not just enough, but plenty. Not just ok, but exquisite, not just ordinary but extraordinary.
God as among us in Jesus is abundant, all encompassing and never ending. And through Jesus, we’ve become vessels for God’s love in this world.
Do we understand this? Do we get it? Have we had this epiphany? Does the story of Jesus at this wedding help shake us out of our old way of thinking---does the promise of God’s extravagant abundant love as symbolized in the gallons of exquisite wine—help us realize the truth: That with God and through God we can---and we must---bring hope to the world? Do we get that we CAN make a difference by allowing ourselves to be vessels of God—bursting with an abundance of grace, truth and love?
Jesus walked among us to show us that we, each of us, is a vessel for God in the world. Each and every day we have opportunities to be an overflowing, bursting vessel of God in the world. Whether it’s a kind word to a lonely neighbor, a helping hand to a hurting child, reaching out to a refugee or a donation to Episcopal Relief and Development to assist the rescue work in Haiti, the world always has room for more of God’s love.
For if there is one thing we can take from the humanity of Jesus is that when God’s creation hurts, as the people of Haiti do today, God hurts. And if there’s one thing we can learn from the divinity of Christ it is that each one of us, through prayer and action, can make the devastation of Haiti, the hurting throughout this world bearable.
Today, through the manifestation of God in the person of Jesus Christ, we have the ability to show others the abundance of God’s grace.
May God among us through the person of Jesus Christ give us the strength and the determination to burst out, overflowing with God’s abundant exquisite and extravagant love.
Amen.
The Wedding in Cana is no different. Mary feels for the host, who has run out of wine and sees a perfect opportunity for Jesus to reveal his glory and help the host save face. A fully human family conflict played out within the Holy Family.
This story of water being turned into wine is one in a series of Epiphany tales, beginning with the visit of the magi and ending with Jesus’ transfiguration on the mountaintop. Each of these stories point toward one truth of Jesus’ nature—his divinity…but today’s Gospel does something more-- it also discloses his humanity. Jesus responds to his mother with the irritation common in most young adult-parent relationships. While the miracle aspect of this story garners the most attention, the wedding in Cana also serves as a post script to the nativity story, proof that Jesus was fully human as well as fully divine.
Besides today’s Gospel, another familiar story illuminates the fullness of Jesus’ humanity within the fullness of his divinity: the Boy Jesus in the Temple. You remember that story---Jesus and his family travel to the temple for the Passover . As the family heads for home, Mary and Joseph realize Jesus isn’t with them,. Three frantic days later they find him sitting among the teachers, discussing and asking questions. Jesus is incredulous when his mother rebukes him for worrying them feeling that her hysteria was an over-reaction. A typical adolescent response to the worry of a parent.
So, while becoming aware of Jesus’ divinity---the promised messiah--is the usual task in Epiphany, we musn’t forget his humanity.
Since Advent we’ve been told that this was going to happen, a boy, born of a woman would come among us as the Son of God. Fully God, Fully Human.
But hearing this and “getting it” are two different things.
And, that’s what epiphanies are all about ---getting it.
Getting that Jesus is God in the flesh. Getting Jesus feels all that we feel, experiencing the world as a human , while also, through his divinity, transforming us into something altogether new.
And that’s where the miracle at the wedding comes into play. That’s when this miracle—this sign as John calls it---shows us that through the very human person of Jesus, God has chosen to dwell among us, to experience his creation first hand. At a wedding.
But, the wine is running out and the wedding host is in danger of being shamed in a very public way. Although Jesus doesn’t feel that his time has arrived, he acquiesces and saves the day.
But, the miracle at Cana isn’t done simply to save the wedding day….it’s done to show us that this Son of God is here to save us in a completely new way.
The water used in the miracle is in large stone jars used for Jewish rites of purification---a cornerstone of the old covenant… From the restrictions of the old emerges the hope and joy of the new.
Much like new wine bursts old wineskins, God, through Jesus bursts out of the old in a big, abundant and extravagant way. It wasn’t that Jesus created a few extra bottles of wine out of water. Jesus created gallons and gallons of wine---exquisite, fabulous wine, out of those stone jars. This first miracle of Jesus is not just a little something. It’s a whole lot of something big. It’s abundant and it’s bursting out all over.
Because that’s what God gives us. Not just enough, but plenty. Not just ok, but exquisite, not just ordinary but extraordinary.
God as among us in Jesus is abundant, all encompassing and never ending. And through Jesus, we’ve become vessels for God’s love in this world.
Do we understand this? Do we get it? Have we had this epiphany? Does the story of Jesus at this wedding help shake us out of our old way of thinking---does the promise of God’s extravagant abundant love as symbolized in the gallons of exquisite wine—help us realize the truth: That with God and through God we can---and we must---bring hope to the world? Do we get that we CAN make a difference by allowing ourselves to be vessels of God—bursting with an abundance of grace, truth and love?
Jesus walked among us to show us that we, each of us, is a vessel for God in the world. Each and every day we have opportunities to be an overflowing, bursting vessel of God in the world. Whether it’s a kind word to a lonely neighbor, a helping hand to a hurting child, reaching out to a refugee or a donation to Episcopal Relief and Development to assist the rescue work in Haiti, the world always has room for more of God’s love.
For if there is one thing we can take from the humanity of Jesus is that when God’s creation hurts, as the people of Haiti do today, God hurts. And if there’s one thing we can learn from the divinity of Christ it is that each one of us, through prayer and action, can make the devastation of Haiti, the hurting throughout this world bearable.
Today, through the manifestation of God in the person of Jesus Christ, we have the ability to show others the abundance of God’s grace.
May God among us through the person of Jesus Christ give us the strength and the determination to burst out, overflowing with God’s abundant exquisite and extravagant love.
Amen.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Baptism---a thought or two.
One of the greatest pleasures of the priesthood is administering the sacrament of baptism. There is the wonder of an infant--all soft and sweet and full of potential-- but then there's also the joy a baptism brings. It isn't that many of us think this baby is doomed to eternal limbo without the sacrament, there is no sense that this little baby has sinned in any way shape or form...no the joy is that "thing" babies bring to the table. Innocence? Possibility? The miracle of life? I don't know what it is specifically, but I do know that, for me, when that child is sealed as Christ's own forever, it is very hard for me to maintain my composure. Of course he is already Christ's own forever, but by publicly annointing him, I get the immense privilege of proclaiming that to the world. The day this doesn't choke me up is the day I should hang up the collar.
God bless Colin and all the innocent, beautiful children of this world.
God bless Colin and all the innocent, beautiful children of this world.
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