Feline Caused Sleep Deprivation

Beloved partner and I had a lovely Christmas which included spoiling our newest member of the family Little Guy. By far is favorite toy was the catnip mouse that beloved found in the local pet store

Come here little boy, would you like some kitty drugs.

Little guy played with the mouse with such glee. Then he discovered how to play fetch with the mouse. I'd throw the mouse into the kitchen, he'd chase after it, put it in his mouth and run back to me. Then I'd tell him what a good boy he was petting him and fawning over him. Then I'd throw it again, he'd bring it back to me, I'd give him attention etc. After a half an hour of doing this, Little Guy and I got tired and went to bed.

Then at 1:00 am in the morning, in a nocturnal fit that only catnip can cause, Little Guy decided he wanted to play fetch. So he got little mousy in his mouth, jumped on the bed and dropped it on my face, waking me out of a sound sleep. I woke with a yelp, waking up beloved partner. She asked what was wrong as I looked all around me. I found Little Guy was inches from my nose, pointing at his toy and meowing.

I told him I wasn't going to play and I put his toy on the floor. He grabbed his toy and jumped on the bed with it and meowed. I put it on the floor, he got it and jumped on the bed. I decided to keep it on the bed. He decided to bat it around the bed. etc. etc. And so it went for the rest of the night into the morning.

Aaaaaah the joys of kitteh parenthood.

Throw it again mommy, throw it again!!!!!

Wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas.

An American Nativity

Tonight we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, Immanuel, God with us. Two thousand years ago God poured God-self into human form so that we would know first hand the depth of God’s love and grace of God's son Jesus. When we think of his birth we imagine magical manger scenes with angels, shepherds and wise men all centered around a holy family in awe. We forget the details surrounding the birth of our Savior.

We have forgottend that Mary and Joseph were dirt poor and that Mary had gotten pregnant out of wedlock. We have forgotten that they were forced to travel to a chaotic town where the roads were dusty and crowded with travelers. We we have forgotten that on this night, they became homeless because they could not find a room in an inn and so Mary had to give birth to Jesus in the only shelter they could find, a smelly dirty barn where animals ate and slept.

Yes Jesus was born in a lowly, humble situation however this does not take away from the wonder of his birth. In fact it shows us just how amazing God’s grace to us is all about. Imagine if you will what the nativity scene would look like if Jesus were born right now in our time and place. Imagine along with me an American Nativity.

In a small town in New Hampshire, lived a young couple Jose and Maria, immigrants from Central America whose families ran away from Honduras to escape the bone crushing poverty and violence in the streets. Jose and Maria had lived in North America for over a year but in order to remain in the United States they needed to apply their green cards at the closest Immigration office which was in Lyndhurst New Jersey.

Jose was a day laborer and he was able to get lots of work through Labor Ready but he didn’t make enough to afford an apartment for he and Maria to live in and Maria was pregnant. Maria was barely 18, very young and very naïve. When Maria became pregnant, she told Jose that he would be the child’s father, but he wasn’t the child’s father. Maria told him that an angel told her that the spark that began the life of their child was from God. Jose thought Maria was crazy for believing that God would conceive a child with her but he Jose stayed with Maria because he loved her so.

Jose and Maria used all their money to buy bus tickets to Lyndhurst New Jersey and made haste as they journeyed all night to their destination. They arrived late into the night and needed a place to sleep and cleanup before their appointment the next morning at the Immigration office. They went to the nearest homeless shelter and stood in line for a bed, but the shelter filled up before they got to the door. The man that was standing behind them in line took pity upon the couple and told them that he could take them to a tent city down by the river where they could spend the night. Jose and Maria gratefully accepted his invitation.

When they got to the camp Jose and Maria’s new friend yelled out to the residents of the tent city, “Hey I gotta lady in a family way here, we need to set up a camp for them, can anyone spare anything for their camp.” One man gave them his tarp, another gave them a portable heater, and yet another said they could sleep in his tent while he doubled up with a buddy in another, then a lady gave them a couple of comforters she had stored in her tent. As Jose and the men were setting up their camp, Maria’s water broke. It was certain that she will give birth that night.

In the tent city by the river Maria gave birth to a skinny little baby boy. She named him Jesus, the name that she was told by the angel to give this special child. As she swaddled him in one of Jose’s shirts a bright star appeared over their tent.

At another homeless camp not so far away, a motley group of hard living homeless men were warming themselves around a fire. While they were passing around a bottle of vodka, they noticed a star above the other homeless camp down the river. Then suddenly in a flash an angel stood before them, surrounded by light and glory. The men were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day is a liberator, who is the son of God. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a tent. And suddenly there was with the angel a choir of angels singing “Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth to all.”

When the angels disappeared into heaven, the homeless men said to one another, “Let’s go to the camp down the river, where the star shines and see this child of God.” And so this motley crew of homeless men ran down the river to the homeless camp where Jesus was born and where they found him wrapped in a shirt lying in a tent.

Every year at this time we re-tell the story of Jesus’ birth to remind ourselves just how incredible it was that God came to us in human form, That he came to us as a helpless little baby born into a poor family to show us how God can turn miserable circumstances around to the greatest glory the world. For this baby born of humble circumstance will grow up to share with us the good news of God’s love and grace freely given to us.

“On a cold moonlit night,

In the sleepy town of Bethlehem,

Born in silence,

in holiness,

In beauty and tenderness...

It all came together one precious moment,

The promise, the purpose, the gift of our Savior
For God so loved the world
that he gave his one and only son
so that whosever believes in him
will not perish but have everlasting life.”[i]

May it be so. Amen.

[i] Jaci Velasquez, “One Silent Night.” Touched by an Angel The Christmas Album. New York, NY: Epic/550 Music/Sony Music Soundtrax, 1999.

A message from Little Guy

Mommy, I demands you get off teh spacehook and play with meh!

There's Something About Mary - Advent 4

I’ve always said, you can take the girl out of the Catholic Church but there are pieces of the Catholic Church that you cannot take out of the girl. And for this Girl one of those pieces is Mary, the mother of Jesus. Yes my friends, there’s just something about Mary!

Growing up in a Catholic School, we girls were taught to emulate Mary because of her obedience. She was portrayed to us as meek and mild, well behaved and always eager to please. At Christmas pageants and May Day celebrations, it was only the best behaved girls who got to be Mary. Unfortunately, because I had a penchant for talking in class, I was never picked to be Mary. Alas, I was either part of the chorus of angels in the background or a lowly animal in the manger scene. However, I never lost my devotion to Mary. For whatever reason, I was drawn to her. When ever I looked at her I felt peaceful inside. I was drawn into her willingness to serve God, drawn into her gentleness, drawn into her calm appearance.

Fast forward to adulthood. As much as I loved the Catholic Church there were certain things that I could not abide by such as only allowing men to serve God as ordained priests and the supremacy of the Pope in Rome. As much as I loved the liturgy of the Catholic Church I knew that many parts of it were not a good fit for me and so I left the church of my childhood to join the United Church of Christ, whose structure and theology I found more fitting to how I viewed God’s work in the world. And yet, there were certain things about the Catholic Church I could not let go of…one of those being my devotion to Mary.

You see I’ve learned through the years that Mary was much more than the meek and mild Saint of my childhood. On the contrary, Mary was strong willed and independent, she was not afraid to share her opinions when the situation called for it. We remember that it was Mary who suggested to Jesus that he change water into wine at the wedding of Cana. During the time of Jesus’ trial and execution, Mary was willing to be by her son’s side even though it was dangerous for women to be in the streets during those times. As a matter of fact, when most of Jesus’ disciples had run away at his crucifixion, it was Mary his mother, and other women that stood by the cross to be with him as he drew his last breath.

Mary was not afraid to ask questions. At the annunciation, when the angel Gabriel told her that she would conceive, she immediately asked, “How can this be…for I am a virgin?” Now some would believe that conceiving Jesus was something that was forced upon Mary, but really at the annunciation, God was giving Mary a choice. Sure nay sayers think, “How could anyone refuse a direct request from God?” However the scriptures are full of stories of people refusing requests from God. Some did meet a bad end however God still gave them a choice. For Mary her “yes” to God came when she heard the angel Gabriel say that her cousin Elizabeth had conceived a child in her old age and that nothing, absolutely nothing is impossible with God. Why Mary was so overcome she couldn’t help but say yes because her heart turned and she knew that she with God, would bring to humanity the long awaited Messiah. She knelt before the angel and with great faith said, “Behold I am a handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” Her life as we know it had begun.

Mary had everything going against her when she said yes to God. She was young, unmarried and poor. Her being pregnant outside of wedlock would cause her scandal and pain. She was at risk of losing everything she had, her betrothed Joseph, her standing in her community and her place in her family. And yet she had enough faith to say yes to God’s call.

Yes, we know that Jesus is the embodiment of God where God poured Godself into human form so as to know intimately our lot on earth, however, this meant that God had to begin this journey in the form of a baby in order to be one of us. God became a being so utterly dependant upon its parents that if it were left to its own devices it would surely not survive. Mary and Joseph, but most especially Mary was whom Jesus depended on for his daily needs. She fed him from her own breast, she kept him warm in swaddling clothes that she found in the manger and she comforted him in her own arms whenever he cried. She cared for him into his adulthood and even after his death, as we’ve seen portrayed in the Pieta, an artistic rendition of Mary holding Jesus after he is taken down from the cross. It takes a pretty gutsy woman to raise into adulthood the child “destined for the falling and raising of many in Israel.” (Luke 2: 33) knowing that one day a sword would pierce her own soul as she witnessed these things.

Shortly after Mary found out that she was pregnant with Jesus, she very quickly left for her cousin Elizabeth’s home in a Judean town in the hill country. The scripture doesn’t tell us why Mary traveled the 80 or so miles to see Elizabeth, but I imagine that she as overwhelmed and that she needed support from an older woman in order to prepare herself for the daunting responsibility of being Jesus’ mother.

The scene we read from Luke’s gospel is quite dramatic. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s voice, her baby, John the Baptist, stirred in her womb and she exclaimed to this poor, unwed, pregnant girl, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” Without Mary even telling her, Elizabeth knew that Mary was carrying the son of God. Elizabeth blesses Mary for believing in the word of God, “And blessed is she who believed there would be fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

Upon hearing Elizabeth’s blessings Mary was so overcome with joy that she breaks out into song, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my savior for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant” (vv 46-48) She praises God for looking to her even though she had everything going against her because she was young, unmarried and poor. “His mercy is for those who fear him, from generation to generation,” (v. 50) she sings, going on to predict how God was going to turn the world upside down—scattering the proud, brining down the powerful, lifting up the lowly and feeding the hungry (vv. 50-53). Some note that Mary knew that God would be reversing everything: “who’s in, who’s out; who’s up, who’s down. Who the winners are; who the losers are. Mary knows that up until that moment the world has gotten things pretty wrong and that God will set things right. But who would listen to her, an unimportant peasant girl of ill repute. Who would listen to her son who would preach, “Blessed are the poor, blessed are the hungry, blessed are the meek.” And just where did her son get his material. Could it have been from his mom? Did he learn from her that God has no intention of tolerating injustice and greed in this world? Did she teach him that it angers God when people are selfish or violent, when rich people watch poor people go hungry and do nothing, when the powerful push around the weak because they can get away with it.”[i] Mary knew that God’s great desire for the world was for all to live in the spirit of Shalom, where all of God’s creation would have what is needed to be whole, well and prosperous.

Some note that Mary was so sure that God will do what God has promised that as she sang her song, she used the past tense as a way of expressing her confidence and certainty of God’s work in the world.[ii]
“He has shown strength with his arm” (v. 51)
“He has brought down the powerful” (v. 52)
“He has filled the hungry with good things” (v. 53)
“He has helped his servant Israel.” (v. 54)

Yes, my sisters and brothers and Christ, there is something about Mary. There is something about the unique way she saw the good news of God’s love and grace. There is something about the way she proclaimed a new world order centered upon her son our Savior Jesus. There is something about her faithfulness, her courageous, her obedience to fulfilling God’s call, her willingness to say, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

May it be so. Amen.

[i] John Ortberg, “Living by the Word: Sunday, December 20 Luke 1: 39-45 (46-55)” Christian Century, 15 December 2009, 20.
[ii] Fred B. Craddock Luke. Interpretation, a Bible commentary for teaching and preaching. (Louisville, Ky: John Knox Press, 1990.), 30.

Little Guy

We've added a new member to the family. For blogging purposes his name is Little Guy. We decided to adopt an older cat (he's three) because they are the most difficult to adopt out. When we met him at the shelter, he came right up to the us and couldn't take his eyes off of us. In a lot of ways he picked us rather than we him.

When I finally got to meet him, the first question I asked was, "What is your Christology? How do you define salvation?" Everyone, my partner, the adoption counselor and Little Guy looked at me like, "huh?" Hey, I need help with my sermons!

Little guy is still adjusting to our household. Sometimes he's very affectionate, a lot of the time he wants to be left alone. He loves to play with the feather toy and any yarn he can get his paws on.

Whaddaya mean I gots to read all these.

Sermon Advent 2

“It’s the End of the World as We Know It.”
Baruch 5:1-9
Luke 3:1-6

Whenever I hear the text that I just read from the Gospel, I am reminded of the song by R.E.M. called, “It’s the End of the World as We Know It.” In a chaotic stream of consciousness the lead singer gives us his apocalyptic imaginations of what the end of the world would look like:

Earthquakes, birds and snakes and low flying planes.
Books burning, bloodletting, cars exploding

And amongst these disasters the group keeps singing the chorus

“It’s the end of the world as we know it….and I feel fine.”

Luke’s gospel gives us a similar stream of consciousness from the character of John the Baptist. In the wilderness he cries out “to make paths straight, every valley will be filled, and every mountain shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth.” Unlike the rock stars of the group R.E.M., John is a man who lives on the fringes of his society, portrayed in other gospels as a recluse, an eccentric who wears camel skin and eats locusts. John is like those the doomsday folk we occasionally see in the comics; you know the ones who carry signs saying, “Repent, the end of the world is near.”

Yet John does not stop at the end of the world. He’s more optimistic than that. He tells all that would listen that yes, the world will end as they know it, but he feels fine because he knows that the Lord is coming to make things right.

The beginning of this passage locates this story in a very specific time and place. Luke lists off the names of the rulers of that time. The Emperor Tiberious of Rome, Pontius Pilate the Governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee. Also included is the high priest Caiaphas. By naming those in the powerful elite of that day Luke projects this story against the backdrop of the political and religious history of Israel. We will see these characters again in this gospel’s account of Jesus’ trial and execution.

History tells us that at the time the gospel of Luke was written, the Roman Empire ruled the world through a system of domination and the homeland of Jesus, John and those who followed them, the land of Israel was oppressed under the tyranny of Roman occupation. Scholars note that in the first century under Roman rule, a small elite class controlled all the production of wealth, resources and land. Those who were not of the elite class, which was most of the population of Israel, lived in wretched poverty. The majority of the people living in under the Roman Empire lived in misery, danger, fear and despair.[i]

For those in power, for those whom the status quo was good, the imagery of valleys being filled and the mountains being flattened was indeed a threat to their way of life. For the oppressed, John’s message was comforting because they could very clearly hear him say “watch out, because the Lord is coming and will be bringing on a new world order.” The theme that runs through out the whole gospel of Luke is the coming of the kingdom of God here on earth, where the powerful are brought down from their thrones and God lifts up the lowly, where God fills hungry with good things and sends the rich away empty. (Luke 1: 52-53) The world order would be reversed as God makes the ground level so that Israel may walk safely in the glory of God. (Baruch 5: 7)

“It’s the end of the world as we know it…and I feel fine.”

I wonder if John the Baptist were to give the same message to our world, right now, if I could count myself among the comforted or the afflicted. The vision of a reversed world order of a ground made level by God makes me nervous. You see, even though I may struggle to make ends meet, have had to deal with the stressors of an uncertain job market for me and my partner, and grapple with the economic problems of our day, I do know that because of my education, my class and my living where I do, I have a life that is more comfortable than most. What does the end of the world as we know it going to mean for me and my family? Am I ready to repent, to turn from my consumeristic ways that may cause harm to others? Am I ready to do what it takes to live simply so that others may simply live? Will I be fine? Will I be forgiven?

When the word of God came to John, he began “proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.” (3:3) Biblical scholars note that repentance literally means to turn, to change direction and John is telling the people of Israel to prepare the way of the Lord by cleansing themselves of the pollution of sin and turning towards God. Although John’s emphasis on repentance might seem to make human action more important than God’s grace, that is not the case, for repentance itself is understood as something God freely gives. We do not turn in a new direction because of our own power. The past can hold us so tightly that something outside our control must happen to create a new opportunity. Repentance is the renewal of personal and communal life made possible the arrival of a special time, the time when “all flesh” can “see the salvation of God.” (3:6)[ii]

A church in a time of interim ministry is in many ways preparing the way of the Lord and making paths straight. Now hang with me here, I am not implying that the person you will call to be your next settled pastor will be as great as Jesus himself and I ain’t no John the Baptist, you won’t see me eating any bugs in the near future. What I am saying is that when a church moves from the ministry of one settled pastor to another, there are things that we can do together to prepare for your new ministry with your next settled pastor. Yes the work may be difficult, there may be crooked roads which we will have to try to make straight, there may be bumps that we will have to make smooth. However, know that we do not do this alone. God is here and God is working with us and through us. “For God has ordered that every high mountain and the everlasting hills be made low and the valleys filled up, to make the level ground, so that [we] may walk safely in the Glory of God.” (Baruch 5: 7)

May it be so. Amen.

[i] Bridges, Linda McKinnish, "Preaching the Parables in Matthew's Gospel in Ordinary Time: The Extraordinary Tales of God's World," Review & Expositor (2007): 325-362.
[ii] Tannehill, Robert C. Luke. Abingdon New Testament commentaries. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1996. 78-79.

I'm a bad bad blogger

Well I've been working in a church for almost two weeks and I forgot to blog about it. I am currently serving as an interim pastor of a church a couple of towns away from the one I live in. This is a very exciting opportunity for me. I've always wondered if I was called to interim ministry, there are parts of it that I find very intriguing, such as the constant changing of positions, the intentional work of helping a church in transition, the unique opportunities of stepping into a system that is open for change.

So for at least the next year I'll be walking with this church and we'll discern together where God is calling us to be in this world at this time.

Friday Five: Thanksgiving Thoughts

Fellow Revgal Jan shares this poem on the blogpal website

The Cure

Lying around all day
with some strange new deep blue
weekend funk, I'm not really asleep
when my sister callsto say she's just hung up
from talking with Aunt Bertha
who is 89 and ill but managing
to take care of Uncle Frank
who is completely bed ridden.
Aunt Bert says
it's snowing there in Arkansas,
on Catfish Lane, and she hasn't been
able to walk out to their mailbox.
She's been suffering
from a bad case of the mulleygrubs.
The cure for the mulleygrubs,
she tells my sister,is to get up and bake a cake.
If that doesn't do it, put on a red dress.

So this Friday before Thanksgiving, think about Aunt Bert and how she'll celebrate Thanksgiving! And how about YOU?

1. What is your cure for the "mulleygrubs"? I've been suffering from the "mulleygrubs" quite a bit this month, read my blog posts to find out why. I like to listen to music and talk to friends when I'm feeling blue. Sometimes I'll fix my computer or other things around the house so I can enjoy a sense of accomplishment. I'll eat lots of french fries with mayonaise and other forms of comfort food.

2. Where will you be for Thanksgiving?

I'll be at my partner's friend's. She and her husband just bought a house and so they are having a big thanksgiving blow out with family and friends. I am looking forward to this!

3. What foods will be served? Which are traditional for your family?

Turkey, mashed potatoes all the fixings. We will be bringing my family's traditional cranberry salad with marshmellows and walnuts.

4. How do you feel about Thanksgiving as a holiday?

Love Thanksgiving because we get to eat turkey. I so love turkey

5. In this season of Thanksgiving, what are you grateful for?

See the above answer.

525,600 minutes

My computer hard drive died. I called the tech support for HP and a really nice man in India talked me through trying to revive the hard drive but alas, it flat lined. He told me that he will send me a new hard drive but the data of the old hard drive is gone, data irretrievable. I took the hard drive to geek squad and they concurred, they called the old hard drive a "brick".

The last time I backed up my data was exactly one year ago. It is as if one year of my life disappeared in the blink of an eye. One year of sermons, outlook calender appts, outlook contacts, downloaded songs, documents, check book entries etc.

I panicked, thinking of all that I had lost. I especially mourned the loss of the pictures. Music can be re-purchased, I can scan the hard copies of my sermons, but pictures cannot be replaced. There were the pictures of me and my kitty on the day I gave her over to God. There was a year of holidays, vacations and get togethers with friends, a year of gardening and most of all a year of transition.

Yesterday I asked a techie friend of mine where I could get data recovery services dirt cheap so I could get the pictures. He suggested I download a program called cardrecovery and see if I could retrieve my deleted pictures directly from my camera. It worked!! Over 400 pictures retrieved!

Then I was looking through my thumb drives I found that I had copied the "my documents" folder into one of my drives because I was going out of town and needed to refer back to some old sermons to write a sermon for a neutral pulpit.

Also on the thumb drive was a back up of my financial records that I did two months ago. Why did I do it on the thumb drive, don't know. But boy am I glad I did back it up.

My appointments and contacts were already on my PDA. Just a matter of syncing to make everything all right again.

Retrieving my data turned into a reflective process as I discerened what data I want to recover and what I am willing to let go of. There are pieces of data that I wanted to delete permanently but knew I needed to keep, such as my letter of resignation when my position was eliminated at my last church, or the sermon I wrote for the candidating sermon that went terribly wrong. These documents, pictures, appts, etc reflected the moments of great joy and devasting pain of the last year. I wanted to erase the painful things from my memory banks however I realized that these events have shaped me and made me realize that I'm a lot stronger than I thought I was.

In this past year, my life has suffered a few crashes however I was able to find recovery from many different and unexpected sources. Throughout this year I was able to reconstruct pieces of myself into a new whole knowing that through it all, the love of my friends and family was solid. I felt the grace of God through those dearest to me and for that I am thankful.

I re-wrote the song seasons of love as part of my reflection. Enjoy.

525,600 minutes, 525,000 moments so dear.
525,600 minutes...how do you measure a year in the life.
In sermons, in meetings, in friends with coffee.
In pictures, in music, in worship, in trips far away.

In 525,600 minutes...how do you measure a year in the life.
How about love? How about love? Measure in love? Seasons of love.

525,600 minutes!
525,000 journeys to plan.
525,600 minutes - how can you measure the life of a woman or man?

In truths that she learned,
or in times that we cried.
In bridges he burned,
or the way that he died.

It’s time now to sing out,
tho the story never ends
let's celebrate remember a year in the life of friends.
Remember the love!
Remember the love!
Remember the love!
Measure in love. Seasons of love! Seasons of love.

Getting out from under

It's been a long time since I blogged. The "debacle" as partner and I like to refer to the incident a month ago was very hard and I am still recovering from the blow. There have been some other life events that my partner and I are recovering from as well.

However this morning when I woke up, I realized I was not depressed. This is huge because for the last month I've been barely able to get out of bed because of the bone crushing depression I've been struggling with in these last days. So I began my day with re-arranging my nightstand. I got caught up on my friend's blogs and realized that I needed to catch up on my own.

In the midst of this dark month of the soul I have been blessed with many moments of grace these last few weeks as shown to me especially from my friends. Thank you thank you thank you. You all know who you are and know that I carry you in my heart always.

A little fun stuff, I got to visit the CowGaels in Tir na Blog. MaineCelt and I are pirates at heart and as we plotted our journey to the high seas, I got to meet her partner the Piper, her cows, her chickens and her border collie. Here's some pictures.

"we're not looking at you...we're still not looking at you."

"Welcome to my humble home...would you like a spot of tea."

"Look into my eye...you are getting sleepy...very sleepy..."

RevGalBlogPal still life with electronic fence and leaves.

The Evil of Fear

I had a candidating sermon last weekend.

The church was ill prepared on calling an openly gay candidate.

The faction who didn't want change was organized. They sat together in the back of the church during the serivce. Glared at me the whole time, glared at my partner too.

The vote was not in my favor. Fear won over good.

I am devastated. Oh God Oh God why have you abandoned me.

Paradigm Shift - with a new beginning

Every time I prepare to preach my mind keeps bringing up memories of when I was a little girl growing up in the Catholic Church. I remember having a healthy curiosity concerning the things that the nuns and priests were teaching me and much to their consternation I was not afraid to question what they were teaching me.

For instance I was led to believe that the only people who were going to go to heaven were Catholics, and only the good ones at that. Oh sure there were exceptions such as babies who were not baptized that would go to limbo but everyone else was condemned to eternal damnation. Well that didn’t seem fair to me. At that time I was friends with a bunch of Baptist girls down the street and I had a hard time believing that were they not going to heaven because they weren’t Catholic. What about the people in other countries, you know the starving children in China that I heard about every time I tried to not eat my vegetables, these kids didn’t know about the Catholic faith, were they condemned as well.

As I grew up I became more uncomfortable with the differences between what I was taught and what I saw. Through careful study of the bible I was able to find out that Heaven was big enough for all people of faith and that God’s grace and God’s love was given to us freely as preached through his Son Jesus Christ. I experienced a paradigm shift that sustained my faith.
I do know that it seems unusual to use a modern word such as paradigm to preach on this morning’s texts.

A paradigm is set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual sense. Examples of paradigms are Watson and Crick’s way of modeling DNA using a double helix, the belief as expressed in our country’s declaration of independence that “All men are created equal.”, and even our culture’s notions of “what’s hot and what’s not” which seem to change by the minute. Basically paradigms are a set of beliefs, rules and systems that help us make sense of the world around us.

However occasionally we encounter things that make us question our deeply held belief systems. For instance Thomas Jefferson was the author who wrote the famous words, “All men are created equal” and yet he owned over 600 slaves. Many of us grew up with the protestant work ethic, the belief that if you work hard, you will move up in the world and be blessed with great prosperity, however in the midst of this recession, many of us who have worked hard are finding ourselves unemployed and wondering how we are going to make our house payments, feed our families, and pay our medical bills. When our belief systems don’t match with our reality we can become anxious, somewhat embarrassed and may even become stressed out.

This morning’s readings present us with two opposing viewpoints, the reading from the book of Deuteronomy has Moses urging the Hebrew people to observe God’s commandments diligently and closely not adding anything to them or taking away from them. Then we have the reading from the Gospel of Mark where Jesus calls the law into question. This morning we are invited to live in the tension.

In order to understand what these scriptures are saying we have to look at the history behind both of them. Who wrote the texts, what were they trying to say, who were they saying it to. The book of Deuteronomy contains the speeches that Moses gave to the Hebrews as they were about to enter into the Promised Land. We remember that Moses helped free the Hebrews from slavery in Egypt. For two generations they wandered the desert because they were disobedient to God. After forty chaotic years of walking, running, packing, unpacking, celebrating, complaining, birthing, dying, obeying and rebelling, they had finally reached the end of the wilderness and they stood on the edge of the Promised Land. As they are about to cross the River Jordon Moses realized that the people needed to know once again what was expected of them according to the covenant that God made with them. The laws of the covenant were not only about making the Lord their God their only God, it was also about living in right relationship with each other and with God. To care for each other, giving special care to the widows, children and vulnerable folk in their community. To care for the land that they are about to enter.
In the covenant are laws on such things as how to worship, how to run their government, how to keep Sabbath, laws on marriage and adultery, even laws on purity which included what the people could eat and how they could eat it. These commandments served two purposes, first to give the Hebrews a way to glorify God, and second to give them a way to live with each other peaceably. Living according to the laws as set out by the covenant made the Hebrew people very different from the cultures that surrounded them not only in religious belief but in how they dressed, how they ate and whom they related to. At times the laws excluded others who were not Hebrew, anyone who ate the wrong foods or anyone who suffered from an illness that made them ritually impure.

Then we come to Jesus in the Gospel of Mark. Here was the son of God who seemed to not follow all of the commandments of the Covenant. Here was this young upstart who touched lepers, ate with sinners, and hung out with prostitutes and tax collectors. During the Sabbath Jesus would heal the sick and let his disciples pick grain from the fields. The Pharisees who were the rule-bearers of that time would confront Jesus every time they saw him break a rule to which Jesus would rebuke them. Now Jesus was not critical of the law. He understood that the law as a whole was good because it was all about loving God and loving one’s neighbor as oneself. What Jesus was criticizing was how some used the law to set up traditions and norms that excluded people not like them according to their interpretation of the law. Now the Pharisees were not bad people, contrary to popular belief. They were doing the best they could with the beliefs they had. They truly believed that they were glorifying God through their faithful following of the covenant. However, Jesus shows them a new way. He gives them a paradigm shift where God’s mercy and grace are not given because you followed the letter of the law but rather because you have faith. It’s not about your actions but rather what is in your heart that causes you to act the way you do.

Jesus and the disciples are being confronted by the Pharisees because they didn’t wash their hands before they ate. The people of that time had no concept of germs causing illness and so the defilement was more about ritual purity than it was about good hygiene. Jesus rebukes them, calling them hypocrites that “honors [God] with their lips, but their hearts are far from [God.]” (7: 6) He tells the crowds, “there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come.” (7:15, 21). In this text he declares that all foods are clean and that the thing that we need to be most concerned about is what is in our hearts. It’s not about what we do, but why we do it.

We are living in an age of constantly shifting paradigms. Where at one time we were a church that didn’t believe in the ordination of women we now include and affirm a woman’s place in the ministry of the church. Where at one time our society believed that the slavery of African Americans was justified according to the law of scripture, we have now moved into believing that all people are created in the image of God and that all are deserving of freedom. In all these things, our forebears the Congregationalists stood on the cutting edge of these paradigmatic shifts. One of the founders of our Congregational tradition John Robinson states, “There is yet more light and truth to break forth from God’s Holy Word.” The Bible reveals the good news of God’s love and grace for all of God’s creation. It is the foundation of our faith. Even though it was written in different times from ours, it still speaks to us in our present world. We do not depend on past interpretations but we hear the scriptures with the expectation of new insights and God’s help for living today. We are of a faith tradition that takes the bible very seriously, and in doing so, we do not take it literally. It is because of our denomination’s willingness to embrace the paradigm shift that we were the first denomination to: experiment in democracy, stand against slavery, ordain an African American pastor, ordain a woman pastor, and ordain an openly gay pastor. We were the founders of the social gospel movement, which led members of our denomination participated in social justice movements such as civil rights and anti-poverty .

I would like to end my sermon with the words of The Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring. “’Yet more light and truth....’ Robinson's assertion continues to be the hallmark of UCC beliefs. That is why in our tradition we read the Bible, we study ancient creeds and catechisms, and we look to the wisdom and guidance of individuals and faith communities throughout history and across cultures—but it is also why we never let ourselves believe that we have read or heard all that God has to say, or all that God may be calling us to be and do.”[1]

May it be so.

Amen

[1] The Rev. Dr. Arlene K. Nehring, “Yet More Light and Truth” sermon preached June 8, 2003 at Eden UCC Hayward, CA.(http://www.ucc.org/god-is-still-speaking/pdfs/Yet-more-light-and-truth.pdf)

The Whole Armor of God

Ephesians 6:10-20

We have often heard it said that our greatest gifts can also be our biggest stumbling blocks. The gift that I have been blest with is a big and sensitive heart. With it I am able to see the good in all people, be optimistic about the future and have hope that all of God’s creation will live in peace and harmony together. My sensitivity allows me to reach out to those who are in need and to comfort them as they weather their storms. The gift of empathy lets me meet people where they are at in their journey and glimpse into what it is like to walk a mile or so in their moccasins.

As grateful as I am for my gift of sensitivity, I also regret it. My sensitive heart is equipped with a very thin skin. My feelings do get very easily hurt. I will find myself worrying more about how other people perceive me rather than doing what is right. I am more likely to take things too personally rather than sorting out what are other peoples issues and what are my issues. I may be slow to anger, but I must admit I am also slow to forgive because I am so easily wounded. It is hard to maintain my faith when all I use for armor is resentment and righteous indignation.

6:12 For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but …against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

When I was younger, I tried to hide my sensitivity behind a very tough exterior. My outward appearance did not match my inward sensitivity. I became the woman that people were afraid to mess with. Like the character Julia Sugarbaker in the show Designing women, I became a verbal terminator. I would cut people down to size with the lash of my tongue thus letting my adversaries know where I stood and how right I was. I thought I was gaining people’s respect, but sadly all I was getting was their fear. The armor that I chose to wear did very little to protect me. There were many chinks and gaps in my tough exterior. It did keep people out however the hurt would still find a way of getting in.

6:11 Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.

Paul’s letter to the Ephesians begins with a striking visual image, that of a Christian standing as a fully armed Roman infantry soldier against the assault of flaming arrows thrown down from above. Paul believes that his audience to be in the midst of a spiritual warfare and is telling them to protect themselves with the whole armor of God.

Biblical scholars note that the Paul gave the names of the various pieces of armor that a soldier wore so as to show what the early Christians needed to defend themselves against that which is evil. “The belt of truth” Roman soldiers wore a belt that was so wide and thick that it protected the soft underbelly of the soldier. Paul recognized that the soft under belly of any community was falsehood and gossip. It is the truth can keep a faith community together.

“The breastplate of righteousness” and the “helmet of Salvation” these instruments shielded the most important parts of the human body, the heart and the head. In Paul’s time it was believed that the heart was the seat of emotion and the head was the center of reason which are the important parts of the emotional and spiritual life. Knowledge of and faith in God’s grace and love given to us freely through Jesus Christ gives us the strength to think and do the right things.

“The shoes on your feet.” Romans soldiers wore half boots so that they would be able to move quickly over the Roman roads. Paul’s image of feet made “ready to proclaim the gospel of peace” tells his listeners that they must be ready move quickly and broadly to share the good news of God’s love and grace for all as shown to us through the life and ministry of his son Jesus Christ so that all may know God’s salvation.

“The shield of faith.” The shield was the most important piece of armor that a soldier of that time carried into battle. With it, a soldier could deflect the attacks of swords and arrows. However some armies used flaming arrows to attack their enemies, a move designed to get individual soldiers to drop their shields long enough to put out the fire, thus exposing them to attack. Roman soldiers used shields of heavy wood with a leather covering that and soaked it with water to extinguish these flaming arrows that hit it. When the flaming arrows of the enemy hit the shield soaked in faith, the arrows sputter out and the Christian “soldier” is saved.

“The sword of the spirit, which is the word of God” up until now, Paul was exhorting these Christian soldiers to take a defensive position against evils unseen. However the sword is used in offense. What Paul is saying is that the only thing we can use for offense is the word of God. Now I do recognize that there are some “offensive” Christians out there; however the offense we are called to use is one that hits people not with condemnation and judgment but with the Good news* of God’s love and grace for all of God’s creation. We remember that in all three gospel’s Jesus states explicitly that the whole of scripture depends on these two commandments, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your soul and with all your mind.” And “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The sword of the spirit is forged with love for God and tempered by the love for neighbor.

In his article “Reflections on the Lectionary” Rev. Matt Fitzgerald shares his thoughts on what it means to wear the armor of God in the midst of spiritual warfare. He talks about a photo of a lunch counter in Nashville during the civil rights movement. He states, “A white man and a white woman are sitting with an African-American woman. Their backs are turned on an angry mob gathered behind them. Their waiter has just poured a bottle of ketchup over the white man’s head. In the black and white photograph, the ketchup looks like blood as it drips down the man’s jacket. His jaw is clenched, his shoulders braced. He must want nothing more than to turn and attack the jeering crowd, to pick up a sword and wade into battle. But he sits still. On the world’s terms he is weak; armed with nothing but the gospel of peace as he receives every sort of abuse. The difficult thing about Christian armor is that it lets more in than it keeps out.

The eyes of the crowd are insane, lit up by the cosmic powers of that dark time. One man has a sugar jar in his hand and a joyful smile on his face as he pours its contents over the African-American protester’s head …If one of the protesters had carried anything but God’s weapons, I imagine [their adversaries] would have fought back with pleasure. But [the adversary’s] weapons proved no match to the armor of God…For God’s victory emerged years later.”+ The victory of equality for all God’s people was won, not by violence but by love. These scenes of: people being attacked at lunch counters, young people being hosed down at civil rights protests and African American children walking with their heads held high into newly de-segregated through throngs of people shouting all sorts of hatred against them that showed the world the evil of racism and now we are living in a world that seeks to celebrate diversity rather than squelch it.

Earlier in my sermon I shared with you how I tried to put on an armor of toughness to shield my sensitivity. This did not protect me from the flaming arrows of hurt and shame that were hurled against me by others who were also hurting. It took years for me to realize that God loves me just as I am because I am God’s beloved child. The good news of God’s love and God’s grace as shown to me by the ministry and life of his son Jesus is the armor that I wear not just to protect me from that which would hurt me in this world but also strengthens me to live a life of service towards building God’s kingdom here on earth. Yes, I still have to dodge the occasional flaming arrow and yes at times I have dropped my shield and have been pierced. It is in these times that I pray to God to give me the strength to pick up my shield and persevere by responding with love and grace. Go and do likewise.

May it be so.

Amen.

*Bob Kaylor “The Liquid Armor of God” Homiletics Vol. 21-4, p. 64
+Matt Fitzgerald “Reflections on the lectionary” Christian Century Vol. 126-16. P. 21

A Listening Heart - rewritten

1 Kings 2:10-12; 3-14
Eph 5: 15-20

“A Listening Heart”

Have you ever played the game three wishes. This is where you and your friends imagine what you would do if genie were to swoop down and ask you for three wishes.
My friends wished for things such as dream houses, handsome and rich husbands, cute ponies and clothes closets bursting with the latest fashions. I on the other hand surpassed them in wisdom and intellect by telling them that I would ask the genie for three more wishes.

Solomon was also a wise guy, I mean a man of great wisdom. He knows what to ask for. He begins his request with praise and thanksgiving for the steadfast love that God gave the previous king, his father David. He then humbly recognizes his inexperience as ruler stating, “I am only a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in…” He doesn’t ask God for riches or a long life. Instead he asks for something beyond material needs, he asks God for an understanding mind so that he would be able to know good from evil.

At an ordination that I attended last week, Rev._______, a retired prison chaplain preached a sermon about prayer and how it changes the prayer. In her sermon she shared her story about how she knew she was reaching the end of her ministry as a chaplain for the state women’s prison. She was near the age of retirement and realized that her health was not allowing her to do the work that was needed for her ministry. She prayed to God to change her circumstances so that she could continue doing the work that she loved so dearly.

Instead she got more work. She was asked to supervise an intern from the seminary.
However, the seminarian sent, ________, changed Rev. _______’s attitude toward the chaplaincy because she saw that ______ had the gifts and graces to replace Rev. _______ in her position as chaplain. God gave Rev. ________ the wisdom to realize how the gifts of another colleague could sustain the ministry at the women’s prison.
So Rev. _________ brought _______ into the fold of the prison ministry and eventually __________did replace Rev.______ as the prison chaplain. It was bittersweet for both of them however this transition led to the celebration of ______’s ordination which happened last Sunday. In her sermon at _________’s ordination, Rev. ________ reminded all of us that God doesn't change things because we prayed for it but rather God changes us through our prayers.

Now Solomon prayed for wisdom and God is pleased that Solomon had asked for it. It is believed that because Solomon was wise by walking in the Lord’s ways that during his reign as King, Israel enjoyed its greatest economic, commercial and political influence.

He was given what God had promised him, “riches and honor all your life; no other king shall compare to you.” Israel was enjoying its greatest economic and political prosperity due to Solomon’s political prowess and national management. Solomon’s empire stretched from the border of Egypt to the border of Babylonia, and peace prevailed.

However, this Solomon strays from the wisdom way and we find out later in 1 Kings that he is shown breaking God’s commandments and turning his heart away from God to worship and build shrines to the many god’s of his foreign wives. In Chapter 11 it states, “King Solomon loved many foreign women…For when Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart after other gods; and his heart was not true to the LORD his God, as was the heart of his father David….So Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and did not completely follow the LORD, as his father David had done.” (1 Kings 11: 1, 4-6) Oh how the mighty has fallen. How does one who was revered as the wisest of all Kings do something as unwise as blatantly breaking the commandment against worshiping false gods and idols.

And most importantly how did such a story end up in the bible.

In order to answer these questions, we have to understand the audience for whom this is written for. If we look at the political history of Israel at the time of Solomon and then go forward 900 years to the time of Jesus, we find a country in turmoil. In the centuries after Solomon’s reign as King of Israel, the kingdom goes through many traumas, beginning with a split in the kingdom after Solomon’s death to the invasion of Jerusalem by the Babylonians four centuries later. This was their September 11th. The fall of Jerusalem was devastating for the Israelite people because their capital was destroyed and the leaders and members the Israelite elite were taken into captivity for several years in Babylon. It is believed that the text from which this morning’s scripture comes from may have been written before the invasion and then edited while the elite were in captivity in Babylon.

The writers of this text were historians who were trying to figure out what went wrong. They looked back to previous stories and found that the story of God’s covenant as mediated by Moses between God and the people of Israel after the exodus from Egypt provided an explanation as to why Israel had fallen. This covenant is in our scriptures in the book of Deuteronomy which is where we get our ten commandments among other things.

Here the historians found the ways that their people fell short on their promises to God.In Deuteronomy the most important commandment God put forth to the people of Israel was, “you shall not put any other God’s before me.” which is explicitly stated in the Ten Commandments and throughout the covenant. Now these historians interpreted the covenant to be conditional. As long as the people adhere to God and obey God’s law, God will protect the people and give them land. If the people turn away from one God Yahweh and pray to the other lesser gods, God will tear their land from them.

Some believe that the purpose of the written history of 1 and 2 Kings was to show the Babylonian captives that their situation was a result of infidelity to the covenant as set forth between God and God’s people.

Now it looks like according to this morning’s text, Solomon starts out on the right foot. He comes to God with humbleness asking God to give him an understanding mind to govern the people and be able to know good from evil and God is pleased with his request and gives him a wise and discerning mind, literally a listening heart. But looking closer into the details of the story, we find slight things wrong with the story. It appears on the surface that the writer of this scripture is openly praising Solomon but then upon a closer reading of the scripture we find an action that shows us how really Solomon fell short of following the covenant.

It’s ironic that this conversation between Solomon and God happens in a high place where Solomon gives a burnt offering which was a questionable worship practice according to the covenant. If you look at the text prior to the one we read this morning, it states that Solomon married the Egyptian Pharaoh’s daughter and the covenant clearly states that Israelites are forbidden from marrying foreign women. It also says that in his reign he attains much silver and horses from Egypt, another thing forbidden by the covenant. Even the narrative of the building of the Temple of Israel is riddled with irony, Solomon bragged that he built the temple for God to live in and God appears to Solomon to remind him that God built the temple and that God will only dwell among the people if they keep God’s commandments. The narrator is quick to point out that while it took Solomon seven years to build the Temple for God to live in, it took him thirteen years to build his palace and royal complex. Thus giving the subtle implication that Solomon’s priorities were more about himself than about God.

The ultimate downfall of King Solomon was that he attained his great riches by oppressing the Israelite people to meet his goals. He set heavy taxes and used slave labor to build the temple and his royal complex. Once again, actions that broke the commandments of the covenant and it is due to this oppression that the kingdom of Israel starts to fall apart.

The story of Solomon is a cautionary tale for us in today’s society. We live in a culture that believes in separation of church and state but yet religious beliefs and claims of authority are brought into the public arena. There are some political leaders speak piously of their faith life which is fine, however it is some of these same folk that neglect making sure all of God’s people have the basic goods of life – in other words, they neglect‘the widow, the poor and the foreigner in our midst’-those most vulnerable and in need.

The core of the covenant between God and God’s people is this, that God calls all of us to live in right relationship with God and with each other. This is the spirit of shalom where all are whole, well and prosperous and all are working towards the well being of all of God’s creation. This is what it means to follow all of God’s commandments and walk in God’s ways.

Living according to the will and way of God calls us to turn away from the false gods of individualism and greed in order to pursue a more divine and wise calling. It is not about following the mainstream, but rather calling everything into question and asking does this contribute to the well being of all creation. Paul exhorts the Ephesians to be careful how they live, to not be like everyone else around them. That being wise means living differently in the society around them by choosing to live a life of integrity and commitment to God. He calls the people to be wise and to understand the will of the Lord and to be filled with the spirit and give thanks to God at all times. For the lifestyle lived in the purpose of shalom is a blessing in itself and the abundance and peace given by this surpasses all the benefits of material success and prosperity.

It was only when Solomon came to God with an open heart that God was pleased. Solomon only asked God for a listening heart to be able to discern between good and evil. At that time he had a proper ordering of priorities. At that time he did not ask for long life, riches or the destructions of his enemies. God was pleased and gave him a listening heart. However as Solomon gained wealth and prestige, he became less devoted to God to pursue the false gods of material wealth and power. I pray that we remember this story and hold ourselves accountable to it. That we remember that prayer-filled discernment is not a one shot deal but a way of living that is pleasing to God. Let us all listen for the still speaking voice of God, calling us to be the hands, feet and voice of God in building the Kingdom of God. Where all of God’s creation lives in wholeness, prosperity and wellness.
May it be so. Amen.

Bread of Life: The Sourdough Version

This summer I am attempting to make sourdough bread from scratch. While surfing the internet a month ago I found a website called foodwishes.com. In it were instructions and videos on how to make sourdough bread from starter to finished product in eight easy steps spread out over a week. Well I couldn’t resist the possibility of making my favorite bread in the whole world so I embarked on this project wholeheartedly armed with the simple ingredients of flour, water, salt and sugar.

First I made the starter. I mixed water and flour together in equal parts and left it alone for twenty four hours. For the next two days I fed the starter once a day by taking out some of the original mixture and replacing it with more flour and water in equal parts. On the third day I had a bubbly mix which would help the dough to raise. I then added more flour and water and left it sit for another day.
Then came the fun part, the kneading of the dough; I took the dough that I had mixed the day before and began working the flour into the original dough in a systematic manner, this is called kneading. I used the fold and push method. I put a bit of flour on the dough, worked it in, folded the dough and push. Then I repeated. Sounds easy doesn’t it, but it is harder than you think. After folding and pushing the dough for over a half hour I began to feel like I’d had a full work out at the gym.

Once the dough was fully kneaded I had to put it aside and waited for it to rise. That was where I had hit a wall in the bread making process. I was not able to get the dough to rise. I decided to bake the bread anyways hoping against hope that it still will turn out. Instead of a luscious crunchy loaf of sourdough bread, I ended up with the equivalent of a battering ram. The loaf was flat and hard. I sliced it as best I could, almost breaking my bread knife in the process and ended up with slices of sour biscotti. I bit into my first slice of “bread” and though it tasted fine, the substance in my mouth so hard and chewy that I was unable to swallow it. My first attempt at bread making, was an ultimate fail.

Imagine what it was like for the people of Jesus’ time to bake bread. I had the modern conveniences of store bought flour, running water and an oven to make bread. Research in biblical archeology has found that it was back breaking work for the women at that time to make the daily rations of bread for their families. Using conical clay ovens, fired with wood located out in the back of their houses they made bread in all kinds of weather, hot humid weather did not keep them from the daily task of bread baking because bread was the staple of life for their families. According to biblical archeologists findings they found that bread baking began, “Early each morning, the baker-women would sweep out the ashes from the day before and stoke the ovens with dry sticks. They’d light the fire and direct a child to keep feeding dry branches into it, until the required temperature was reached.

While this was happening, the women would go through the familiar ritual of bread-making: preparing the dough from flour and water, kneading it, adding a leavening agent and waiting for the dough to rise, then pounding it down, only to have it rise again. When it reached the desired consistency, the bakers would press it out flat and slide it into the clay oven. What came out was a warm bubbly loaf very much like pita bread. It was the staff of life indeed, for those people. Other food items might come and go with the seasons…but bread was the staple that got them through seasons of feast and famine alike.”

Unlike my situation of bread making as hobby, for the women of first century Palestine, bread making was a matter of survival. The only thing I lost in my attempt at bread making was some flour, water and my pride. If a baker of Jesus’ time failed at baking bread, it meant that their family would go hungry.

So when we think about the intense labor it took to make bread in Jesus’ day, hearing the verse, “I am the bread of life.” takes on a different meaning. The purpose of the Gospel of John was to encourage its audience to believe that Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of God. The early Christians whom the evangelist John writes to were part of the Jewish community but in conflict with them because of their belief that Jesus was the messiah sent by God to be the embodiment of God’s grace and love. They were expelled from their church home, the synagogue and so they had to carve a new church home for themselves. This was a painful separation from the Jewish society to which its members belonged. It is important to remember that when John speaks of “the Jews” it refers not to the Jewish people as a whole, but to the synagogue authorities of a particular time and place. The book of John was written to help this community maintain their belief in Jesus as the son of God rather than converting outsiders.

For this community who are trying to make a new way, the words “I am the bread of life, he who comes to me shall not hunger, he who believes in me shall not thirst.” are of great comfort to them. Cut off from the synagogue, they feel that they’ve lost their source of spiritual nourishment; their bread. However Jesus promises them that they can find sustenance through belief in him as the son of God.
“Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

Today we have mixed feelings about bread and Jesus. In a culture of easy access to we have fallen off the edge into excess. Many of us are struggling to maintain a healthy weight and so we turn to such things as the South Beach Diet and the Atkins diet in hopes that it will give us a quick fix to our weight problems.

Unfortunately because of these diets, we have come to believe that bread is bad for you and that elimination of carbohydrates is essential in the task of losing weight. However we forget that whole grain which is contained in bread is a staple of good nutrition. If you look at the food pyramid provided to us by the U.S. department of agriculture, you will see that the bread group is the foundation of a good diet.
Now I do acknowledge that not all of the bread that is available to us is nutritionally sound or that it’s ok to eat bread in excess but what I am saying is that when eaten appropriately, bread can provide the necessary foundation upon which the rest of a healthy diet can be built. The same thing can be said for faith and religion.

It is said that a full 16 % of Americans claim to have no religious affiliation. For the first time in the 62 generations that have come to pass since the beginning of the Christian Church, we have a generation of people, mostly 35 and under who were not raised in the church. When asked about their faith life, these folk were more likely to say, “I am spiritual but I am not religious.” They long to have a connection with something which is greater than themselves, something that lets them know that they are accepted, that they are loved. But they are disenchanted with organized religion because they believe it to be exclusionary and narrow-minded and can you blame them? In the time that the Christian church has grown, the radical nature of Jesus has diminished. Like processed food, his message of God’s great desire peace and social justice through has diminished through the years and we are left with a white bread religion of quick fixes and easy answers that tells us if you just follow the rules, God will bless you with prosperity. Jesus’ ministry had more substance to it. It was about radical hospitality and God’s realm being built here and now. Jesus associated with the outsiders of his society and he invites us to do the same. He ate with the sinners, the prostitutes, the lepers and he called them friends. Jesus’ relationship with God was not based on how closely he held to the religious rules of his day, but on how close he held God, so close and abiding that he called God father.

In it’s purest form the teachings of Jesus are about God’s love and God’s call for us to be the hands, feet and voice in the world in building God’s realm here on earth, where the hungry are fed, those who mourn are comforted and those who hunger and thirst for justice, well they are satisfied. This, my sisters and brothers in Christ is the bread of life whole, hearty and nourishing. “This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die….whoever eats of this bread will live for ever.”

May it be so. Amen.

Bread of Life

Jesus had just fed 5000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. The crowd that followed him was so amazed by this miracle that they can’t get enough of Jesus. Hungry for more they went to Capernaum looking for him. The gospel reading reminds me of the opening scenes of the movie musical “Oliver.” which is based on Charles Dickens classic “Oliver Twist.” The movie begins at the orphan and pauper workhouse in early 19th century London. After a day of hard labor in the mills hundreds of ragged skinny little boys descend down several flights of stairs in lock step with empty bowls in their hands ready to receive their tasteless, colorless daily gruel.

In unison the miserable little boys sing,

“Is it worth the waiting for
If we live till 84
All we ever get is gruel
Every day we say a prayer
Will they change the bill of fare
Still we get the same old gruel.”

I imagine the crowd of people that were chasing after Jesus were also suffering from a similar hunger. Under the tyranny of Roman occupied Palestine, most of Jesus’ audience consisted of poor people living under the thumb of Roman imperialism. Scholars note that in the first century under Roman rule, a small elite class controlled all the production of wealth, resources and land. Those who were not of the elite class, which was most of the population of Palestine, lived in wretched poverty. The majority of the people living in under the Roman Empire lived in misery, danger, fear and despair. These people who suffered exploitation by the powers that be clamored after Jesus with such a hunger because they wanted someone powerful to hang all their hopes on. The people rejoiced, “This man can feed 5000 with only five loaves and bread and two fishes, this man can make the lame walk, this man who could heal the sick and even raise the dead, surely this man can save us!” Like the orphans in “Oliver” sang ever so wistfully:

“Food Glorious food.
What we wouldn’t give for
That extra bit more
That’s all we live for
Why should we be fated to do
Nothing but brood on food
Magical food
Wonderful food.”

The miracles of Jesus gave the crowds the hope that Jesus was their Messiah who would take back the throne of David and take away power from the Roman government.

However this was not what Jesus was all about. Jesus performed miracles not to t satisfying the people’s immediate needs but to give them signs of what Jesus was all about. Jesus the son of God was brought on earth to spread the good news of God’s love and grace for all of God’s creation. Instead the crowds thought of him like we think of the convenience of a fast food drive up window. Need some food, just come on down to the son of God and his miracle of multiplying loaves and fishes will feed you and 5000 of your closest friends. Are you crippled, lame or just fallen and can’t get up, well just pull on up to the magical Jesus and he will make you walk again. Has your child suddenly died for no apparent reason, well mourn no more because Jesus the short order miracle worker will raise her from the dead. After each miracle the crowds chase after Jesus with their hands held out and like Oliver they say, “Please sir, I want some more..”

Just as our mouths water as we wait in the fast food drive-thru lane in anticipation of the burgers, fries and soda that will immediately satisfy our physical hunger so too the crowd’s mouth’s watered at the witnessing of Jesus’ miracles. However, like fast food, the miracles do not give us what we need for long term sustenance. The effects of miracles are short term, those whom Jesus healed from sickness got sick again, if not with the original malady…they became sick with another. The newly walking lame eventually grew old and became crippled again. And the child whom Jesus raised from the dead, well she grew up and eventually died of natural causes. And gospel shows us that the ones whom Jesus fed with the loaves and fishes became hungry again.

Many of us suffer from our own unsatisfied hunger. We crave for things such as financial security, physical well-being and peaceful relationships. We chase after things thinking that they will make us happy. We think we will be happy when: we get that job, buy that big house, or the fastest car. When we attain these things, they don’t seem to give us satisfaction for a long time and so we continue to chase after things that are bigger, better, faster than what we already have. We buy self help books and turn to folks such as Dr. Phil and Oprah hoping it will provide us with the healing that we hunger for. The overwhelming problem of this human condition of wanting comes from our feeling alienated from God. This alienation can cause a deep sense of not being good enough and to escape this feeling of inadequacy we turn to things to make us feel better. Some have become addicted to things such as alcohol, shopping, over-eating and other maladaptive behaviors to fill up their emptiness. Underneath it all the wanting is the longing to have a connection with something which is greater than ourselves. Jesus offers us that connection. He shows us how to have a close and abiding relationship with God. In the gospel Jesus instructs us, “Do not work for food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” We know that Jesus had a close abiding relationship with God. God was not some distant other presence up in the sky someplace, but someone whom Jesus held close to his heart, so close that he called him Father. In his claim, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” Jesus promises that if we follow in his example, we too can have that same close and abiding relationship with God.

Today we break bread and drink of the fruit of the vine to celebrate Jesus…the bread of life who came to us both divine and human to share in our lot. He came not to impress us with miracles, but rather to impress us with his relationship with God. It is this relationship that will become the “meal” that sustains our souls, bringing us wholeness healing and growth. When our souls are fed and filled by a close and abiding relationship with God, we may still go through hunger, illness, lameness and yes even death. But one thing we will never ever be is – empty.

We come to the communion table to connect with God and to know God through his son Jesus. We gather around this table knowing that Christ is the host, Christ set this table and Christ welcomes us all and following Christ’s example we invite those who feel disconnected from God to know God through our communities of faith. Not because we think that Jesus is a magical miracle worker, but because he shows us how to have a relationship with God. We invite people to know God the same way we do, through a man whom we know as the bread of life, whose ministry was about love and justice. And emboldened by the promise of new life that Jesus gives through rising again on Easter morning, we know that hope is alive and that grace abounds. May it be so. Amen.

Friday Five: Childlike edition

Today’s Friday Five celebrates the spontaneous child in all of us… or at least the one that we admire in someone else:

1) On a scale of 1-5, with 5 being I can’t do this now I am about to jump into a pit of plastic balls at the mini-mall and 1 being I can’t do this now until I can get all of the fonts on my blog to match – where are you? Oh I definitely am a 5. I have a very young spirit and anyone who encounters senses this. My motto is life is to short to be so serious.

2) What is the silliest/most childlike thing you have done as an adult? I do silly things all the time. I like to think that life is a musical and so I've been known to break out into song and dance spontaneously. There was the time where I stood up on a coffee table in a coffee shop and sang to my friends (almost got us kicked out). When I was a chaplain, I used to sing and dance down the halls to stay up in the middle of the night. My favorite place to sing was the ICU. I regret that cuz I'm sure once those folks woke out of their comas they probably South Park songs in their heads.

3) Any regrets? Yep, but I'm not going to write about that incident, I'm too embarrassed.

4) What is the silliest thing you have ever seen another adult do on purpose?
My father-in-law mooned my partner and I as we walked past his house. Oh so silly. Oh so white, I close my eyes and I can still see the glare.

5) What is something you wish you did when you had the chance? Kiss my same gendered partner in front of Fred Phelps. We had an opportunity but she was too nervous. So I kissed my best gay boyfriend instead. Didn't have the same effect regrettably.

BONUS: For our ‘I told you so’ sides – what thing did you skip doing and you’re really glad you did!Please let us know if you played in the comments including putting a link to your post. I wish I could say I skipped a silly thing but unfortunately I have poor impulse control.

Monday Garden Blogging: The fruits of my labor

A Bean

A squash

A bunch of tomatos

A tomato good enough to eat!

Wednesday Garden Blogging

Spinach and Onions

A little tomato

Squash up close and personal

Surviving Cilantro

A RevGal meet up

A fun time was had by all at the Portland Maine RevGal meetup. Mary Beth was visiting Songbird in Maine over the weekend and Songbird invited me to come visit them at her house. Originally she invited me for Monday lunch, however being a pastor in between churches, I did not have a Sunday commitment and I've always wanted to hear Songbird preach. Well I got a twofor on Sunday because not only did I get to hear Songbird preach a wonderful sermon at her new church where she is serving as an interim, I also got to hear MaineCelt preach another lovely sermon at Songbird's other church. Usually when I attend two worship services on one Sunday I get tired, however both these sermons captivated me. As MaineCelt would put it, they definityly have the gifts and graces for ministry.

After worship we went to SongBird's for a yummy brunch and then sat in her living for hours talking about life, ministry and music. It was good to be in the company of friends old and new!

I've decided to change my attitude about my being in-between ministry jobs. I realized through prayer and discernment that God is giving me a much needed break from ministry so that I'll be fresh and optimistic for my new church whatever it will be. I've asked God to help me let go of the pain of my previous pastorate so that I would not let it effect my future ministries. This time of not serving a church is God's way of letting me heal. And now I'm enjoying some of the benefits of not working for a church such as being able to hear my colleagues preach and two day weekends for the first time since I got ordained!