Sermon: Hunger and Thirst

Hunger and Thirst

          Hey! Hey you. You thirst for clean good water, drink freely!

          Hey! Hey you. You hunger, eat your fill, have a sumptuous meal, free of charge.

          Hey! Hey you. You are worn and tired, find rest, abide at the bosom of God.

          Hey! Hey you. You are isolated from those you love and those you hate—God will gather you together.

           Let us pray

          I look out and see,

a society that has cleaved itself into little enclaves. Sunday is often the most racially segregated hour in America, even whole towns and neighborhoods have separated out, and not just racially,

but these days you are more likely to live next to someone who:

looks like you,

and thinks like you,

and votes like you,

and spends money like you, than every before.

          It’s easy to believe the other guy is evil or an idiot, when you’ve never even met him.

          Why do we divide ourselves when our hearts yearn for unity?

          I peer out and see,

a bunch of stressed out people. You are strapped for time and killing time—at the same time.

Multi-tasking until you’ve cheapened every task and made them all unimportant. Shouldering activity after activity, until you are squished and it all means nothing.

You rush from your screen at work to a phone/TV/Computer screen at home.

          How have we managed to even make rest into a chore?

          I look out there and what do I see?

 People so hungry in the 3^rd world that a flavoring for dirt is a big-ticket item—because then it can at least be swallowed and the belly filled. 

And before the rest of you get cocky, you better ask why there is essentially sawdust mixed into the meat of your fast food meals.

For that matter, I see kids on street corners looking out for cops for the local drug dealer, for a chicken box—risking arrest for two legs and a Styrofoam container of mashed potatoes, because their parents can’t afford to put food on the table.

I see too, people who demonize these hungry and ill-fed people, because it is an easier task than feeding them!

          Why do we choose the hungry belly over the full?

          I look out there and see,

oceans that will soon have more plastic waste than fish in them.

I see a town in Michigan where it took nearly 2 years for anyone to notice that 90,000 of its residents were being poisoned with Lead in their water.

          Why do we poison one of the main building blocks of life—water?

          Listen, sisters and brothers, lean close so that you can hear.

          There is a steam of living water that can make you clean, a clear brook that can quench your every thirst.

Being found baptized in the blood of the Lamb, drinking from the Well that is Jesus Christ.

If you drink of other streams,

if you are washed in other baths,

you will need to return to them,

but this water is forever and free.

          Listen, sisters and brothers, lean a little closer to make sure you can hear me.

          There is bread enough for all

—come to the table and eat of the bread of life and drink of the cup of salvation. Consume the meal that fills and satisfies and makes you what you are.

          Listen, family, turn up your hearing aid if you need to, what I say is important.

          St. Augustine writes: “We do not rest until we rest in him.”

There is a calm, a strong, spot of safety

—a holy timelessness that we can stand upon and be free.

In the face of all urgings and anxiety, we can lay our head upon the rock of Christ and simply be!

          Listen, all of you, wiggle your ears so that you can hear me.

          Whenever a line is drawn, whenever we separate ourselves from one another—Jesus will be on the other side of that line, he is with the excluded.

He goes to barriers and breaks them, he hears Samaritans are stigmatized and stands up for them. His welcoming arms are outstretched on the cross for everyone, even for you and for me!

          Seek the LORD while he may be found.

Call upon him while he is near.

Forsake deeds that are deadening and return from all of your unrighteous paths.

Return to the LORD, for God is merciful and full of abundant pardon

—God’s ways are bizarre to us, but thank God for them!

          Repent or perish, repent, and in so doing be fruitful, be fed, accept abundant life in God.

          Seek your neighbor that you might love him!

Find in him Christ hidden and revealed for you. Welcome one another into fellowship with our Lord Jesus Christ.

          Seek that strong place in which to rest.

Find Sabbath, find the embracing peace that is both inside and outside of time. Be shaped by sacred time.

          Seek the bread that satisfies.

Find and eat of this free meal, and share it

—give as you’ve been given, respond to this kindness with kindness,

see that you are full and that you overflow, and pass it on.

          Seek the water of life, find it and drink of it and be made clean

—in the dryness of this weary world show them all the oasis that is here in Christ Jesus.

God’s ways are bizarre to us, but thank God for them!

Amen.

Sermon: Fox and Hen

Sermon: Fox and Hen

            Two boys were out in the street of their cul-de-sac playing soccer. They would rush back to their driveway when cars come through.

            And so it went…

            But one time, a car was driving by, and they didn’t notice, until one of the boys kicked their soccer ball hard, and whack! it hit the side of the car driving by.

            The car stopped.

            A man started to get out.

            The boys ran.

            They ran passed the driveway,

            They jumped over their own fence,

            And continued to run away.

            The man, picked up the soccer ball and deposited it back in their yard. He’d stopped and got out of his car because he wanted to make sure no one, not even the ball, was hurt.

            The soccer-playing boys were expecting wrath, but the man just wanted to make sure everyone was okay.

            And that’s part of the story of humanity

—all of us

—so often we expect a fox, but we’re being offered a hen

—we expect God to be a carnivore, but God is looking to protect us.

Let us pray.

            Paul is gripped with disappointment at what he sees among his people in Philippi. They are settling on a Jesus plus kind of Gospel. They’ve assumed Jesus is great, but not enough to finally stand as the bedrock upon which to build their life. They ought to be citizens of heaven, but they’ve instead accepted a dual citizenship,

a Jesus passport and an earthly passport.

They do not see their Identity in Christ as sufficient ground to standing firm on in this life.

            In a parallel way, the Pharisees come to warn Jesus off of doing his gospel work…

They warn of Herod’s wrath

—Herod who, to Luke’s eyes is a gadfly, a goofball interested in Jesus

—a powerful person who wants to come and see Jesus, but not a threat until he links up with Pilate at the end of Luke’s Gospel.

            But Jesus stands up to say,  “I know what I’m doing, in the face of a potential danger, you don’t see the real danger. The danger is not being under his wings, the danger is not being there with Jesus doing his Gospel work!”

           

            Paul warns the Philippians that they are trying to keeping safe with a Jesus plus strategy, and Jesus warns the Pharisees they are trying to keep safe with a Jesus Minus strategy.

            One worries Jesus isn’t sufficient, the other that Jesus isn’t even an option.

           

            And both, both are caught up in a lie.

They’ve bought into the strength of that fox Herod, the power of the enemies of the Cross of Christ.

Both over and against the magnificent power found in the weakness of the cross of Jesus Christ.

            And how does that happen?

            How do we decide Jesus isn’t enough for us?

            I suppose these days it is because we buy into what our culture tells us, becoming citizens of Heaven and America, just as the Philippians were citizens of Heaven and Rome.

            We buy into the myth of scarcity and the fallacy of choice.

            Think of it, we can get so revved up by the messages of our society:

That success and having more are one in the same

That we have such a limited life that we have to spend every ounce of it getting the best!

            We can grasp onto these messages so tightly that we loose our grasp on God.

            I think of the comedian Aziz An-sari, who describes these phenomena well in his book “Modern Romance” and his TV show “Master of None.”

In one scene, he is ready for Lunch and he wants Tacos, so he looks up on Yelp where the best Taco stand is, and there are so many different metrics you can use to judge a Taco, that by the time he makes a decision on where to eat, the place is closed.

            So too, he finds woman after woman to date on a dating site, and ultimately he can’t decide who is the best person to contact, and therefore goes away single.

            Or look at TV, for every half hour we get 8 minutes where we’re told we’re worthless unless we choose the best product.

            The world we live in is so anxious about getting “the best” of everything that it can’t settle for anything.

            We’ve bought what the world is selling. We’ve managed to forget the resurrection and have come to believe our life is such a scarce thing that we must be so very careful how to spend it.

            Listen to that… spend it. Spend our life. We’ve made ourselves into a thing instead of a person!

            We’ve forgotten that we’ve been given this life! Our life is not a commodity to be horded and sparingly spent, but a gift.

            A gift… a free gift.

            Think of that strange covenant God makes with Abram. If it was a sensible covenant both parties would sign it

—both God and Abram would walk through the blood and guts of these sacrificial animals

—but no, the smoke and flame of the presence of God goes through alone

—it is an unconditional promise, one predicated on God’s gift to Abram.

            And so too, the citizenship Paul preaches, we’re citizens of heaven because the heavenly one is transforming us from humiliation into glory. It is a gift of God.

            And so too, this warm shelter at the hen’s bosom, calling her chicks to rest in the safety of her wings. Pleading that we take her gift, her motherly love,  and get away from the world when it insists on being fox-like!

           

            And so too, our lives! Gift!

            Let us hold fast to the promise of God, that God is for us and therefore none can be against us.

That life isn’t for spending, but for living, living this great gift God has given us.

            Living it! Knowing our choices, though they matter greatly, do not matter as much as the choice God has made through Jesus Christ. Therefore we can live freely,

nestled gently under the wing of the Mother Hen.

Living boldly the gospel in the face of all that would stand against it.

Living as citizens of Heaven, here on earth.

            Trust that this life isn’t one of constant fleeing, jumping our own fence when God comes to check if we’re alright, and give us back our ball.

            Trust that God isn’t a fox, trying to eat us.

Life isn’t the struggle of carnivore against carnivore,

each choice we make some kind of blood sport,

a maelstrom of anxiety.

            No. God is not a meat eater.

God is our Shelter in times of trouble, our Helper and our Salvation in all times of need.

Amen.

An Opportune Time: A Sermon

An Opportune Time

         Good morning class. I’m professor Faust.

         This is Deviling 102: Temptations. If you are here for Torture 206: Advanced Bagpiping, that’s down the hall on the right, I don’t want another mishap like last week.

         Today we’ll be coving the opportune time.

         I hope everyone has read the primary documents in preparation for today’s lecture, the 4^th Chapter of Dr. Luke’s Gospel

         (point) What, you didn’t… Why not?

(wait) you were busy watching the politicians rip one another apart the last few nights… that’s fair—I’ve always said never let schooling get in the way of your education.

         Today we read of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness. He’d just been declared Son of God… This was a powerful day for the Enemy, like a coronation or the start of an invasion

         Satan tried to blunt this attack upon our control of the world in a crafty way, by defining the terms

—if we get to define what “Son of God” means, we’re half-way to victory right there.

         The Christian’s Saint Augustine was right in describing our subtlety

—at our best we misuse the good.

Outright evil is rarely useful, instead taking their weapons and turning them around …

a spiritual jujitsu if you will…

that my pupils, that’s where we can draw real blood.

(point)

Why? you ask. Because humans have some sense of propriety, not much mind you, but when confronted by absolute evil, they’ll stand fast, but dealing with misused good? They don’t have a prayer… I say that in the colloquial of course, prayer is, unfortunately, a mighty, if often unused, weapon of the Christian.

…

Where was I? Yes, defining the terms. Satan takes this powerful name, title, vocation, “Son of God” and tries to hack Jesus away from his Father—dismember that divine relationship.

         Unfortunately, Jesus would have none of it.

         Famished though he was, he did not make bread the totality of his relationship with God,

powerless though he was, he did not see power as an end to be sought,

humbled and vulnerable though he was, he did not see safety and glory as his goal.

         Of course, all that is background. It leads us to today’s lesson, Satan departing “until an opportune time.” This is read as the last temptation of Christ, the betrayal, abandoning, and cross—Satan waiting in the wings for “Good” Friday.

            But, I would suggest, dear little Devils, that there are other opportune times that Satan finds, that each of us as we go about the business of temptation, can find, to tempt all those Children of God, offer a misused good in exchange for their Identities as Children of God!

         Let’s step out of the ivory tower for a second and get practical… Satan comes to Jesus when he’s hungry and offers bread… you all are going to be working in New Jersey when you graduate, right… what might they be starved for?

--No, that’s an ugly stereotype about people from New Jersey.

 --Time! I like that… Let’s assume people from New Jersey are starved for time.

         So, go out there and offer it to them.

         Give them all the time they need. Give them minute rice, machines that wash clothing and dishes, shopping and banks done by phone and on the internet. Tell them to go and enjoy it.

-No… no… Not everyone could hear him. He said “You can’t do that! Imagine what they’ll do with all that free time.” He mentioned how Luther prayed for an hour each morning, two if he was busy.

         Don’t worry. They’ll take time, and kill it. They’ll waste it. They’ll find millions of ways to dump it down the drain, all the while afraid that they’re not making the most of it.

-How?

         Well, time management isn’t ultimately, about efficiency, it’s about choices. It is about seizing a goal and going for it. Having a vision, holding onto values and investing time in those things and not in others…

         These humans, they’re rudderless, give them all the time in the world, I’m almost positive they won’t choose their Baptismal Identity as their goal.

         What else was offered up?

-Yes, Power! And not just a little power, but imperial power. Satan offered Jesus authority over all nations. He essentially offered him Roman power. Offered him the ability to topple nations, and actually change the cultures and values of other people. It’s God-like isn’t it?

         Here’s the trick, we can even inject that kind of hubris into nations that see themselves as Christian—in fact, when a nation state makes a religious claim like that, as if any entity can see itself as completely bearing the image of God—the Church, our great enemy, doesn’t even claim that, when they make such claims, they’re ripe for the picking, so self-assured they won’t even notice we’ve turned them! Imagine the sins that can be ignored if you think you’re doing them in the name of God.

         Yes, taking the good and turning it to its worst… believe me this place is filled with the souls of self-assured, self-righteous, nations.

         And what was that third temptation? ah yes… Safety and Glory… they might seem dissimilar at first, but once you think about it, it makes a lot of sense.

A bloodless Christianity is one where there is no risk involved, nothing on the table, one without sacrifice—total safety…

and at the same time, one that revels in it all, so entranced with itself that it doesn’t notice that God has left the building, one that encourages worshippers to say “Thank God I’m not like that sinner over there!”

Our greatest ally is a people who seek easy answers and miracles when God is calling for martyrs and adventurers. Safety and Glory is nothing short of Sin itself, heads shoved so far into belly buttons that there is no coming back!

         I think my time is about up… the big picture of today’s lecture is this: misusing the good is an excellent way to tempt humans,

Satan’s paradigm of tempting Jesus “Pleasure, Power, Safety/Glory” are excellent tools in your toolbox.

        

         Any questions?

-Yes, this will be on the Exam!

-THE opportune time… Bad Friday, or “Good” Friday as the Christians call it—what they’ll be celebrating in 40 some odd days, well, there is that.

I suppose, in a sense, this is impolitic to say… but, I’ll say it anyway

—I have tenure after all, right

—The Last Temptation makes this degree you are working on worthless…

Yes, ultimately, all our victories here are shallow ones.

Ultimately, we’ve already lost, we’re training you for a job here, that can not be won.

Jesus continued to hold onto that Identity as Child of God, through everything we could throw at him,

He multiplied bread, for others.

Was crowned the servant king.

Showed forth God’s glory on the cross.

Even Death itself could not hold him.

Not only that, he ripped the hinges off our front gate, he defeated and bound Satan

and he clothed all these Christians in that damn Identity of his, Child of God.

         They are clothed in God’s love, rooted in that identity, so that they can face us, and all of our temptations, not in fear, but instead led by a passion for their Lord.

Class Dismissed.

Ash Wednesday Sermon: Why Worship?

          As we enter into this highly ritualized season, this time of extra worship, and very particular worship—whole days dedicated to entry into Jerusalem, foot washing and meal, gathering around the cross, waiting and storytelling, and of course tonight, confession and ashes.

          As we enter into all of this, and as we feel the readings, especially from Isaiah and Matthew, rub against the rituals of worship and the disciplines of Lent

—it is worth asking the very basic question, Why Worship?

Prayer

          When I say “Why Worship?” I’m being rather broad, not just why here in this building, but also I’m talking about our Lenten Disciplines.

Why, for example, participate in prayer partners,

why choose a practice from the Instead of Me Tree,

why collect food for the two Food Pantries we support?

          And there are two answers you might give me. The first, the same answer as Isaiah’s society, the second more inline with Jesus’ description of cultivating treasures in heaven.

          The first is that we worship to discharge a duty,

do a thing so we’re done with it and can forget it forever…

this answer would be a sort of show spirituality, ultimately an act of insincerity.

          Consider Isaiah’s description of a society in which faith is given a lot of lip service

—people play humble, but don’t notice the humiliated,

fast but instead of feeling for those who do not have enough food, they fight and fix the incomes of the poor so they continue to go hungry.

          It’s a society that is outwardly religious, but is in fact faking it,

so self centered the hungry and homeless are hated,

even members of one’s own family forgotten.

It is a society that looks like a spiritual oasis, but once you get up close is a mirage.

          Similarly Jesus hears piety pumped out of a bullhorn.

Alms given to get praise,

prayers said to be seen,

fasts kept to receive commendation.

          I’ve heard tell from friends who get grants from the government  to do good, that when you talk religion to Senator Cory Booker, one of our two senators, he responds:

 “Before you speak to me about your religion, first show it to me in how you treat other people;

before you tell me how much you love your God, show me in how much you love all His children;

before you preach to me of your passion for your faith, teach me about it through your compassion for your neighbors.

In the end, I'm not as interested in what you have to tell or sell as in how you choose to live and give.” And he’s not wrong.

          If our answer to the question “Why Worship” is:

to be done with it

—to ritually do a good thing so you don’t actually have to go out into the world and face it as it is, and do what you can to better it and live faithfully in it

—then we ought to be ashamed.

          But, if a simple discharge of duty isn’t our answer to the question “Why Worship?” but instead Worship is about Discipline

If Worship is practice.

If we’re doing these rituals here, to strengthen us our there,

If worship is strength training for the soul by the Holy Spirit

—if we do ritual so we can to do it regularly,

to bring our practice out into the rest of our lives

—if our dismissal causes us to go forth and serve God and neighbor

Then maybe we’re getting somewhere.

          Why Worship? Because it is part of an ongoing cycle of life… the cycle of Practice, Participation, Frustration, and back to Practice,

Participation, Frustration,

Practice, Participation, Frustration!

          Consider this evening right now:

Tonight we practice…

we admit that we are immoral and that we are mortal. We confess together our faults, we receive the reality of our limited nature,

touched with dust.

          And we’re sent out, participating…

living out this reality, more aware of our shortcomings, more aware as well of our neighbor being in that same spot. And we are gentler with one another because of it.

          We’re sent out, the dust and ash imposed on our brow, even long after it has blown away, it is there, and we are there in it, taking more seriously our moments, savoring our time here on earth all the more.

          Eventually though there will be frustration…

these are hard things to bear, especially as the days wear on, as signs of sin and death take hunks out of us…

Think of Paul, afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger, dishonor, treated as imposters, punished, sorrowful, poor, impoverished…

that’s gotta wear you down…

It’s like that Springsteen Song says: “In the end what you don't surrender. Well the world just strips away.”

          And that’s why we come back, again, to practice…

gathered and sent, gathered and sent… so that we might endure faithfully.

          Why worship?

          Never to hide, never to stunt our sacred duty to God and neighbor. Never that.

          Why worship?

          That we might endure, that we might follow faithfully, and when we fall, find ourselves held by the Spirit, nurtured, and sent out again.

Amen.

3rd Corinthians (1st Jerseyans)

3^rd Corinthians (1^st Jerseyans)

         Dearest Sisters and Brothers,

         I have heard that those communities I planted so long ago have spread and changed and popped up all across the globe.

         I have heard that they’ve spawned divisions now called denominations, and movements that I would have never imagined.

         When I brought Jesus’ message from Jerusalem to Rome

—I traveled 1434 miles

—that was an unbelievable length.

It was as if my gargantuan effort to bring the Gospel there

—through shipwrecks and beatings and all kinds of disasters…

It was as if that effort which, the Holy Spirit moved me to do, had brought the Gospel to the entire world.

Now the Gospel is firmly entrenched in such far off places as South Plainfield New Jersey in the USA—which is over 4 times farther away from Jerusalem than my impossible journey was from Jerusalem to Rome.

         I suppose, thinking of my image of the Church as the body of Christ, it is as if the child has become an adult

—the Church has matured. What was once small, has grown large.

         But brothers and sisters, let me be clear

—you are still the body of Christ

—each congregation, each denomination, each piece of you, and all of your gifts, is part of a larger whole.

         In your diversity and in your wide reach, this grand stretching out of the body of Christ

—in this you are still members one to another. Some are eyes, others ears or toes, elbows or nose

—Understand me, you are not a horror show, a bunch of disembodied body parts

—not a crime scene, but a church!

         How we are connected one to another, is extremely significant!

How we foster that connection in love, that is of ultimate import!

         And so, it distresses me when I hear of the recent rending of the body of Christ taking place within the Anglican Communion, dividing the Episcopals, the American manifestation of that denomination, from her English and African siblings. Can you not bear with one another? Are not arm and body connected by ligaments?

         At the same time, I am astounded by the speed by which the Roman Catholics and Lutherans are remembering that they are of one body

—re-membering the body,

 membering again,
making what was once dis-membered re-membered!

That the Roman Catholic Pope will commemorate the 500^th anniversary of the Lutheran Reformation alongside world Lutheranism

—that is astonishing! It is as if the Ear has heard the Mouth and the Mouth realized the Ear is just a few inches from him!

        

         Or, there are the latest tales of merger from those two Lutheran Seminaries in Pennsylvania who have been feuding like the Hatfields and McCoys since the American Civil War. Out of two, will come one.

Is that not the story of the body,

of union,

of our hope,

being one together

—the creation of something new,

being reconciled to one another and in so doing showing forth the body of Christ?

         And then, there is the work of Christ done in this particular piece of Central New Jersey

—that five churches would recognize one another for each of their unique gifts, seeing them all as gifts of the Spirit in their particular neighborhoods, and at the same time recognize the connections they have to one another!

It’s like the eyes see that the body’s got feet for walkin’ and the ears hear that the arms are useful for more than just picking out earwax!

         What I’m saying, to shift the metaphor, is that God has rooted each congregation in a particular community, and God is calling these congregations to share the burdens and the joys of ministry with one another… I thank God for that!

        

         As I stated earlier how you live out these connections are significant—if it is done without love, it does not matter.

         If I adhere to all proper doctrine, but do not have love, I am myself excluded.

         If I connect to my brothers and sisters so quickly and fully that every slight either of us ever committed is erased then and there, but do so without love, I have whitewashed myself.

         If I create something new, birth the Christ Child himself, but do so without love, the whole project is stillborn.

         If I dig deeply into a community and the branches of our mutual ministry together reach out and touch the sky, but I have not planted in love, take a chainsaw to me!

         Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.

It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.

It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

         For at the end of the day, love alone will remain.

When the fire has cleared out the forest floor, the tiny seeds of love will be all that is left.

Purity and Division. Merging, Partnership, Community

—that’s all fine and dandy.

But the one place I hang my hat,

the only ground I can stand on, the only place I can put my trust

—is love.

A+A