Palm Sunday Sermon at Emmanuel, Mercer Island

I am going to read for you the next four verses

that come right after the Gospel description of Jesus riding into Jerusalem.

            All his followers were getting worked up

            as they related all the wonderful things about Jesus that they had witnessed

                        until they began acclaiming him as the coming king.

The Pharisees in the crowd were getting nervous

            and they told Jesus to get his disciples in order, to rein them in.

But it was too late, and besides

            ascribing kingship to him would be provocative enough for Jesus’ purposes

            to set in motion irrevocably the events that would lead to his crucifixion.

And if the crowd was silent, the stones would shout.

Luke 19:41   As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it,

42   saying, "If you, even you,

had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace!

But now they are hidden from your eyes.

43   Indeed, the days will come upon you,

when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you,

and hem you in on every side.

44   They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you,

and they will not leave within you one stone upon another;

because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God."

This procession, down the side of the Mount of Olives

                        across the Kidron gulch and up the other side into the city,

            is feeding a state of delusion for the disciples.

This is no triumphal entry.

For Jesus it is a one way journey towards death.

The stones, the stones, the silent witnesses.

All through the history of the Hebrew Bible are stories about stones:

            Jacob with a stone for a pillow had a night vision

                        of a ladder connecting heaven and earth.

            Joshua and the Hebrew people freed from slavery in Egypt

            coming finally into the Promised Land

                        piled up stones by the River Jordan.

Stones were stacked in the locations of great events

            to be witnesses for those passing by

of the great deeds done there, of God’s intervention, of God’s saving power.

What would these stones say if they could speak?

            Would they speak of the mistake the crowd of disciples was making?

                        the mistake about the Kingdom of God,

                        how it does not come as a political kingdom,

                        but by the Holy Spirit indwelling in each one’s life.

            Would the stones speak about death?

                        Would they cry out for Jesus,

                        whose face had been set like flint toward Jerusalem

                                                and a final denouement?

These very stones would be torn done by the army of Titus

                        not many years hence,

            not one stone left on another

as witness to the blindness of this people.

“If you, even you, had only recognized on this day

the things that make for peace!

But now they are hidden from your eyes.”

The triumphal entry into Jerusalem was not Jesus’ agenda,

            but what the Romans would do.

So now, today, we once again enter into the liturgies of Holy Week.

Now, today, we again have the opportunity

            to participate in the stories and events that are at the heart of our faith.

And we have the warning,

            lest “you do not recognize the time of your visitation from God."

I cannot stress enough the value of attending

                                                as many of the liturgies of the week as possible,

            as an expression of your devotion,

            as a means of spiritual formation for deepening faith and awareness,

            as an act of worship.


March 25: Monday of Holy Week  


6-7 p.m. Holy Eucharist


March 26: Tuesday of Holy Week
 

6-7 p.m. Holy Eucharist


March 27: Wednesday of Holy Week  


6-7 p.m. Holy Eucharist


March 28: Maundy Thursday
 

6-8 p.m. Agape Feast, Foot washing and Eucharist

the commemoration of the Last Supper, the foot washing, the stripping of the Altar and the prayerful vigil keeping watch in the garden


March 29: Good Friday
 

Noon Liturgy
, 4 p.m. Stations of the Cross

the Good Friday liturgy at noon, and the Stations of the Cross at 4:00


March 30 


8-9:30 p.m. The Great Vigil of Easter


lighting the Paschal Candle, The Easter Vigil, baptism and the first Eucharist of Easter

March 31: Easter Day
 

8 and 10:30 a.m. Holy Eucharist,

Come so that you do not fail to recognize the time of your visitation from God.

Today and this week

         let us have the boldness of heart

                  to face all the suffering we experience or see around us

         and to place it all in the context of the Passion.

Walk with Jesus this week

         from the palm strewn entry into this Holy Week

         to that Upper Room where the disciples gathered

         and Jesus told them to eat him and to drink his blood

         to become him, to be transformed into his likeness

                  through this very earthy, very physically intimate process of eating.

Walk with Jesus this week

         out to the Garden of Gethsemane and keep vigil in prayer.

Draw near to the Cross

         and be present at his dying

         and be present in all our own dying and in all the grief and suffering.

We are invited this week to walk through death into life,

                  unspeakable Life, which is Light shining out in the darkness,

                           Life that brings light to all living beings.

In Luke’s Passion account

         Jesus said, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”

Let us also place our lives in the hands of God.

Indeed this is the intent of the Epistle reading for today.

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,

who, though he was in the form of God,

did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited,

but emptied himself,

taking the form of a slave,

being born in human likeness.

And being found in human form,

he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—

even death on a cross.

Therefore God also highly exalted him

and gave him the Name that is above every name,

so that at the Name of Jesus every knee should bend,

in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the Father.

Sermon for Lent 2 at Emmanuel, Mercer Island

Genesis 15: 9   [God] said to [Abram], "Bring me a heifer three years old,

            a female goat three years old, a ram three years old,

            a turtledove, and a young pigeon."

10   He brought him all these and cut them in two,

            laying each half over against the other;

            but he did not cut the birds in two.

11   And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses,

            Abram drove them away.

12   As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram,

            and a deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him.

17   When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking fire pot

            and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.

Does this sound a little weird to you?

Yes, they are words directly from the Bible,

            but they sound foreign and alien to us.

We want to know what’s going on.

This is not how we do liturgy on a Sunday morning,

nor how we have a conversation with God:

            all this slaughter and pouring out of the life blood of these creatures,

                        for God who is the Source and giver of life to all living beings.

A deep sleep fell upon Abram, deep sleep, the dreamless sleep –

            in India this is understood as the third state of consciousness.

The first state of consciousness is waking consciousness;

            this is the lowest state of awareness.

The second state is dreaming consciousness,

            where the limiting perception of waking consciousness is surpassed,

            and what we see in dreams includes images

                        suddenly shifting to something entirely different,

            and sometimes we are even able to fly,

                                    released from the constraints of waking perceptions.

The third state is dreamless sleep,

            when there is still consciousness of being

            but without the constrictions of the images

                                    of either waking or dreaming perception.

This is higher yet, but not the ultimate.

Finally there is what the Hindus call turiya,

            the fourth and highest state of consciousness, pure consciousness.

Actually it is no state but the background

            and what underlies and transcends the other three states.

It is the consciousness that is not qualified as an identifiable self.

It is pure awareness, undifferentiated, no subject-object relationship,

            the “deep and terrifying darkness” of no self

                                                                                                            into which Abram sank.

Have I lost you all yet?

Are you saying to yourself, “My God!  What happened to Beverly in India?

            What is she babbling about?  It’s as weird as that passage from Genesis.”

Right.

            There is a lot out there that can sound strange

                        when we are not familiar with it, and the first reaction to it is fear.

If an angel from God were to show up right now,

            it probably wouldn’t look like something from a painting by Rafael,

and its first words to us would have to be “fear not.”

I say all of this as a preface to sharing with you about my sabbatical,

            because it was different from conventional sabbaticals

                                                                        spent in academic institutions.

The goal of a good sabbatical is to be able to step outside our current reality

                        and look at it from a new perspective

            so as to discover, quite possibly, obvious truths

                                    veiled by familiarity and dullness of awareness.

So I went somewhere that would challenge the conventions

                                    of the way of life I was immersed in,

            challenging the sensibilities and moving outside the comfort zone.

Well, meditation by itself will provide that sort of challenging environment,

            let alone going all the way to India, living in an ashram

                                                            and being with a for real spiritual master.

But it is a rare opportunity to be able to be with a living saint,

            especially one from the long, ancient and highly revered tradition

                                                of the guru, bodhisattva and avatar of India.

So, my own experience – First of all, India is a challenge.

Even if you are attracted to the culture,

            there is the climate and the distinctly different ways of doing things

            and over one billion people.

At the ashram there were up to 10,000 people there at times.

The temperatures were in the high 80’s and 90’s with humidity to match.

            I bathed three times a day

and yet in each case I would be in a sticky sweat by the time I finished dressing.

The mosquitoes thought I was quite tasty,

            and they could find the spots of skin that got missed

                                                and didn’t get covered by some of the repellant.

For living quarters we were assigned rooms that were 12 feet by 12 feet,

            three of us each with a mat for sleeping on the floor,

                        and only cold water for showers.

The food was simple and repetitive.

Each of us was assigned a seva, a job to do in the every day life of the ashram.

            It was only for two hours a day, however, but we all helped out.

My job was sorting garbage at the ashram recycle center.

Now, I do have to say something about this,

            because it was a spiritually significant seva,

and I have talked about it in the adult ed. class.

But back to the main point

My experience at the ashram and with Amma, the hugging saint of India,

            was not like the usual going on a retreat and being spiritual in that way.

It was a total immersion of every moment of the day – and night –

            in the presence of a living spiritual master

                        which approximates as close as possible

            what it would have been like to be around Jesus.

And it was not as delightful and easy as one might suppose.

When you are with someone who can see into you,

            who knows you deeply and personally instantly,

there is no avoiding truth.

It’s best to give up right away and pay attention to her,

            because it is for your own best good, no question.

Even if you doubt it at first, you will find out soon enough that she is right.

In her presence everything fits into spiritual practice

            and everyone around you that you have any interaction with

                        is a part of the spiritual process

                        and an encounter with Jesus in one form or another.

So one might think that my experience with Amma in India could be terrifying,

            but no.

From the moment I arrived and throughout the whole time there

            I was filled with profound joy,

                        a joy that was undergirded by a deep sense of peace

            because I was most definitely in the presence of divine Love,

                                                what the New Testament calls  agaph love.

The heat, the humidity, the itchy mosquito bites, the garbage, the press of the crowd 
all were sheer joy

            because the same Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the Resurrection Jesus,

            was very present, irrefutably present, and vibrantly alive in power.

When you get a taste of this once in your life, you can’t forget it.

And this is no different from what I had first experienced as a young person

            when faith first came alive in me.

In this atmosphere one becomes fully engaged in the process of discipleship.

Now, I have been in this discipleship process for a long time,

            I would say intentionally for a good fifty years of my life,

            and let me tell you, that process is not done.

The deeper I go, the more subtle the work,

            and much of it is like being in a rock tumbler,

                        getting the rough edges, all the tendencies and habit patterns,

                        worn away, until the stone becomes smoother and smoother,

            and finally polished

until it shines.

This is my path, what I have been called to.

I have been infected with that bug

            that wants with all the heart to be as close to Jesus as possible,

                        and to become like him

                        if only in some small way

            so that what I do may be in measure more effective in serving you.

For you are the very face of Jesus,

you are the other rocks in the tumbler with me,

you are the glorious expression of God’s creativity,

            so full of unrealized potential and power and beauty – unrealized –

                        for healing a hurting world.

I report to you about the spiritual impact of doing something crazy

            like going to India and being with a high powered guru

                        and that’s my thing.

But I am infected with a joy and peace and love

            that won’t let the status quo alone.

I’ve just finished up taking my malaria pills

            to ward off what those mosquitoes were sharing,

but I’m taking nothing, doing nothing to stop this spiritual infection,

            and I hope it’s contagious.

I think about Jesus in today’s gospel reading,

            his poignant lament over Jerusalem, his nation’s religious center:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets

            and stones those who are sent to it!

How often have I desired to gather your children together

            as a hen gathers her brood under her wings,

                                                                                                and you were not willing!”

How much he loved those who were intent on shutting him down!

That’s not the situation here, of course,             we hope not, 

            but we might each ask ourselves

                        how we shut down the movement of the Spirit within us,

                        how we squelch his voice calling us out of our comfortableness,

                        how we resist being gathered under his wings.

Why does a hen seek to gather her brood under her wings?

                        Because of impending danger.

The mother bird offers protection to her babies

            even if she herself remains exposed to the disaster coming upon them.

Jesus comes to Jerusalem

            and stretches wide his arms on the hard wood of the cross,

                        and his arms embrace the whole world.

In surrendering himself to death, the ultimate dissolution of self,

            he becomes the source of new life.

Lifted from the earth on the cross,

            he draws all people to himself.

Quit resisting our Lord’s invitation to come more closely within his embrace.

That is the purpose and work and goal of Lent.

Quit your resistance, give that up,

            and come get your hug.

Ash Wednesday Reflections Post India

            Looking back at the time in India at Amma’s ashram, engaging in the spiritual practices of meditation, yoga, and seva (selfless service), I find the Prayer of the Lamb and the history of this spiritual tradition reinforced, renewed and reaffirmed.  Some of the simplest instructions from the very first of practice are still true and even more powerful.  Here are a few examples.

            Meditation is not about me.  It is bigger than the person sitting there in silence.  I sensed this from the beginning, and when one is meditating with several thousand others in the same place, this is much more discernable.  Amma says that in a way meditation is the only selfless action.  The Prayer of the Lamb is intercessory in its structure: “Jesus/Yeshua, Lamb of God, have mercy on us.”  This intercession is not dependent on me or you to articulate what the need for mercy is, or for whom.  And so when we sit down let us begin by offering the time and the meditation to Jesus, and surrender the fruit of our practice for the benefit of others.  Certainly we each benefit personally from meditating, but that benefit is not for me or you alone.  Meditation is one of the best services you can offer your family.  You meditate and they benefit, maybe not dramatically in ways that can be seen immediately, but as you persist in your practice the family receives blessing, not from you, but from our Lord.

            In meditation I am not the “doer.”  Whatever effort I am putting into meditation is the effort of ceasing from doing, restful effort, like laying out in the “corpse pose” at the end of a yoga class.  The body rests from all actions except breath and heartbeat and those other subtle movements.  Sitting in a quiet space the ears rest from listening to the cacophony of sounds.  The eyes close and rest from looking at chaos of so many objects.  The tongue is still as the silent mental recitation of the Prayer of the Lamb flows gently through awareness, giving rest from attention absorbed in thoughts. Then in this stripped down meditation environment awareness goes to the subtle, and so often neglected, sensations of the body.  It is here that the healing effects of meditation might be noticed.  I am not the doer.  It is the Lamb of God at work, serving and ministering.  And so my intention is not to interfere with this.

            On this Ash Wednesday my advice for this Lent for meditation is this: Love the practice!  Love why it is you want to practice meditation.  Love the actual sitting down.  Love what the fruit of practice is, whether seen or unseen.  Love that by meditating you are serving others.  Love the Lamb.  If love is the foundation for your spiritual practice, everything will fall into place.  And when you practice, then it  can benefit the whole world. 

            Keep meditating!