Sermon for Easter 2, 4/15/12 Emmanuel, Mercer Island

The Gospel for today is always the same for the 2nd Sunday of Easter,

            but it is so rich a story that we can always hear again with new ears.

There are two parts to this gospel reading,

            and the theme of the first part is summed up in the collect.

Almighty and everlasting God, who in the Paschal mystery

established the new covenant of reconciliation…

Jesus appears to the disciples (all except Thomas) and says to them:

“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

“Receive the Holy Spirit.”

Jesus breathes into them Holy Spirit,

            and then he commissions them into the ministry of reconciliation

                        "If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them;

                        if you retain the sins of any, they are retained."

Well, we may want to back away from this statement, sounds too much like:

            "I forgive you, but I don't forgive you."

So let me help unpack this.

The Greek for "retain" means hold, to hold back, like a retaining wall.           

            bind.  restrain.                        What is being restrained?

            “If you restrain the sins of any, they are restrained.”

not the person, but the sin.

            We can have a restraining effect on sin!

So notice: there is a two-fold aspect to the ministry of reconciliation.

Forgive or take away sins – responding to the occasion of sin, reactive reconciliation. 

And retain or hold back sins - proactive reconciliation.

Think about the implications of this for us in daily life:

            What we say,

what we do,

the attitudes we have,

the opinions we express,

how we live out relationships

– all can be proactive reconciliation.

We who are called by his Name,

            have been sent, and

            have been given an awesome power and force in the world for good,

a force that is desperately needed now in any number of countries

                                                rife with war and civil unrest,

                        and in any number of homes among family members.

We are called to ministry of reconciliation through our baptisms;

            Book of Common Prayer, page 855, from a section in the Catechism, Outline of the Faith:

Q. What is the ministry of the laity?

A. The ministry of lay persons is to represent Christ and his Church;

            to bear witness to him wherever they may be

            and, according to the gifts given them,

            to carry on Christ's work of reconciliation in the world;

            and to take their place in the life, worship, and governance of the Church.

There is much more to say about the ministry of reconciliation

            but we also have the other half of this gospel reading.

Someone forgot to tell Thomas about the meeting.

Despite all the other disciples corroborating their story of seeing the Risen Christ

            Thomas says he must not only see, but also touch.

He would not trust just his eyes.

Maybe all the others were deceived by their eyes – hysterical hallucinations.

He wants to see the wounds; he wants to see that which killed Jesus.

Maybe he wants to make sure

            that it is absolutely apparent that Jesus is risen from the dead,

                        not just a survivor of the ordeal of crucifixion.

So Jesus shows up,

and apparently unseen the Risen Lord had overheard Thomas’ conversation.

Jesus shows great compassion to Thomas

            and he give a special invitation to Thomas to touch the wounds.

Doesn't say if Thomas then did touch.           

But what Thomas said is very significant:            "My Lord and my God!"

Thomas was not just looking at Jesus as his rabbi, or teacher, or master,

            but as GOD.                        This is bold declaration of faith.           

Thomas goes from doubt to calling Jesus God.

            This even goes beyond what the others told Thomas.

Thomas' declaration, "My Lord and my God!" is both a creed

and an act of devotion or worship, a response to the Holy.

Then in verse 29 from the Gospel reading Jesus says:           

            Blessed are those who have not seen,

            and yet believe.

Now here is another place where how the Greek gets translated into English

            is tricky.

There are nuances of meaning around any Greek word

            that may overlap with the many nuances of meaning

                                    around a corresponding English word,

and the Greek verb pistew is one of them.

It gets translated believe and have faith in.

            In English for us here in a church setting

                        believe has a creedal sense to it

                        – such as in a tenet of belief or a doctrine.

            It can have a sense that having gathered so much evidence

                        one can now reliably believe something.

Have faith in is more relational.

            We say we have faith in someone

                        because our experience of that person shows us

                        that he or she is trustworthy.

It’s a matter of trust level.

            Being willing to trust what is not in my control.

            Trusting what I cannot prove, what I cannot dictate as verifiable,

                        only what has been revealed to me,

what I have experienced so subjectively.

Faith, in this sense then, is a participation in relationship

with the God of the resurrected Lord in us.

Now listen carefully to what I am going to say.

We are not saved on the basis of what we believe.

We are not saved on the basis of what we believe.

If that were the case, then purity of theology, the content of belief

            would be of primal importance,

and only those who believed rightly would be saved, reconciled to God.

That makes for a pretty scary situation,

           since with all the different denominations and all their different belief systems,

knowing what is right belief is problematic.

If someone didn’t know the right formula of doctrine, then too bad.

            This would leave out most children,

            those of low mental capacity and the ageing mind that is forgetful.

But that is not the case.

            It is a matter of trust, that kind of faith, rather than belief.

So can you see that it is not what you believe, but what Jesus did.

God doesn’t leave anything as important as salvation,

            to us and our response alone.

Even our faith is a gift.

If we really comprehended the reality of our baptism

            as being in Christ in his death and resurrection

then we could say with Paul: Gal. 2:20

            “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me,

            and the life I now live in the flesh

            I live by faith in the Son of God,

            who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Now back to what Thomas said and its connection with the Eucharist.

The Eucharist is a concrete and specific Resurrection appearance of Jesus.

In the Eucharist we say that we have before us the Body of Christ.

            These are the words as the bread is placed in your hands, right?

So do you realize what you take into your hands every Sunday?

            The very presence of the Resurrected Lord,

                        tangible, touchable.

That is why we make such a point of the moment of silence

            at the breaking of the Bread.

This represents the very wounds of the crucifixion,

            the very thing Thomas wanted to see and to touch.

And we get to touch and see and taste and eat.

When the altar party lifts us the patens and chalices, and the Presider says             “The Gifts of God for the People of God” these are words of invitation:

come forward to see and touch and taste

            that our faith, our trusting may be nurtured

            and our spirits and whole being nourished

            and strengthened for the ministry of reconciliation.

The very thing Thomas wanted to see and to touch,

            we get to touch and see and taste and eat.

All you need to do is trust the process of the Resurrection Spirit of Jesus,

                        the Holy Spirit breathed into us and at work within us,

                                    and take the Mystery into your own hands.

Sermon for Lent 2, 3/4/12 Emmanuel, Mercer Island

Each year the Bishop recommends a book to the diocese to read during Lent.

This year he recommended the Bible.

Well, how novel, you might say.

After all the Bible IS “Holy Scripture,”

            words that have the power to convey what is holy,

                                    what is of God,

                                    what is revelatory of God,

                                    what is life-revealing and life-sustaining.

I grew up in the Episcopal Church

            and during all those Sunday School years

            we got some of the stories in the Bible, but not really a whole lot of them.

I remember being embarrassed because of my ignorance of the Bible

            around other kids who went to bible churches,

                        who knew more of the stories

                        and who had been made to memorize verses.

So as a young adult I made a point of reading the Bible all the way through.

And that began a love affair with the Bible

            that has continued throughout the years.

I would read the Bible according to the two year lectionary for the Daily Office

            using a different translation every two year cycle.              You can too.

I also have studied Greek and Hebrew so as to delve deeper into the texts.

But the main point for reading the Bible is what

A colleague of mine wrote in his church newsletter this last week:

“…we  easily remember the characters, plot and action of good stories,

and the stories of the Bible are wonderful, often strange, even bizarre, intensely personal narratives in the lives of real human beings

living the intensity and often confusion

of an intimate open or closed relationship with God…”

The Gospel reading for today is just such a story:

            personal, about Peter, as a real human being

            living the intensity and confusion of an intimate relationship with Jesus                                     that is both open and closed to what Jesus is saying to him

                                                                                                and to the other disciples.

First we need a little background to give some context for the story.

To understand the Gospel for today,

            we need to back up and read what came just before today’s reading.

And then you may come to see that what we are dealing with here

            is radical, counter-intuitive and off the charts.

But then we are dealing with Jesus,

            or rather I should say, HE is dealing with us.

He loves us so very much,

            and so he disturbs us.  That’s part of the love.

Those of you who are taking part in the adult education hour

            for this Lenten series with Peter Snow already have a leg up on this.

-- That’s a bold-faced “hint” to the rest of you to attend. --

Peter Snow last Sunday talked about the Hebrew ideas regarding the Messiah

            and the historical context for this tiny nation

                        caught up in the movement of vast empires sweeping through,

            how the people were focused in their despair, their hopes, their prayers

                        for the Messiah who would rescue them  -- and more:

the Messiah who would take on the foreign oppressors

            and actually would conquer them, and the nations of the world,

            bringing them to their knees,

so that it would be they who would come to Jerusalem bearing their tribute money

            instead of the other way around.

So Jesus had just asked his disciples, “Who do people say that I am?”

And they had related ideas about his being a prophet.

And then he had asked them point blank, “Who do YOU say that I am?”

And Simon Peter, bless his heart, blurts out, “You are the Messiah/

            the Christ/the Lord’s Anointed.”

And in Mark’s version, Jesus simply says, “Don’t tell anyone THAT!”

Why?  Because that was not the kind of Messiah

that had anything to do with Jesus and what he had been doing and preaching.

Then, the passage continues, Jesus began to teach his disciples – what? –

            that the Son of Man MUST undergo great suffering  --  Oh, no!  --

            and be rejected by the elders, the chief priest, and the scribes

                        -- NOT be affirmed in messiah-ship by the religious power that be!

                        that is, to be considered a heretic and outlaw

            and THEN be killed – but the Messiah was supposed to live forever –             

and after three days rise again.              Huh?

He said all this quite openly.

This was not what the disciples expected Jesus to say,

            nor what they wanted to hear.

This was the moment when the fingers go in the ears:

            “La la la la la.  I’m not listening.”

Jesus would keep repeating this however.

Well, all this just flew in the face

            of what Simon Peter had just claimed for Jesus,

                        because the Messiah was not supposed to die, but live forever.

What Jesus was saying was totally unacceptable.

It seems Peter was ashamed of Jesus for backing away from

            his (and the culture’s) ideas about the Messiah.

For Peter, being a good Jew,

            the idea of Jesus rejected by the religious leadership is unthinkable.

And the kind of death Jesus says he will die is incredibly shameful.

I’m sure Peter thought

            he was expressing positive concern and appreciation for Jesus,

but that was so small and so off-track from this greatest of all spiritual actions

            that would be the salvation of the whole world.

So Jesus comes down fast and heavy on Peter

and makes his rebuke of Peter for the sake of all the other disciples present.

And today’s reading ends with a final rebuke for Peter

                        - and anyone else for whom the shoe fits -

            “If you are ashamed of me and what I am telling you,

                        then I’m ashamed of you.”

Ouch! 

Well, one crucial part in what Jesus was saying had been missed:

            Jesus would be killed, and after three days rise again.

The deal is the resurrection.

            If we don’t get that, what Jesus said next can’t make sense.

Because Jesus then called to him not only his disciples, but the whole crowd,

and said,

            “If you want to follow me,

            you have to deny yourself, renounce/disregard yourself,

                        forget yourself, refuse to acknowledge yourself,

                                    that with which you identify yourself.

            In fact, take up a cross of your own, your own means of execution.

            Then you can follow me,” said Jesus.

Because here’s the great paradox:

            If you try to save/preserve yourself/your life,            you will lose it.

We all know that we have no control over how long we live.

If you try to save your life and cheat death,

            that will only go so far and then you’re dead.

                        -- The undeniable reality of our mortality. --

BUT if you lose your life for my sake, Jesus says, you will save it.

            If you lose your life for my sake, you will save it.

Now, what really does that mean?

It’s important for us to grapple with this because this statement

                        - If you want to save your life, you will lose it,

                        but if you lose your life for my sake and the Gospel’s,

                        you will save it. –

            appears in all four Gospels, a total of seven times.

Hmmm, must be important.

What does it mean?

Start with this thought:

            Jesus is saying that I need to lose the idea that my life belongs to me.

The word for life in the passage in Greek means more specifically

            life breath, life force, that which animates the body,

            the breath that God breathed into the first human

                                                                                    formed of the dust of the earth.

Notice our own breath and the process of breathing.

It is hard wired into us,

            not even needing my intention and will in order to function.

How is it that I can then claim that my life belongs to me.

Life is a gift that we get to live.

Well, I need to wrap this up,

            because I have way too much that I could say about all this.

Here’s the situation:  You have to give up the idea of your life.

Follow Jesus, and it is no longer your life.

Follow Jesus, and you will come to see the truth of this

            and the great liberation this brings.

Now be willing to see your life in respect to

            the mission of the Kingdom of God coming on earth as in heaven.

Follow Jesus, and it is no longer your life

            and now life is lived out in Christ, in service and in mission.

We might say either that we can’t do that,

or we really don’t want to do that, we would rather have our own little lives.

But that is settling for the small self in place of the fullness of life,

            the full human potential, the abundance of eternal life

                        which is not off somewhere when your body finally dies,

                        but is here, now, even if you don’t realize it.

Jesus would call us into a discipleship

            in which you would die out of your life and into his life.

This may not be the message we want to hear,

            but it’s Lent, so it’s a good time to listen to it anyway.

Read your Bible.

The story for today is one of those stories

                                                that can connect with us on the basic human level:

a story that is personal, about Peter, a real human being, like you and me,

            living the intensity and confusion of an intimate relationship with Jesus                                     that is both closed and open to what Jesus is saying to him

                                                                                                and to the other disciples.

Think about your own mortality

            in the light of what Jesus is saying.

And remember that one crucial part

            about after three days rising again.

The deal is the resurrection.

Sermon for Ash Wednesday 2/22/12 Emmanuel, Mercer Island

I once heard a very wise person say that

            repentance is too important for God to leave it all up to us.

As the years go by I am seeing more clearly

            not only the truth of this statement

                        but also the implications.

Welcome to Lent!

            And as we begin this Lent I want to say something to you

                        that you may not have heard before.

Anyone who has been around the Episcopal Church for a few years

            and has shown up on Ash Wednesday

                        to get the ashes rubbed in the shape of a cross on the forehead

            will recognize the scripture readings.

These readings can become so familiar

            that we end up not looking at them more than at surface level,

and then people tend to fall into patterns and rituals for observing Lent

            that just plain miss the point altogether.

And this gets reinforced by the Ash Wednesday liturgy itself.

In this liturgy you will be told to observe a holy Lent

            by self-examination and repentance;

            by prayer, fasting, and self-denial;

            and by reading and meditating on God’s holy Word.

And what perennially happens is that people will think

            that the ashes on the forehead is the repentance part (but really it isn’t).

They may give up desserts or chocolate for their fasting and self-denial,

            and maybe they will read a devotional book

            and, to cover the prayer part, try to get to church more often.

All done in good Anglican moderation.

If this sounds anything like what you have known,

            then sit up and pay attention,

because I’m going to tell you what repentance really means.

You probably know that the word repent means “to turn around,”

to change course, reverse direction, return to your beginning point, the Source.

In other words, the way you are going is in the wrong direction,

            and you are getting farther away from what is life giving and holy.

Repentance is also about having a change of mind,

            and what does that mean?

There is a change in what I have held as my reality, my world view,

            when something happens and I experience a new reality,

                        a new perspective on life,

so that I can no longer think the way I used to,

            and as a corollary what I do changes too.

Well, how do we get to repentance?

Do I say to myself, “You’re going in the wrong direction.

            You should change your mind.

            Let’s try out a new take on reality.”

No.

            Repentance happens to us.

Something happens, we have an encounter or interchange with others,

            something that catches us up, sometimes with a devastating effect,

and we stand aghast at ourselves.

We did not initiate the repentance, we did not choose to repent,

            but now we find that we are very much in the midst of it.

Isn’t that much more like what really happens?

This, my friends, is God’s merciful intervention in our lives.

God is the giver of repentance.

It says so in the Bible in more than one place.

            Start with Acts 11:18 and Romans 2:4, for example.

            Look them up and then come talk to me about it.

God is the giver of repentance.

You see, repentance is much too important for God to leave it all up to us.

Lent is about having a season to prepare for Holy Week and Easter,

            a whole 40 days to get ready so that we will be able to better grasp

                        what Good Friday and the Feast of the Resurrection are all about.

That’s it. 

            That is all that Lent needs to be about.

If we can get it, if we can take in

            just what it is that Jesus did in going to the cross,

            how it was more than just sins that he was taking on,

how he took on all the suffering that ever was and ever will be,

            and released this huge power and energy of resurrection,

and made that all available to us by his continuing presence in the world

                        through the Holy Spirit.

But we don’t get it,

            so we need Lent.

We need 40 days or 40 years or a whole lifetime.

And even at that it takes God’s intervention in our lives

            to bring about real repentance.

HOWEVER we can cooperate.

            We can cooperate with this process off being repented.

Repentance is not about self-affliction and asceticism and breast beating.

Our part in repentance is making ourselves available,

            making ourselves available for God’s merciful act of repenting us.

It’s a matter of trust.

Can we trust God to have our best interests at heart?

            I’m going to risk that,

which means I will need to be open to considering

            that all events in life have the potential of being in my best interest,

                        events both lovely and gruesome.

It’s a matter of trust.

So do you want to know a way, a good Lenten practice

            for being open in trust to God’s merciful act of repenting us?

Meditate.

            You knew I’d say that.

Meditation is one way,

            I must say a particularly simple, accessible and efficiently effective way.

Do the praying, do the fasting, do the self-denial

            (by the way, meditation is a form of self-denial and fasting),

read the Bible –

            that’s the book the bishop recommends this year for Lenten reading.           

These are all ways in which we can be open

                                                                        to repentance happening in our lives.

Remember, the purpose of repentance is to return us to the Source of Life,

            to return us to the embrace of God,

who like the father in the parable about the prodigal son,

            has never ceased to watch for us,

who sees us from afar and runs to meet us,

who before we get through our litany of penitence

            has already killed the fatted calf and started the party.

What we are doing today in this liturgy

            is to set us up for 40 days of spiritual practice

so that when we get to Easter we just may realize the immensity of it all.

And this year I would encourage you

            to take home with you the worship booklet and read again Psalm 103.

This Psalm gets overlooked with everything else happening

                        in the Ash Wednesday liturgy.

We’re more likely to remember Psalm 51 which we will be reciting shortly

            than Psalm 103 that we read after the Joel passage.

Here’s the Easter goal for us:

    1   Bless the LORD, O my soul, *

          and all that is within me, bless his holy Name.

    2   Bless the LORD, O my soul, *

          and forget not all his benefits.

    3   He forgives all your sins *

          and heals all your infirmities;

    4   He redeems your life from the grave *

          and crowns you with mercy and loving-kindness;

    5   He satisfies you with good things, *

          and your youth is renewed like an eagle's.

    8   The LORD is full of compassion and mercy, *

          slow to anger and of great kindness.

    9   He will not always accuse us, *

          nor will he keep his anger for ever.

    10  He has not dealt with us according to our sins, *

          nor rewarded us according to our wickedness.

    11  For as the heavens are high above the earth, *

          so is his mercy great upon those who fear him.

    12  As far as the east is from the west, *

          so far has he removed our sins from us.

    13  As a father cares for his children, *

          so does the LORD care for those who fear him.

And now here is the segue into what comes next in the liturgy:

    14  For he himself knows whereof we are made; *

          he remembers that we are but dust.

    15  Our days are like the grass; *

          we flourish like a flower of the field;

    16  When the wind goes over it, it is gone, *

          and its place shall know it no more.

If there is anything that can bring us to repentance,

            it would be death, the reminder of our own mortality.

Death is a gift that makes us look at the precious gift of life we have been given.

You know, we all have to face this sometime;

            none of us get of here alive.

Welcome to Lent.