To Live in God's Reality

TrinitySundayC, Sullivan Park Care Center, May 26, 2013 by Annette Fricke

            Today is one of the most dreaded Sundays of the entire year on which to preach.  I know this.  My Facebook newsfeed has a joke about it which is this: A picture of the group of people who ordain—represented, of course by one of the three in a miter—that would be the bishop and the caption reads, “Prepare her as a deacon in your church to be asked each year to preach on Trinity Sunday.”  The truth is, I have seen some bad sermons on this day, including the one children’s sermon given by an ordained pastor of the Lutheran Church in which the Trinity was explained as one person with differing relationships to other people in his life.  I no longer try to explain it in my own words.  There is a hymn that I believe captures it much better.  It is attributed to St. Patrick, patron saint of Ireland, who lived around 385-461, and goes like this in the first verse, “I bind unto myself today the strong name of the Trinity by invocation of the same, the Three in One and One in Three.”  And since we know God most profoundly by way of Jesus, the fourth verse is, “Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ to win me, Christ to comfort and restore me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ in quiet, Christ in danger, Christ in hearts of all that love me, Christ in the mouth of friend and stranger.” The words seem to echo the gospel according to John and to speak to all that God is. And to underscore and reinforce the meaning and main point of this hymn, the fifth verse is the last, “I bind unto myself the name, the strong name of the Trinity by invocation of the same, the Three in One and One in Three, of whom all nature has creation, eternal Father, Spirit, Word.  Praise to the Lord of my salvation; salvation is of Christ the Lord!” And not to mention, for those of you who know music, the tune is written in ¾ time.  Waltzes are also written in ¾ time, not as easy to sing or conduct as 4/4 time.  There is something about three that makes it difficult to comprehend.  It is not natural.  However, we are not alone.  The early Christians debated the whole concept of the Trinity for the first several years of Christianity and thus the Orthodox Christians began labeling those who believed otherwise as heretics.  Even though the concept of the Trinity is really difficult to describe or comprehend without being heretical, this is the Orthodox Christian teaching. The Orthodox Christians’ hierarchical teaching authority did a great job of enforcing that teaching and snuffing out other teachings to the contrary, except when discoveries were made recently that there was plenty evidence in print of other teachings, tucked away in jars in caves. 

            Why do I mention and quote that which is attributed to St Patrick?  Because he lived during the time that the Nicene Creed was freshly debated, written, and revised to elucidate our understanding of the Trinity.  The Eastern Church leaves out one of the phrases of this well known creed and adds other phrases.  The truth is that the Eastern Church does not believe or confess the same concept of the Trinity as the Western Church.  The Church remains divided on this, what appears to be a crucial doctrine.

            We find another description of God in The Book of Concord which was written by the reformers of the 1500s.  It reads like this, “We unanimously hold and teach, in accordance with the decree of the Council of Nicea, that there is one divine essence, which is called and which is truly God, and that there are three persons in this one divine essence, eternal, without division, without end, of infinite power, wisdom, and goodness, one creator and preserver of all things visible and invisible.  The word “person” is to be understood as the [Church] Fathers employed the term in this connection, not as a part or property of another but as that which exists of itself.  Therefore all the heresies which are contrary to this article are rejected.

            Between 710 and 714, The Apostle’s Creed as we now know it was formed and solidified.  It is much shorter than the Nicene Creed and has found a wider audience that subscribe to the belief that it puts forth.  Here is one modern version, “I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.  I believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; he descended to the dead.  On the third day he rose again; he ascended into heaven, he is seated at the right hand of the Father, and he will come again to judge the living and the dead.  I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the dead, and the life everlasting. Amen.”  In this version, the descent into hell and the resurrection of the body are rejected as doctrine.  In times past, Christians did not cremate bodies for burial because they believed in the resurrection of the body. Later scholarship revealed that the concept of hell was borrowed from neighboring religions.

            Although on the surface, it may look like a lot of bickering and fighting amongst Christians, this is for sure: we no longer use the words of anathema, heretic, or excommunication as often or as with much vehemence as in our history.  We no longer burn people at the stake because they do not believe as we do or burn their books.  Christianity has learned that belief comes from the heart and to what the heart consents.  Nobody can force anyone else to believe anything.  You are free to pick apart anything that I say or anyone else says.  What you believe is what you believe and nobody can take the right away.  During the terror of Hitler, those who were not thrown into the gas chamber and actually survived the duration of captivity, were those who recited in their minds the scriptures and hymns, both Jews and Christians, but mostly Jews.  Our minds are free and will always be free.

            Barbara Taylor Brown, a celebrated Episcopal priest puts it this way in her book titled, The Preaching Life, “While it may seem more respectable to approach faith as an intellectual exercise or more satisfying to approach it as an emotional one, our relationship to God is not simply a matter of what we think or how we feel. It is more comprehensive than that, and more profound. It is a full-bodied relationship in which mind and heart, spirit and flesh, are converted to a new way of experiencing and responding to the world. It is a matter of learning to see the world, each other, and ourselves as God sees us, and to live as if God's reality were the only one that mattered."

            However, as one old wise priest said, because of the creeds about such things as the mystery of the Trinity, the church has survived all these years.  It has been both bane and blessing as we still strain to figure out who God is and who we are in God’s world.  This much we know for sure, and it is not dependent on any doctrinal statements or beliefs of any kind: God loves us and constantly seeks to have a relationship with us and seeks that we have a relationship with each other.  God will always be there to create and re-create newer understandings and insights for us and we will grow in them if we continue to be open to them and love from our hearts.  The Trinity remains a mystery and is probably best seen that way and not explained.

You will Set the World on Fire

PentecostC, Sullivan Park Care Center, May 19, 2013, by Annette Fricke

'A Prayer to God the Father on the Vigil of Pentecost' by Thomas Merton
Today, Father, this blue sky lauds you. The delicate green and orange flowers of the tulip poplar tree praise you. The distant blue hills praise you, together with the sweet-smelling air that is full of brilliant light. The bickering flycatchers praise you with the lowing cattle and the quail that whistle over there. I too, Father, praise you, with all these my sisters and brothers, and they give voice to my own heart and to my own silence. We are all one silence, and a diversity of voices.
You have made us together, you have made us one and many, you have placed me here, in the midst as witness, as awareness, and as joy. Here I am. In me the world is present, and you are present. I am a link in the chain of light and of presence.
Whatever may have been my particular stupidity, the prayers of your friends and my own prayers have somehow been answered, and I am here, in this solitude, before you, and I am glad because you see me here. For it is here, I think, that you want to see me and I am seen by you. My being here is a response you have asked of me, to something I have not clearly heard. But I have responded, and I am content: there is little more to know about it at present.

Pentecost is the Greek name for the Feast of Weeks, a prominent feast in the calendar of ancient Israel celebrating the giving of the Law on Sinai. This feast is still celebrated as Shavuot, which also includes the celebration of the first fruits of the harvest. Later, in the Christian liturgical year, it is also a feast commemorating the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the twelve Apostles of Christ.

In the Eastern church, Pentecost can also refer to the whole fifty days between Easter and Pentecost, hence the book containing the liturgical texts for Paschaltide is called the Pentecostarion. The feast is also called Whit Sunday, or Whitsun,especially in England, where the following Monday was traditionally a holiday. Pentecost is celebrated seven weeks (50 days) after Easter Sunday, hence its name. Pentecost falls on the tenth day after Ascension Thursday.

Among Christians, Pentecost commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Twelve Apostles and other followers of Jesus as described in the Acts of the Apostles 2:1–31. For this reason, Pentecost is sometimes described by some Christians today as the "Birthday of the Church."

The Pentecostal movement of Christianity derives its name from the New Testament event.

The biblical narrative of Pentecost, where the 11 Disciples of Christ (Acts 1:13, 26), along with about 109 other individuals (Acts 1:15), including many women, among whom was Mary the mother of Jesus (Acts 1:14), received the Baptism in the Holy Spirit in the Upper Room, is given in the second chapter of the Book of Acts. As recounted in Acts 2:1–6:

“

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability. Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each.”

While those on whom the Spirit had descended were speaking in many languages, the Apostle Peter stood up with the eleven and proclaimed to the crowd that this event was the fulfillment of the prophecy ("I will pour out my spirit") In Acts 2:17, it reads: "' In the last days it will be,' God declares, 'I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy and your young men shall see visions and your old men shall dream dreams." Acts 2:41 then reports: "So those who welcomed his message were baptized, and that day about three thousand persons were added."

Peter stated that this event was the beginning of a continual outpouring that would be available to all believers from that point on, Jews and Gentiles alike.

Traditional interpretation holds that the Descent of the Holy Spirit took place in the Upper Room, or Cenacle, while celebrating the day of Pentecost (Shavuot). The Upper Room was first mentioned in Luke 22:12-13 (“And he shall show you a large upper room furnished: there make ready. And they went, and found as he had said to them: and they made ready the passover."). This Upper Room was to be the location of the Last Supper and the institution of Holy Communion. The next mention of an Upper Room is in Acts 1:13-14, the continuation of the Luke narrative, authored by the same biblical writer. Here the disciples and women wait and they gave themselves up to constant prayer: "And when they had come in, they went up into an upper room, where there was present both Peter, and James, and John, and Andrew, Philip, and Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas the brother of James. These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his friends." Then, in Acts 2:1–2, "And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting." The "place" is in reference to the same Upper Room where these persons had "continued with one accord in prayer and supplication".

This description of the beginning of the Church tells us quite succinctly what the early Church was all about. It is even more simply put in verse 42 of this second chapter of Acts: “They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”  As Christianity spread throughout the world, Christians adopted many different practices as to what they heard from the preaching and teaching and how to go about structuring the worship and administration of the community of believers.  “What did Jesus really say?” and “What did Jesus really mean?” continue to be studied by mainline denominations.  The popularity of the abbreviation WWJD seems to have died out—WWJD meaning, “What would Jesus do?”  And yet, at a certain level, this is a question we need to have in mind on a daily moment by moment basis.  If Jesus were here in the flesh once again on earth, what would he do and how would he address the various situations and issues we now face in our world?  God now leaves that up to us, having given us the resources and opportunities to be Jesus’ presence in the world. Catherine of Sienna’s answer is this: “Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.” the first Christian pyromaniac!  Her answer is to have zeal enough to set the world on fire, not literally of course, but to take the word of God very seriously.  Think of it this way: the world used to marvel at martyrs---now the world celebrates celebrities. What do you celebrate?

 

 

Be like a Tree

7EasterC, May 12, 2013, Sullivan Park Care Center, by Annette Fricke

            As I was thinking about whether or not to even mention Mother’s Day in my preaching today, I came across this piece.  The author is a woman who is not a mother and in this essay, she expresses how she feels when certain pastors in her life would say on that day, “All of you who are mothers, please stand up.”  Motherhood is much more inclusive than that and she does a great job of articulating the various forms of motherhood within our earthly experience.  Here is what she wrote:

            The wide spectrum of mothering: To those who gave birth this year to their first child—we celebrate with you. To those who lost a child this year – we mourn with you. To those who are in the trenches with little ones every day and wear the badge of food stains – we appreciate you. To those who experienced loss through miscarriage, failed adoptions, or running away—we mourn with you. To those who walk the hard path of infertility, fraught with pokes, prods, tears, and disappointment – we walk with you. Forgive us when we say foolish things. We don’t mean to make this harder than it is. To those who are foster moms, mentor moms, and spiritual moms – we need you. To those who have warm and close relationships with your children – we celebrate with you. To those who have disappointment, heartache, and distance with your children – we sit with you. To those who lost their mothers this year – we grieve with you. To those who experienced abuse at the hands of your own mother – we acknowledge your experience. To those who lived through driving tests, medical tests, and the overall testing of motherhood – we are better for having you in our midst. To those who have aborted children - we remember them and you on this day. To those who are single and long to be married and mothering your own children - we mourn that life has not turned out the way you longed for it to be. To those who step-parent - we walk with you on these complex paths. To those who envisioned lavishing love on grandchildren, yet that dream is not to be - we grieve with you. To those who will have emptier nests in the upcoming year – we grieve and rejoice with you. And to those who are pregnant with new life, both expected and surprising –we anticipate with you. This Mother’s Day, we walk with you. Mothering is not for the faint of heart and we have real warriors in our midst. We remember you. by Amy Young.

            And then I thought of this: This gospel text basically says the same thing three times. "I in them and you in me, and together we ARE the body of Christ..." In the midst of the horrifying yet miraculous news of three girls.... what they endured over the last decade... these three now rescued young women in Cleveland are returning to families who are experiencing bitter-sweet reunions as one's mother had died just two years after her absence. Still there were other family members who can't wait to "catch them up" on their families’ and friends’ lives. We all hurt for these women... and their friends and family because we can only imagine what that must be like. Their names were made known and not forgotten and God's love remained and still remains! We pray for their healing. "I in them and you in me, and together we ARE the body of Christ..." I guess the question is, do we hear Gospel in this prayer--that because Jesus prayed it, God must surely have answered this prayer and our task is to show in our lives the unity that God has already given us...? Or do we hear Law in this prayer--look at how broken and fragmented we are when Jesus prayed that we should be one. How far have we fallen from the prayer that Jesus prayed?

            Jesus' prayer that we may be one, is clearly for the purpose "that the
world may believe that you have sent me" (vv.21 and 23). The Christian community on earth isn't some cozy little gathering of "like minded people" that Jesus has in mind, but a group that will change the world. As said by Peter J.B. Carman, "unity isn't for its own sake but for the sake of (being a) witness to the love of God and the authenticity of Christ as the one 'sent'." In other words, we are the ones sent by Jesus to be witnesses of the love of God to all of humanity. Since the basis of this unity is found in God's love, our message must be rooted somehow in this love, as with all our relationships. We find that peace and that glory when we join in with the love Jesus has for us and extend it to others. We have been given the power to respond in love, even when someone intends us evil.

            Jesus’ prayer is a futuristic prayer.  He is praying for us because we are now his disciples in the world.  Broken though we may be, represented by many different denominations and Christian groups, Jesus calls for us to unite into a single unit. Like the pieces and colors of a stained glass window that lets the light of both the world and Jesus in, so we are.  The nature of the unity of Jesus’ disciples in this world that he yearns for is to be as profound and close as the unity of Jesus and the Father.  As a child, my eyes would wander to the stained glass windows of my church.  Each one of them represented an important story or key phrase from the scriptures.  Above the altar was the picture that represents this gospel text.  It is a picture of Jesus praying on a big rock in the Garden of Gethsemane.  It is a reminder that Jesus cares very deeply for us.  That is the kind of deep love he hopes to instill in us so that we will love as he loves us, to hold back the words and thoughts of cursing, name-calling, jealous and malicious gossip, questioning others’ motives. In union with God in prayer, we will be guided to do that which is no longer our will, but God’s will.  Paul followed God’s will when he went to Macedonia, we are told.  He was open to the guidance of the Holy Spirit on a regular basis.  That was his guide for ministry. God calls all of us to that intimate union in constant prayer.  At the very least, we should all pray for each other in our daily lives, in all our contacts with others, all of our relationships. We are made in God’s image to be in relationship with God and all of humanity.  That is the stuff we are made of.  Thomas Merton put it this way, “A tree gives glory to God by being a tree. For in being what God means it to be it is obeying [God]. It “consents,” so to speak, to [God's] creative love. It is expressing an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree.”  Paul was doing that which Jesus did and continues to do through us.  But, as Merton so eloquently states, we need to be like the tree and consent to God’s creative love working in us.  We are called to be God’s love in the world, a world that works at tearing us down rather than building us up; a world where things happen that we don’t understand, where there is pain, crippling of hands, knees and feet.  It is a world of kidnappers, murderers, liars and cheaters. It is a world of violence that we sometimes see as senseless and irrational.  Intentional acts of kindness are sometimes forgotten by random acts of violence.

Until Someone Believes in the Risen Jesus

EasterC, Sullivan Park Care Center, March 31, 2013 by Annette Fricke

                Early on the first day of the week, we are told, while it was still dark---If you have ever studied the gospel according to John, the theme of dark and light runs throughout.  We first see it in chapter 1, verse 5: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.” Raymond Brown, the late, great scholar of John, writes: "In this Gospel, where light and darkness play such a role, darkness lasts until someone believes in the risen Jesus."

Compliments of Apologetic Press, According to Eric Lyons, “Mary Magdalene is mentioned a total of 12 times in the New Testament—the oldest historical record mentioning her name. All 12 occurrences appear in the gospel accounts, wherein we learn the following:

Jesus cast seven demons out of her (Luke 8:2; Mark 16:9).

She was one of many who provided for Jesus out of her own means (Luke 8:1-3).

She witnessed the crucifixion of Christ (Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40; John 19:25).

She was present at His burial (Matthew 27:61; Mark 15:47).

She arrived at Jesus’ tomb on the Sunday following His crucifixion to find His body missing (Matthew 28:1-8; Mark 16:1-8; Luke 24:1-7; John 20:1).

She saw the risen Lord, spoke with Him, and later reported the encounter to the apostles (Matthew 28:9-10; Mark 16:9-11; John 20:11-18).

Mary Magdalene apparently was a devout, faithful follower of Christ. Not a shred of solid biblical or extra biblical evidence suggests she played the role of harlot, wife, mother, or secret lover. The New Testament, as the oldest, most reliable witness to her identity, testifies loudly and clearly about her genuine faithfulness to the Lord, and keeps silent about those things which twenty-first-century sensationalists allege.”

In addition to the above, there has been controversy as to whether or not the other Marys mentioned in the New Testament are also her or separate identities.  I think I will go with the separate identities since Mary seems to have been a very common name for women during the time of Jesus and it only makes sense, as a writer, knowing that it is a very common name that one does need to distinguish which Mary is the subject at any given point in the narrative.

However, despite the confusion over which Mary was where and did what, one thing is in agreement in all four gospels.  Mary Magdalene is named in all of them as being one of the very first witnesses to the resurrection.  She, along with other women was the first to arrive at the empty tomb, not the male disciples.  In her confusion, she ran to tell the disciples.  She noticed that the stone was moved, but didn’t go in. She did not walk.  She ran. She ran to Peter and the other disciples, perhaps only half believing or half remembering that Jesus had said that he would rise from the dead, half believing that perhaps his body was simply moved or stolen.  We know that the stone would have been rolled at an incline so as to make it very difficult to move the stone. We really don’t know what her inner thoughts were but could probably assume that she was scared as well. But we do know that she, who had been healed of seven demons by Jesus, is now privileged to be one of the first to discover the empty tomb and the possibility that her Lord has done something even greater. Could it be that the incredible rising from death that Jesus talked about really did happen? Could it be that we also can live in that life that Jesus talked about in his earthly ministry? Could it be that Jesus’ deep love, commitment, and loyalty to his disciples---the ones who travelled with him as well as those who believed in him from a distance and those yet to believe---could it be that this is the fulfillment of that love?  Could it be that there is a deep truth here, a longing fulfilled and yet far surpassed?  Perhaps the lyrics of “Alfie” from 1966 that say, “Without true love, we just exist.” hit the nail on the head.  We were created in love by God to be in relationship with God who not only loves us, but is love.  Would that not be the ultimate disappointment if God loves us from the point of our creation, but then all dies with him and dwindles to nothing? This is the challenging part of the story for most people.  Did the resurrection really happen?  Will that happen to us?  Or rather, does that happen to us?

I know that for Mary Magdalene, the resurrection was very real.  She had been profoundly healed. She had been very ill and now she was a committed disciple of Jesus, one who contributed money to his ministry while he was on earth.  She was there for Jesus’ crucifixion and burial, faithful to what she thought was the end.  That is how things end.  I am sure she had seen it many times before: people are born, they live here on earth, and then they die.  End of story-- right? Without our belief in Jesus as the Messiah of God, the ultimate Messiah who sets everything right, who makes a new covenant with us, who completes the circle that always seemed to be not quite right before---without that belief and the riveting reality of resurrection, it is the end of the story.  What could the life of Jesus possibly mean if we don’t believe in the transforming power of God in Jesus?  What does the Lord’s Supper mean if it is not Jesus’ transformation of his followers?  What does baptism mean if Jesus is not raised from the dead?  What do all those stories about healing and forgiveness mean if Jesus is not raised? In the words of Dr. Jerald Daffe, “Mary Magdalene provides an example of the power of God to transform a life. Regardless of the depths of sin into which one has fallen, he or she can be rescued and changed into a new creation with a new purpose in life. Mary Magdalene once suffered under the control of demons but was delivered to become a disciple. Countless similar stories can be found throughout the history of Christianity. The names are different, but the renewal is the same.”  Think back to another Mary, the one who anointed Jesus’ feet with expensive perfume, her hair, and her tears.  She showed great sorrow, deep and genuine contrition for her sin.  When all around her ridiculed both her and Jesus, Jesus stuck up for her and said to leave her alone, that she is doing a good thing.  When I saw in the news that Pope Francis washed the feet of prisoners on Maundy Thursday, I and many thought to ourselves, that he did a good thing. Next thing I know, there is another press release titled, “Pope’s foot-wash a final straw for traditionalists.”  It turns out that the offense was not because they were Muslim or prisoners, but some were women.  According to the liturgical rites, this is not to happen because only men are to have their feet washed.  Some saw it as promoting the ordination of women.  However, the Pope is apparently against the ordination of women. 

Without getting into this further, I think you can see how it is that we end up with controversy over the meaning of stories in the Bible.  What strikes me the most is that this pope seems to like more interaction with people and likes to do more than just talk about things.  He expressed that he chose to take on the name of Francis because Francis of Assisi was a champion of the poor.  He also demonstrated that by suggesting to the people of Argentina that they not come to his enthronement as the new pope, but rather give their money they would have spent to the poor.  Jesus is not with us in the same sense as he was with us on earth before the resurrection.  All is now changed.  It is transformed. John tells us that the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed. "In this Gospel, where light and darkness play such a role, darkness lasts until someone believes in the risen Jesus."

 

Passion/Palm SundayC

I have attended the last couple of mid-week Lenten discussion/Bible series at the cathedral.  This last one was particularly poignant.  We were studying the person of Moses. It began with an essay that a member of our choir had written.  It was humorous and kept our attention, but then something happened that I have never seen in a congregation that keeps most things at an intellectual level.  The essayist mentioned her upbringing in a very conservative and evangelical church and the whole concept of conversion.  What surprised me was that individual people began talking about their conversion experiences.  The old priest, who is now eighty-seven, told a story I don’t remember hearing before.  As part of his seminary training, he was asked to be part of a congregation in Montana. He was finishing up the year and pretty much deciding that he was going to quit seminary and go back to his old job.  Then, his bishop said that he had a special assignment for him.  He wanted him to go to a small church and preach.  So, he reluctantly agreed, thinking that it was a small church in a small town and nobody would show up, so he did not even prepare a sermon.  As he sat waiting for the service to begin, the size of the congregation swelled and he became very nervous.  This was serious.  There was no escaping now.  He got up to speak and only a sentence or two came out of his mouth and he prayed fervently to God to give him the words to say.  God delivered, and the congregation sat in silence for a full half hour after the service was over.  Nobody moved. Somehow God had spoken to the people through this faithless seminarian, someone in training for the priesthood, yet not at all sure of his vocation.  God had spoken in such a profound way, that he knew God’s existence and power, and returned to the seminary to resume his studies.

            What is the purpose of the Church?  Oscar Romero puts it this way, “The church’s good name is not a matter of being on good terms with the powerful.  The church’s good name is a matter of knowing that the poor regard the church as their own, of knowing that the church’s life on earth is to call on all, on the rich as well, to be converted and be saved alongside the poor, for they are the only ones called blessed.”  When it comes to really thinking this thing out, all of us are poor, every one of us.  I cringe when my girlfriend of nearly fifty years says something to the effect to me that a certain person she is talking about is from a lower class.  I remind her that I am from a lower class.  She forgets that she grew up with wealth and I was from a blue collar family.  She forgets that I was once dependent on her and now she is dependent on me.  Life has had many twists and turns for me as I am sure it has for you.  Some of those twists and turns have probably brought each of us to new conversions and insights about how God works in each of us.

            I have always thought that this story of Jesus’ ride into Jerusalem on a donkey that had never been ridden to be a bit odd.  I love the symbolism, don’t get me wrong, but have you ever tried to ride an animal for the first time?  It is rarely an easy task.  You usually get bucked off.  I think we are missing details here and probably for good reason because it misses the point.  The point of this passage is to bring up the contrast between the powerful, earthly kingdom of Rome in comparison to that of Jesus.  Jesus’ power is much different and continues to be different from all that came before.

            This past week, I shared an article about the institutional church being like bubbles on the surface of water.  They float along and as long as nobody intentionally bursts them, they remain intact.  I have no qualms with the analogy, but like all analogies, I wonder about the negative implications of it.  Will the institutional church survive?  Will the new leaders of the Roman Catholic Communion and the Anglican Communion work for peace and unity among Christians, but most importantly, will it happen?  Will they see their roles as an ecumenical influence on all of Christianity, as most of us do? Will we once again be able to see a larger visible church, one to which we can point and say, “There it is.  There are Christians.  There are people who identify themselves as Christians and share their faith with others and work for peace and harmony among all people.”  We are all endowed with the Holy Spirit to carry out the mission of Jesus in our lives regardless of our station in life.  Very few are ever called to the station of archbishop or pope, yet we are each called to ministry.

            The violence of the world kills Jesus, but the result of that violence, brings us life.  It won’t make us popular and it may even make us “a nobody” in the eyes of the world, but this is our lot when we follow Jesus.  Jesus is our atonement.

            As Bruce Birch and Larry Rassmussen have worded it, “Atonement means quite literally “to make one,” but this reconciliation is costly because its path is through the suffering of the cross.  There is dying that goes with unity.  There is pain that goes with giving up swords and spears, and living with pruning hooks and plows.  There is pain and death and vulnerability that come with living in the world defenseless, but in that way comes unity.  The church has always been clear that as the body of Christ its life must be cruciform.  Thus, if we are to make shalom, following Christ, it cannot be at the level of lowest risk.  It will require becoming vulnerable to the pain of the world.  It will require a willingness to die.”

            We live in an age when the shape of the church is changing, and like the passage from Isaiah that I preached on last Sunday, God says, “I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?  Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old.”

            We are called to open our minds and hearts to what God is doing right now, forgetting the past, and moving forward into the future.  We may be moving with fear and trembling and all sorts of anxiety, but remember this: God is with us each and every step of the way.  Allow God to work through you.  Wait on God, for God is about to do a new thing.

Thy Word my soul with Joy doth Bless

5LentC, Sullivan Park Care Center, March 17, 2013 by Annette Fricke

Johannes Olearius, a prolific hymn writer, wrote these words:

Lord, open Thou my heart to hear
And through Thy Word to me draw near;
Let me Thy Word e’er pure retain,
Let me Thy child and heir remain.

Thy Word doth deeply move the heart,
Thy Word doth perfect health impart,
Thy Word my soul with joy doth bless,
Thy Word brings peace and happiness.

       Elie Wiesel writes: ‘One day the king summoned his counselor and told him of his anguish: “I have read in the stars that all those who will eat of the next harvest will be struck with madness.  What shall we do, my friend?”

            “Nothing could be more simple, Sire,” replied the counselor, “we shall not touch it.  Last year’s harvest is not yet exhausted.  You have but to requisition it; it will be ample for you.  And me.”

            “And the others?” scolded the king.  “All the subjects of my kingdom?  The faithful servants of the crown?  The men, the women, the madmen and the beggars, are you forgetting them?  Are you forgetting the children, the children too?”

            “I am forgetting nobody, Sire.  But as your advisor, I must be realistic and take all the possibilities into account.  We don’t have enough to protect and satisfy everyone.  There will be just enough for you.  And me.”

            Thereupon the king’s brow darkened, and he said: “Your solution does not please me.  Is there no other?  Never mind.  But I refuse to separate myself from my people, and I don’t care to remain lucid in the midst of a people gone mad.  Therefore we shall all enter madness together.  You and I like the others, with the others.  When the world is gripped by delirium, it is senseless to watch from the outside: the mad will think that we are mad too.  And yet, I should like to safeguard some reflection of our present glory and of our anguish too; I should like to keep alive the memory of this determination, this decision.  I should like that when the time comes, you and I shall remain aware of our predicament.”

            “Whatever for, Sire?”

            “It will help us, you’ll see.  And thus we shall be able to help our friends.  Who knows, perhaps thanks to us, people will find the strength to resist later, even if it is too late.”

            And putting his arm around his friend’s shoulder, the king went on: “You and I shall therefore mark each other’s foreheads with the seal of madness.  And every time we shall look at one another, we shall know, you and I, that we are mad.”

            This past week and entire month have been extremely busy for me and that can either cause one to become extremely possessive of ones time or so generous that you wonder if time is ever meant for oneself.  I suppose the point of it all is really what we do with our time and see it more from the perspective of where God would have us be. There is a time to grieve past our thoughts, actions, and experiences.  There is a time to let go of the past whether or not we deemed it good or bad.  God does new things in our lives.  God invites us into the future by allowing us time and space to repent and start fresh.  It is sometimes quite unhealthy to keep doing things and seeing things the same way we always have.  God can give us that new perspective that will change and transform our lives in a way we never thought possible.

            Elie Wiesel is Jewish, so I thought that we would at least ponder that first lesson from the book of Isaiah. In Isaiah we read, “Do not remember the former things, or consider the things of old. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?”  Although the setting of this passage is the exile and all that the Jewish people lost because of it which included land, their families and homes; this passage speaks at a deeper level.  The cry of the Jewish people is universally applicable to many situations in life.  Where was God when this disaster happened?  Why had God allowed this to happen?  What kind of future did the chosen people of God have now? Has God abandoned us?  If we go back just three chapters in this same book, we hear those words we remember most in that Johannes G. Olearius hymn sung during Advent, “Comfort, comfort ye, my people.  Speak ye peace, thus saith our God.  Comfort those who sit in darkness, Bowed beneath their sorrow’s load.”

            Our text in Isaiah goes on to proclaim the providence of God.  God will provide for our every need.  If we go back even further, to Abraham, that is also the message.  When Abraham followed God’s command to make a sacrifice, his only son Isaac; God provided.  Yet, because we have experienced the grim shadow of past tragedies, the way in which those ghosts of past loss, shame, and grief swirl around us and cloud our vision, preventing us from seeing anything but darkness and despair.  They still, at times, cause us to doubt God’s providence.  They cause us to doubt even the promises we have received in Jesus Christ: divine forgiveness, new life, and the love of God. Isaiah reminds us that our God is the God who has delivered us in the past and will deliver us again.  Our God is the God who makes a way where there is no way, creating streams of living water in the midst of parched deserts.  God will never abandon us, no matter how bad things get.  Weeping is not denied, but God redeems it and transforms it into a means of blessing.

            From our second lesson, Paul writes, “For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith.”

            God does not promise us riches or an easy life in choosing to be a disciple.  Life itself will batter, bruise, and break us down.  It will tear us apart and bring us to tears and heartfelt grieving. Yet we, like Mary, are continually called to radical devotion to God.  We are to be generous, as generous as Mary was when she anointed Jesus’ feet with costly ointment and dried his feet with her tears.  In our temptation to condemn those like her in our own world, let us see her in a new way, in God’s way.  She is doing a good thing.  As Evelyn Underhill has so eloquently and succinctly put it, “worship is summed up in sacrifice.”  Here is the ideal action of a disciple: the washing of feet.  Jesus received from Mary what he would soon offer to the other disciples, she “wiping” his feet with her hair as he will “wipe” their feet with his towel.  Here is a holy emblem of the disciples’ life: washing and being washed; blessing and being blessed. We are to be God’s people to all, the poor and the wealthy alike, those economically and spiritually rich or poor; all of us need God because before God, we all stand naked and in need.

            We live our lives in the shadow of the cross, but we also live in the presence of the risen Christ.  Here is your invitation to daily companionship with Jesus, in extravagant acts of compassion and generosity, in moments of worship.  All this, in a world which lives by a mind-set of scarcity, rather than a mind-set of abundance, and so tempts us to close in and give little; God and all that God is, is always with us blessing us with abundance.

The Family of God

4LentC, Sullivan Park Care Center, March 10, 2013

The parable of the prodigal son, I am quite sure, has been one of the most preached and discussed parables in the entire New Testament. You can tell it from the perspective of the younger son who left the household or you can tell it from the perspective of the insanely jealous older son who always did right and worked hard. But there is still another way to look at it.  The parable is about the family of God.  We are all God’s children and it is up to us to figure out how to all get along.  Some of us quit for a while, and then come back; some of us remain faithful to God and the kingdom.  Some of us don’t understand how the mercy of God can extend to everyone. We see it as certain people should be punished and we are angry if they aren’t, right? All of those sentiments are expressed in this parable. Kyle Franklin in Spokane’s Faith and Values writes, “These last six months or so have been extremely difficult. I moved three times, left my job (and accepted a position with fewer hours and a massive cut in pay), and went through an extremely difficult breakup. In the midst of those things I went on medication to stabilize my mood because I felt like I was living on a roller coaster. And, most recently, I encountered unemployment — 10 weeks so far.
During this time, I basically ceased contact with some of my long-term friends simply because I could not write home with good news. I was nervous about the idea of calling and telling them that life seemed to be falling apart with no hope of restoration in sight. This was especially true with friends who entrusted me to follow through on a commitment I made to them. And, while I recognize that my closest friends and family will not be scared off even in the worst of times, my human nature (and the subsequent tendency to believe that others will give up on me when times are tough) tells me that it is better to hide my “flaws” and put on a façade that all is well.
As people with varying degrees of faith and notions of God, I think that we sometimes have this tendency in approaching God. We want to have it all together and try to fool God — whatever form God takes in our lives — into believing that we have it all together. The truth, though, is that God recognizes that we are in need of healing, whether we make that clear or not. And beyond openness with God, our own communities — friends, family and even strangers — can fill in our blanks and help us through difficult times.
The key is to be honest and recognize that at different times in life we are going to be a burden or a blessing. And at other times in life our friends and family will seem to be a burden or a blessing. But the notion that we remain in healthy community — sometimes falling into the safety net and other times being the safety net — is what makes us fully human.
Life is hard sometimes for each of us. But we are not alone. And I believe we were not meant to be alone. We need each other. We need to be brutally honest and vulnerable. But we also need to be brutally open to sharing the burdens of others.”

            I believe that this is one of the best summations of what the story of the prodigal son is all about.  The only difference is that this story is something that does not happen from an intentional falling away as we see in our gospel text.  But does that detail really matter?  Falling away, intentional or not, do any of us really in any sense of the idea want to be a burden to anyone, especially to those we feel closest to?  Whenever I have needed monetary or physical help to accomplish something important in my life, my inclination was that of guilt and wanting to pay them back, to be even again, to make up somehow for not being as independent as most of the time I claim to be.  From day one, the idea was beaten into me by my older siblings that I should not be a burden to my parents.  Later in life, I applied that to all my interactions. It is also known as the Protestant work ethic, “pull yourself up by your own bootstraps.”  Many people seem to still think that if we just follow this simple principal, all will be well economically in this country. And some take it even further and think that everyone is capable of working and therefore there is no need whatsoever for a welfare system.  Intentionally or not, making mistakes by not calculating the risks or becoming a victim of the changes in society, we really do need each other and it behooves us to learn and practice this lesson.  The more I think about the story of the prodigal son, the more I see it this way.  It is not a story simply about the younger son, nor is it a story about the older son who is extremely jealous of all the attention the younger son is getting for acting a fool.  It is a story about community.  All of the characters of this story have a role to play and that role is to learn how to live with each other’s faults, despite the reasons for ones words and actions. Learning how to get along with others and actually have relationships with others and maintain my sense of integrity and dignity has been a lifelong struggle.  Will I ever get it right or will this always be my source of consternation.  Most of the day on Thursday, I was in a rather subdued and contemplative mood.  Do I really want to join the order?  Do they really want me?  Or have I been such an incorrigible jerk to my fellow postulants that they don’t want me anyway?  And perhaps my sense of wanting to hold on to what I see as integrity and dignity should not even be of concern to me.  As I sat and thought about the story of Jonah which was the topic at our Lenten meditation Wednesday night, it once again came back to me: God is far more merciful and inclusive than we are.  We criticize, we get mad, we argue and fight and disagree and draw lines---not always, but enough that I wonder why we don’t hold back more and let things take their course and see if it doesn’t turn out OK anyway.  My very best friends could not see themselves joining an order, but allow that maybe that is the way for me.  For them, I am truly thankful.  For me, joining the order is about community, but I am hoping that if I mess up as badly as the younger son and want to come back, that I will be welcomed because that, to me, is the gospel. God is a heck of a lot more inclusive and merciful than we are. God is merciful—full of mercy-- and hopes that we too, will show mercy to others. Showing mercy is very hard to do when we feel deeply offended. I think that is our greatest challenge.  Sometimes it is better to just hold the tongue. Sometimes we need to say, “I’m sorry.  I will try to do better next time.  I will try to listen to someone else’s perspective.  I will try to be more compassionate. Forgive me.” rather than simply trying to defend ones position. But in the heat of the moment, when emotions run high, it can be hard to do what needs to be done to make things right again.  What the father did in the parable by throwing a party for the younger son was allowing him to be a part of the household once again, the inner fellowship, similar to the disciples closest to Jesus.  The older son is more interested in justice, not forgiveness and thus we see the potential for conflict and thus we see how the tendency is to judge in human terms.  The older son is saying loud and clear, “Not fair!  Not fair!” But from God’s perspective, mercy and forgiveness is fair, because from God’s perspective, every situation is on unequal grounds.  Despite what we do and say, our instinct remains to protect ourselves and defend ourselves because we think that is only right.  It’s not about integrity or dignity.  It’s about mercy. God shows us mercy; therefore, we ought also to show mercy.

            Kyle Franklin puts it this way, “In all our actions, we must consider both our own stories and the stories of those around us.  It is when we fail to consider others that we become self-centered and unable to function in relationship or community.” That is the only way we can live in God’s mercy; knowing that God must be mercy.

 

Give me Life in Your Way

3LentC, Sullivan Park Care Center, March 3, 2013 by Annette Fricke

            Teachers and parents are assigned the awesome duty of instructing children about life and what is needed to sustain life.  My brother and I would sometimes find a caterpillar in the yard outside and wanted to put it in a jar and bring it inside.  Such things were discouraged, that and picking flowers.  My dad objected to picking flowers to bring inside because they last longer if they remain outside.  The same was basically true for bringing in other things from the outside.  My mother would have to remind us that we needed to poke holes in the top of a jar so the caterpillar could breathe.  The caterpillar needed oxygen.  But, at the same time, we couldn’t make the holes too big, or they would escape.  In the early 1960s, my dad was transitioning from chickens for his egg business to chickens only for the purpose of having meat and eggs for the family.  I vaguely remember a time when we went to the feed store to purchase baby chicks.  All it required for transport was a box with holes in it.  The holes provided the needed oxygen so the chicks could breathe.  If they didn’t have that, they could suffocate and die.  No chicks meant no future chickens and no future eggs.

            Today is the third Sunday in Lent.  There are three things that come to mind when most people think about Lent and they are fasting, repentance, and giving something up for Lent.  The seminary I attended in Ohio thought fasting to be particularly repugnant.  After all, Jesus didn’t seem to observe fasting and when you are in most grad schools in the US, the one thing that most students will not give up is drinking.  I went to an ethnically German seminary and they were not about to give up beer and bratwurst; not happening. Although I don’t recall which seminary professor said it, he said that we should get it out of our system, because it would not be tolerated in the parish. We did not understand the full impact of that statement just as when I was a child, I did not understand what would happen if holes were not poked into the boxes and jars of living creatures.  Perhaps the clerical collars most of us were happy to wear at the time would at some point make us feel that we were choking.  One of the times when I feel the most helpless as a nursing assistant is when someone begins to choke or aspirate in the dining room.  Internally, I panic.  I know now how vital it is to get air to the lungs.  

            The three lessons before us today can be summarized by just two phrases: the mystery of suffering and the mystery of holiness.  Jesus gives us examples of things that may or may not have actually happened, but one thing is for sure: Jesus points out that people who suffer death and disease are no more sinners than anyone else.  We are all equal before God.  Paul makes the same point when he states that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.  Here we are again, we feel helpless.  On Ash Wednesday, we hear the words, “You are dust and to dust you shall return.”  We are all mortal; that part will never change no matter how much we may want change.  All our lives, we are caught between heaven and earth, the finite and the infinite.  Our minds and our hearts take us in two seemingly opposite directions. How do we reach holiness when we are filled with sinfulness?  How do we get right with God?  Paul says that the Corinthians have presumed upon God’s mercy by assuming they are privileged because they have been baptized and have the sacrament of the altar.  They now suppose to live as they please.  Paul says this is not so.  Not true.  Jesus says, “No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did.”  Paul says that the loving God has given us life, and expects us to produce fruits.  If the fruit is not produced, then judgment will come. Yet Jesus says that God is forbearing and will yet give time for the fruit to be produced.  It remains a paradox and the only solution the Church has come up with is this: repent.  The only way to God is through repentance, continual repentance; daily and moment by moment repentance. As in the liturgical writings of the Church throughout the ages, whether coming before God privately in confession, or within the worshipping community, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.  Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. O Christ, thou Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world; grant us your peace.

            From an Eastern Church liturgy, “Accept the fountain of my tears, O Powerful One who draws down from the clouds the waters of the sea.  Incline to the groaning of my heart, O Merciful One whose self-emptying has bowed down the heavens.  I shall kiss your most pure feet and wipe them with the hairs of my head, those feet whose sound Eve heard at dusk in paradise, and hid herself for fear.  Who can search out the multitude of my sins and the depths of your judgment, O Savior of my soul?  Despise not, your handmaiden, for you alone have mercy without measure!”

            Mark Searle writes, “The purpose of the first part of Lent is to bring us to compunction.  The word compunction is related to the infinitive, to puncture and suggests the deflation of our inflated egos, a challenge to any self-deceit about the quality of our lives as disciples of Jesus.  By hitting us again and again with demands which we not only fail to obey, but which we come to recognize as being quite beyond us, the gospel passages are meant to trouble us, to confront our illusions about ourselves. “Remember that you are dust…” From this perspective, Lenten penance may be more effective if we fail in our resolutions than if we succeed, for its purpose is not to confirm us in our sense of virtue but to bring home to us our radical need of salvation.”

            Thomas Merton writes on this same subject of compunction, “Compunction is a baptism of sorrow, in which the tears of the penitent are a psychological but also deeply religious purification, preparing and disposing him or her for the sacramental waters of baptism or for the sacrament of penance.  Such sorrow brings joy because it is at once a mature acknowledgment of guilt and the acceptance of its full consequences: hence it implies a religious and moral adjustment to reality, the acceptance of one’s actual condition and the acceptance of reality is always a liberation from the burden of illusion.”  From Monastic liturgy, “Turn my eyes from watching what is worthless; give me life in your way.”

            Caterpillars need oxygen.  Baby chicks need oxygen. Just as creatures both great and small need oxygen in the air to breathe, so we need God to punch holes into our hearts, to deflate out egos, to challenge any self-deceit about the quality of our lives as disciples of Jesus, and to breathe into us the life-giving spirit and grace that only you, God, can give.

            Again from the Eastern Church liturgy, “I was entrusted with a sinless and living land, but I sowed the ground with sin and reaped with a sickle the ears of laziness; in thick sheaves I garnered my actions, but winnowed them not on the threshing-floor of repentance.  I beg you, my God, the eternal farmer, with the wind of your loving-kindness winnow the chaff of my works, and grant to my soul the harvest of forgiveness; shut me in your heavenly storehouse, and save me!” “Turn my eyes from watching what is worthless; give me life in your way.”