On Baptisms, Community, and Belonging…

04 Wednesday Sep 2024

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Photo credit: https://www.sacredheartcalgary.ca/sacraments/baptism-2/baptism/

One of the challenges of a church with multiple service times is the inevitable formation of multiple smaller communities within a larger community.  Between different attendees and different worship styles, each service begins to take on its own personality.  I have had families with young children show up at our early service, and had to be sure to let them know that the later service might be much more familiar and comfortable than the meditative feel of the early service.  Or I have had folks who grew up in an Anglo-Catholic tradition show up at our later service, and had to be sure to let them know they might find the more formal liturgy of the early service more heart-warming.  The trick is figuring out how to create a sense of “home” in each worship service while also providing opportunities for cross-pollination across services.

I think that is why I am so excited for a baptism at my church this weekend at the early service.  We almost never have children at that service (I know very few parents of littles who can get their families at church by 8:00 am), and we do not have music (for those littles to join in the joyful noise making), and the pews in the historic chapel are way less accommodating than the movable chairs in our newer chapel.  But the mother of the baptized grew up in that space and wants her child to experience the centuries of prayer found there.  And although there may not be other children there, she will tell her son of the days when she used to sit in the window wells or babies crawled under the pews.  And when she sees parishioners the age of her son’s grandparents in worship, she will be able to tell her son about the fellowship of saints, and maybe even let parishioners take a turn rocking her son if he becomes fussy.

That is the true beauty of the kind of community church creates.  No matter which service you choose, there is a child whose grandparent may live far away, a grandparent who hasn’t seen his children in months or a year, and a parent who just needs a place who gets how hard parenting is.  And those three groups come together as a fluid organism, with all their everyday human stuff, laying their troubles before God, praising God for their blessings – even when it is sometimes hard to see them, and breaking bread together, recognizing the beauty of a diverse room of people reflecting the image of God. 

That is what this Sunday’s baptism is all about:  bringing another human being into to the strange, mysterious, beauty of Church; helping him know that he is a child of God and is marked as Christ’s own forever; teaching him that he will now belong to a community that will both love him unconditionally and challenge him to live into his vocation and calling – whatever it may be.  We baptize that little one to tell him all that.  But we also baptize that little one to remind ourselves of that reality:  to remember how we too are beloved children of God with a commission to love and serve the Lord in the world.  No matter what service you choose, we all need that message.   

Sermon – Mark 7.1-8, 14-15, 21-23, P17, YB, September 1, 2024

04 Wednesday Sep 2024

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Before I became a priest, I served as a Director of Volunteer services at a Habitat for Humanity affiliate.  In my training as a volunteer manager, I learned that one of the most important things about recruiting someone to a volunteer position was clarity about what one was asking from a volunteer.  If they were going to serve on a committee, how long was the commitment, how frequently would they meet, what work would be expected, and how was leadership structured were all details they should have.  If they were going to work on site, what training was expected or would be provided, what age restrictions existed, what risks would they undertake, and how their day would be structured were important details before a workday.  If they had a group event, they needed to know how many volunteers could be on site, what hours they needed to commit to, and what happened in inclement weather.  By the end of my tenure, every volunteer position had a position description outlining expectations, qualifications, and rewards.

So, imagine my transition to the priesthood and realizing how poorly the Episcopal Church had defined membership.  The very first time someone asked me (and every time since then), I dread the question, “So what do I need to do to become a member of this church?”  The Episcopal Church does a notoriously poor job of defining membership.  Our commitment to professing “All are welcome!” seems to translate into no defining characteristics of membership.  “How do I join your church?” should be one of the easiest questions there is.  And yet, when I talk to new members, the answer has to be two-fold:  the technical answer (as long as you attend three services a year and are a financial contributor, you’re considered a member – the answer from the wider Episcopal Church which I loathe!), and the more practical answer we have crafted here at Hickory Neck:  you fill out a form, you commit to supporting the church financially, you commit to feeding yourself (through study, prayer, regular worship), and you commit to feeding others (through giving your time to the church and to the wider community on behalf of the church). 

Our gospel lesson today seems to be wading through a similar lack of clarity.  The Pharisees and scribes are totally perplexed by how some of Jesus’ disciples are not washing their hands before eating – a totally valid concern in these days of post-pandemic!  But handwashing was not just about hygiene.  The ritual washing of hands was about identity, or “membership” as we understand membership today.  The Jews of this time are in an “oppressed minority, living in an occupied land.”  Their question is asked with the backdrop of colonialism, cultural and religious diversity, and competing claims on identity.[i]    Their question is both simple and complex:  why aren’t the disciples living like members of our community? 

For many a reader of this text, all sorts of erroneous conclusions have been drawn – primarily the anti-Semitic understanding that the laws of the Jews are superseded by laws of Jesus.[ii]  But that is not what is happening in this text.  Jesus does not have any issue with ritual cleansing:  he of all people understands the expectations of following God.  But Jesus is saying something more nuanced about identity and membership.  Jesus is saying that no matter how we traditionally mark ourselves as “other,” even if something is “the way we’ve always done it,” what is more important is how we live our faith.  So, if we are doing all the right things:  washing our hands the right way, bowing or genuflecting at all the right times, crossing ourselves when we’re supposed to, saying “Amen” during the sermon – or avoiding saying “Amen” during the sermon – none of that matters if our insides are defiled.  As Jesus quotes from Isaiah, “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me…”[iii] 

Today’s invitation is to ponder what membership in this body of faith means.  Are we honoring Jesus with our lips, but our hearts are far from Jesus?  Are we following the external “rules” but fostering evil intentions in our heart?  Have we filled out the membership form but neglected our work of feeding ourselves and feeding others?  Our work this week is making sure that when we go out into the world to love and serve the Lord – the dismissal that the we agree to every week – that we love and serve the Lord in ways that show people Christ through our words and actions; that as the political season ramps up, we ensure we are not defiling the dignity of any human being with our lips; and that when we talk about how much we love this church on the hill, we do so in a way that does not mask our individual struggles with avarice, deceit, slander, pride, and folly.  Telling the world you are a proud member of Hickory Neck Episcopal Church is just fine – and something I hope you do on a regular basis.  But our invitation from scripture today is to be clear with others that, as that old tune says, “He’s still working on me,” is also a part of membership in the body of Christ – perhaps the most appealing one that draws others into a desire for membership too.  Amen. 

[i] Debie Thomas, “True Religion,” August 22, 2021, as found at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/lectionary-essays/current-essay?id=2944 on August 30, 2024.

[ii] Idea suggested by Matt Skinner on the Sermon Brainwave podcast, “#799: 14th Sunday after Pentecost (Ord. 22B) – Aug. 29, 2021,” August 22, 2021, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/podcasts/799-14th-sunday-after-pentecost-ord-22b-aug-29-2021 on August 28, 2024.

[iii] Mark 7.6b.

On the Joy of It Not Being about You…

28 Wednesday Aug 2024

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Photo credit: https://wexnermedical.osu.edu/blog/visit-someone-in-hospital

One of the privileges of the work I do are visitations.  On countless occasions I have visited someone approaching death, someone in the throes of dementia, or someone just bone-weary with illness, and the immediate response when I walk in the door is a huge smile and the lightening of their countenance. 

I am very clear what that reaction is not.  It is not about me:  I have come to understand that the reaction is much more about the collar I wear and associations that collar has with a beloved church community.  It is also not about me bringing God to the room:  God is already there – my presence just sometimes helps people remember that fact.  And the reaction is definitely not about what I bring:  my visit will not physically change the pending death, the continued dementia, or the ongoing suffering – my work is much more about helping the individual find peace and a sense of connection to God in what can feel like a desert.

Despite all the things those smiles and lighter countenances are not, there is still a shared joy in them.  As the parishioner is reminded of God’s grace and love, so am I.  I too take joy in how being a part of a community can make me feel whole.  I too marvel at God’s presence that has gone before me.  I too can receive the peace of Christ in those desert places.  The gift of the visitation is not just for the visited.  The gift is also to the visitor.

I wonder what ways God is inviting you to be that smile and lightened countenance for others.  As schools restart, I see overwhelmed, weary parents, children, and teachers trying to adjust.  As individuals struggle financially, I see the defeated feelings that manifest themselves in hunched body postures and the diminished capacity for hope.  As a caretaker sits through another appointment or misses another engagement, I see a fatigue unlike any other.  To whom is God inviting you, in your daily journey, to be the light of Christ – to be the reminder that God is already there, that a community awaits, and that glimpses of peace can be found?  It is not about you, to be sure.  But you will be blessed as you do the work of blessing too. 

Sermon – John 6.35, 41-51, P14, YB, August 11, 2024

28 Wednesday Aug 2024

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One of the components of our leadership training in Vestry is to talk about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.  If you’re not familiar with his model, Maslow presents a pyramid of needs.  At the bottom are the physiological needs:  food, water, shelter, etc.  The next level of need is safety or security:  this would include health, employment, and social support.  The third level up the pyramid is love and belonging:  this entails friendship, family, intimacy, connection.  The fourth level is self-esteem:  including confidence, achievement, and respect.  And the final level, the tip of that pyramid is self-actualization:  creativity, a sense of purpose and meaning, and acceptance happen here.  The idea is, you cannot work on someone’s sense of purpose or meaning – the top of the pyramid, or even their sense of achievement and confidence without first meeting their basic needs at the base of the pyramid.  The same is true in the church.[i]  If we want to have excellent programming and ministry, where people are successfully naming and living into their vocations, we first have to make sure that we are a church who is in accordance with the canons of the Episcopal Church, that our property is safely maintained, that people feel welcome and cared for, before we think about people feeling proud about their church and helping their church thrive.  For Vestry members, when we are initiating change, we must be sure the hierarchy of needs has been met before we act.

Neal Mitchell tells a story of church who struggled with that sense of pacing with change.  There was a pastor who decided that the piano was not in the ultimate location in the sanctuary, so one week, he just moved it to the other side.  You would have thought he sacrificed a baby on the altar for the blowback he got.  He stirred such a commotion with his unilateral change that he eventually left the church and took another job.  Years and years later, that same pastor came back to the church for an anniversary celebration.  When he walked in the sanctuary, he immediately saw that the piano was in the location he always wanted but the church had refused to allow in his tenure.  After the worship service, he quietly asked the current pastor, “How in the world did you get them to move the piano over to that side of the worship space?!?”  The newer pastor said, “Oh, that.  Yeah, I just moved the piano an inch at a time.  No one even balked with the piano landed in the current position.”[ii] 

In John’s gospel today, Jesus in right in the middle of a lesson about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.  We are in the third week of what is called the Bread of Life Discourse.  To the casual reader, you may be thinking, “Didn’t we just talk about the bread of life last week?”  And you wouldn’t be wrong.  We are in the middle of talking about the bread of life for five weeks.  But the text may not be as repetitive as the text feels.  You see, Jesus has been walking us through a hierarchy of needs.  First, we had that feeding of the five thousand.  Jesus starts by attending to the people’s immediate need – food.  You can’t share the love of Christ if your belly is growling with hunger.  Next, the conversation goes back to their history – when God provided manna in the wilderness – in other words, when God didn’t just tend today’s hunger, but worked on the need of security – of daily bread.  There God tended to the second level of need.  Today, Jesus is talking not about today’s bread, or even daily bread.  Jesus is talking about the bread of life – the bread that will sustain us for eternity – the feeding of our souls, not just our bodies.  This kind of bread means relationship, intimacy, care, and empowerment.[iii]  

This week, I experienced another week of Vacation Bible School – this time through one of our ecumenical partners in town.  Over the course of two weeks of VBS, one of the common conversations I have had with church members here, there, and with the other Williamsburg Episcopal Churches was a reflection about how although families find their way to church through a program like VBS, the next step of coming to church regularly is more difficult to inspire.  Now there is a lot wrapped up in that pondering, but at the heart of that reflection, particularly by longtime churchgoers is an understanding that they have found something deeply meaningful and lifegiving at church and they want to share that soul sustenance – that bread of life – with folks who do not have that same sustenance. 

I think that is what Jesus is trying to help us see today.  We are certainly called to be a community of food.  Lord knows Jesus did that all the time – feeding masses of people, tending to their health needs, helping lift up the poor.  And, Jesus was also about feeding souls – helping people find relationship, belonging, soul-nourishing, and that sense of purpose in the kingdom.  We consume the bread of life here every week not because the bread tastes all that particularly good or because that bread fills our stomachs (certainly not like Coffee Hour does).  We consume that bread of life because that taste, that lingering feeling of a melting wafer moving down our throats, is a balm of belonging, of purpose, of entrance into the eternal.  We are very good at describing our welcoming community here at Hickory Neck or our awesome children’s formation program or our incredible service to the community.  But what Jesus is inviting us into this week is vulnerable conversations with others about our deep-soul needs that God fills every week in this place.  Those kinds of conversations are tricky while standing at the bus stop with our kids, or while waiting in line at the grocery story, or while running into someone at the gas station.  But those are the conversations that move pianos and move hearts – conversations that name the deep, hidden longing for the eternal that we all have.  Jesus invites us to feed others today, to tend to others’ daily bread, and to share the bread of life:  to share the deepest gift of the Church with a hungry world.  Amen. 

[i] Idea explored by Matt Skinner in Sermon Brainwave Podcast, “#977: Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost (Ord. 19B) – Aug. 11, 2024,” August 4, 2024, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/podcasts/977-twelfth-sunday-after-pentecost-ord-19b-aug-11-2024 on August 7, 2024.

[ii] Neal O. Michell, How to Hit the Ground Running (New York:  Church Publishing, 2005), 51-58.

[iii] Idea explored by Karoline Lewis in aforementioned podcast.

Sermon – 2 Samuel 11.26-12.13a, P13, YB, August 4, 2024

28 Wednesday Aug 2024

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One of the most powerful offerings at Hickory Neck is our Godly Play program.  Our youngest children engage in Godly Play in Sunday School, we broadcast Godly Play stories on Facebook every Sunday, our children use Godly Play in Children’s Chapel at the 10:00 am service, and we use Godly Play at The Kensington School for over 20 children each week.  Several of us got to witness Godly Play this week at Vacation Bible School, and I have to tell you, Mr. Z. told one of the more powerful stories this week.  He started out with wooden figurines – a man with a staff, a fence, and lots of little sheep.  As he told the story, the kids came up with names for the sheep:  Rufus, Bob, and Cookie, to name a few.  And then very quietly and dramatically, Mr. Z said, “Look what happens now.”  The fence for the sheep that the Good Shepherd was protecting was taken away and replaced with a little wooden table.  Then the sheep were replaced one by one with little wooden figures of people.  And then the Good Shepherd shed his staff, and assumed the role of serving bread and wine at the table.  The transformation had all the adults in the room stunned – not to mention all our kids.  Suddenly the Good Shepherd (i.e. Jesus and his sheep – or followers), was found in modern day, consecrating a meal among similarly named people, or followers of Jesus.  I made sure Mr. Z clarified that the priest at the table was not actually Jesus but a representative of Jesus, but as one who breaks bread with you weekly, my senses were totally disoriented by those powerful little pieces of wood.

The same thing happens to David today.  We did not talk about it last week, but our Hebrew Scripture reading last week told one of the more awful stories in our Scriptures – the sainted King David acting very un-saintly:  coveting what was not his, acting violently against a woman and impregnating her, attempting to cover his sin through trickery, and when that did not work, having the woman’s husband killed so he could have her as his own.  In today’s lesson, Nathan takes on the role of Mr. Z, entering the narrative with a story.  Nathan spends a great deal of time describing this poor man who has only one ewe lamb, whom he feeds with his own meager food, and loves like a daughter – and a rich man who, although he has more than enough of his own lambs, takes the poor man’s beloved little lamb and kills it for food.  The story is so pitiful that even David gets in a rage and says this man deserves to die and should restore the lamb fourfold.  And here is where Nathan pulls a Mr. Z switch.  “You are the man!” Nathan says.

Now in the whole of this sordid story of David there are three instances of characters speaking two simple words in the original Hebrew.  The first happens in the last chapter of second Samuel when Bathsheba sends word, translated as “I am pregnant” or harah ‘anoki.  The second instance of two simple Hebrew words comes from Nathan “’atah ha’ish,” translated as “You are the man.”  The final two words will come at the end of the story, when David realizing his grave sins, confesses “hata’ti lyhwh,” translated as “I have sinned against Yahweh.”  In these three short phrases, David is indicted, David is identified, and David submits and turns to God.  None of these phrases is easy to say by any of the characters, and yet all are needed for powerful transformation to happen before God.[i] 

But most of those words could never have emerged without the gift of story.  Just like Mr. Z transformed sheep named Rufus, Bob, and Cookie into parishioners named Sue, David, and Linda, so God uses Nathan to transform human sinfulness into faithful living.  As one scholar describes, Nathan’s parable, “…engaged a side of David that is totally different from the man who forces sex upon Bathsheba and orders the death of her husband Uriah.  David is no longer the absolutist king acting from the prerogatives of power and authority.  Nathan’s parable has touched the moral sensibilities of David’s humanity.”[ii] 

One of the more troubling realities of our day is that we have lost the ability to really talk to one another.  The seductive power of “us versus them” in the world has put us in seemingly impenetrable bubbles that keep us divided, full of hate (or at least extreme dislike), and surrounded by people who always agree with us instead of challenging us to be better followers of Christ.  Into this troubling reality, Nathan and Mr. Z remind us of the power of story to transform us into the faithful community that God calls us to be – not divided, hateful, monolithic groups – but united, loving, diverse groups of truth and love.  Nathan teaches us that our work is to reframe narrative and the message of Jesus so that we all stand on common ground.  Though we and others may need judgment, our invitation is not to condemn, but to invite others into fresh eyes through the power of reframing story – to find ways to tell the story of Jesus in alternative ways that lead to new insight and behavior.[iii]  The promise in our commitment to that work is that we can fulfill God’s deepest desire – that we turn from our sinful ways and return to God.  We can do that work as long as we work to do that work together – sinners united in loving storytelling and turning to God.  Amen.

[i] Walter Brueggemann, First and Second Samuel:  Interpretation:  A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville:  John Knox Press, 1990), 282-283.

[ii] Thomas H. Troeger, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Proper 13, Year B, Supplemental Batch 2 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2012), 4.

[iii] Shawnthea Monroe, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Proper 13, Year B, Supplemental Batch 2 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2012), 5.

Sermon – John 6.1-21, P12, YB, July 28, 2024

28 Wednesday Aug 2024

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This spring and summer your Vestry has been reading Mark Elsdon’s book We Aren’t Broke:  Uncovering Hidden Resources for Mission and Ministry.  Elsdon’s primary argument is that churches and faith communities have more resources than they realize and often neglect to utilize those latent resources as alternative sources of revenue and mission.  In his own setting, a campus ministry in the Midwest that no longer had students, they converted the parking lot of their worship space to a high-rise apartment building for students, with designated intentional communities for students.  The rental income from the apartments became a revenue stream that supported both the housing ministry and the worshiping community that emerged.  Whether churches repurpose their existing buildings for coworking space, redesignate green space for affordable housing, or simply rent their land for use by a business like a childcare center, Elsdon’s argument is that churches have an abundance at their fingertips that they rarely recognize or utilize.

As our Vestry has been dreaming about abundance and creative repurposing of resources, I have been seeing a lot of parallels from Elsdon’s vision and today’s gospel lesson.  Because every gospel has a version of the Jesus’ miracle of feeding a mass of people, and because this story is beloved, we sometimes gloss over this story without really hearing the story.  As scholar Karoline Lewis argues, “…a comparison of John and the Synoptic Gospels yields important differences and underscores particular theological themes in the Gospel of John.  The setting has a specific detail unique to John:  that of much grass (6:10).  This description alludes to and foreshadows the presentation of Jesus as the Good Shepherd in chapter 10.  The pasture for the sheep signals provision and abundance of life and this abundance is clearly present in the feeding of the five thousand.”[i]  In a place where there is abundant space, where an enormously abundant amount of people gets to eat until they are full, and there is an abundance of leftovers – twelve whole baskets to be exact – Jesus gives us insight into the abundant life that is found in him. 

But abundant thinking is not how most of us are hardwired.  As one pastor describes, “Much of the time our faith mirrors that of Philip and Andrew, who could not see past the six months’ wages or the meager five loaves and two fish.  We tend to base our living on our own scarcity or even on our own fears of insufficiency.  So we hoard and save and worry and end up living life in small and safe measures.  We pull back when we should push forward.  We give in to our fear of a shortfall rather than exercising faith in God’s abundance.  But Christians are constantly on call to go places where we have never been, to do things that we have never attempted, and to be things we have never envisioned.”[ii]

For those of you who have been around the Episcopal Church very long, you may know that we have something called “the reserve sacrament” – a fancy phrase for leftover communion.  When we celebrate the Great Thanksgiving, if any wine or bread is leftover, we set the elements aside in a safe place – in the New Chapel, we use the aumbry.  We then use the reserve sacrament the next week, or when your clergy take communion out to our homebound members.  But the holy meal we consume each week rarely needs that reserve.  I remember distinctly being asked once to come and deliver communion to a dying parishioner.  I came with a few reserve wafers in my kit and my flask of reserve wine.  But when I arrived, there were probably ten to twelve people in the room.  And although I expected some of them to say, “Oh, no thanks – no communion for me,” they all wanted to consume.  And so, I found myself making tiny wafers even tinier so that everyone might share the sacred meal with their grandma one last time.

Now, I am not suggesting Jesus gave super tiny bites to everyone on that huge area of “much grass.”  In fact, John’s gospel says they don’t just get what they need, they get as much bread and fish as they want – and there are still leftovers!  What I am saying is, Jesus is inviting us today to see with eyes of abundance.  To look at a room full of grieving people and figure out a way to make much bread out of little.  To talk to a business owner who serves our community and see what creative ways we can use our blessings to bless others.  To know that there is a shortage of housing for the workforce in our community and imagine if some of our property might be the solution.  I have been to enough potluck dinners at churches in my lifetime that we almost never finish every morsel of food – in fact, usually we are all taking at least a portion or two home of what we brought.  Jesus is inviting us into being a potluck community:  to see the abundance all around us, to remember where that abundance comes from, and to live and love abundantly in ministry without fear of scarcity.  As one scholar says, Jesus “…gives bread because he is Bread.  He makes possible the gathering of the body so that we might become his body, the church.”[iii]  Our invitation is to honor his generous, abundant legacy in the way we live, move, and have our being – as His Church in the world.  Amen.

[i] Karoline Lewis, John: Fortress Biblical Preaching Commentaries (Minneapolis:  Fortress Press, 2014), 83.

[ii] Charles Hoffman, “More than Enough,” Christian Century, July 25, 2006, vol. 123, no. 15, 18.

[iii] Debie Thomas, “The Miracle of Gathering,” July 18, 2021, as found at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/3081-the-miracle-of-gathering on July 26, 2024.

On Stories and Wonder…

17 Wednesday Jul 2024

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Photo credit: Jennifer Andrews-Weckerly; use with permission only

This week my older daughter and I volunteered with a local agency that is providing weekday meals to children in our community experiencing food scarcity.  These are children who qualify for free lunch during the school year, but when school is out of session, lose their one steady source of food for most of the week.  On our volunteer day, we packed about 260 meals – including a protein-packed sandwich, juice, fruit, a salty snack, and a homemade cookie. 

As the smell of those freshly baked cookies wafted from the brown paper bags, I found myself wondering about the countless details of these children.  In that mass of children spread around our county, I wondered how they were getting the food from those drop-off points, knowing that many of their care providers likely work during the day.  I wondered if they took joy in the unknown contents of their bag, or if those five items felt rote for them after a summer of brown bags.  I wondered if they had siblings or friends also receiving bags and whether they traded food items like my kid does sometimes at school.  I wondered if a temporarily filled belly eased any emotional strain they may be experiencing without the socialization of school. 

Wondering about those 260 stories was an important reminder to me of how irregularly I see the world as God does and instead get lost in my own slice of the world.  As I juggle transportation of children, writing the next sermon, facilitating a church meeting, and planning meals, I totally lose the stories of those who struggle with those basic things I take for granted.  I think that is why I longed so much to know at least some of the stories of those children – so that I might more tangibly be mindful of the wideness of our community and those God loves that I have the privilege to be unconcerned about most days.

I wonder what stories you have been missing lately.  Who in your community have you forgotten – not out of malice or lack of generosity, but more out of the busyness of life?  Whose stories might help you see your family members and coworkers with a bit more compassion?  What stories might make you view politics a bit differently or impact where you give your time and resources?  My prayer for you is that you seek those stories this week – and that those stories find you.

Sermon – Mark 6.14-29, P10, YB, July 14, 2024

17 Wednesday Jul 2024

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Today’s gospel lesson contains one of those iconic stories that is so vivid the story is seared in our minds.  In short, John the Baptist is decapitated by Herod Antipas who serves John’s head on a platter.  On the one hand, the brutal scene, depicted in art for centuries, is one we prefer to acknowledge and move on.  Certainly, this is a cautionary tale for the prophetic life.  John is now dead, and Jesus takes the reins.  But there is so much more to this story.  There is John’s faithfulness to making a way for the inbreaking of the kingdom – including the criticism of Herod Antipas’ marriage to his brother’s wife.  There is the king’s imprisonment of John mingled with his fascination with John, leaving him sitting at John’s feet enthralled by John’s teachings.  There is the vengeance of Herodias, the criticized wife of Antipas, who manipulates her daughter into asking for John’s head.  There is the proud Herod Antipas who makes ridiculous promises to his daughter and spinelessly agrees to kill John despite his knowing better – just to save face in front of his friends.  This is a story so woven in political and ethical intrigue that we do not like to look too closely for fear of seeing modern-day parallels.

But what is perhaps more intriguing about trying to avert our eyes from this brutal, shameful scene is that John’s beheading is not the first time scripture hands us a story like this.   “The story looks like a reprise of 2 Kings 16-21, the story of Queen Jezebel, the enemy of Elijah.  Just as Jezebel manipulated her husband, King Ahab, so Herodias manipulates Antipas.  Just as Elijah indicts Ahab and Jezebel, so John the Baptizer indicts Antipas and Herodias.”[i]  Furthermore, there are parallels to Esther’s story, whose husband also promises her anything she wants, up to half of his kingdom.  Esther uses her promise for good, able to thwart the villain Haman’s plan to kill off her fellow Jewish brothers and sisters.  Reflecting on the canon of scripture, we cannot avoid the ugly truth that scholar Amy-Jill Levine uncovers:  that “Death at the hands of corrupt authorities is the fate of John, and Jesus, and of countless others who have done the right thing, at the cost of their own lives.”[ii]

So, what do we do with this tale of terror laid at our feet today – a tale told time and time again in scripture?  I am intrigued by scholar Matt Skinner’s instruction look at the disciples.[iii]  In the very last line of our text today, Mark says, “When his disciples heard about [John the Baptizer’s murder], they came and took his body, and laid it in a tomb.”[iv]  If you remember, in the text last week, Jesus was shut down in his hometown and unable to perform miracles, instead sending out the twelve in pairs to cast out demons and to heal the sick.  For Jesus and his disciples, they got back to work.  And if we kept reading Mark’s gospel, in the verses that follow today’s story, we will hear how Jesus and disciples go on about their work, with Jesus miraculously feeding five thousand people.  John’s death is horrific, brought about by evil and sinfulness.  And yet, his disciples boldly come forward and bury his body.  Jesus sees John’s death and must know a similar fate awaits him.  And yet, he and his disciples get back to work, doing the good news of God in Christ.

Stories like John’s beheading are indeed graphic, sobering stories of what awaits those who live in the light of God.  And yet, time and again, Elijah, Esther, John the Baptizer, Jesus, and Jesus’ disciples keep going.  They keep doing the next good thing.  There is part of that model that feels unjust – surely, we should be fighting for justice, standing up to those who abuse power, who manipulate authority, whose self-centeredness and pride promote evil.  We revere plenty of saints who did just that kind of work.  And yet today, in the face of brutality, hopelessness, and injustice, the disciples of John and the disciples of Jesus just keep going.  They keep doing the work of the kingdom.

We are in an unprecedented time of political turmoil.  And in the coming weeks and months, given our diverse political backgrounds in this community, we will likely disagree about what our country can and should be doing.  But what brings us to this common table every week is a commitment to the life and ministry of Christ – the bringing about of a kingdom that is not of this world.  We will need each other – sometimes to figure out what the next best thing is, sometimes for the encouragement to do the next best thing, and always as a reminder that we disciples of Jesus need each other to do the next best thing.  We know from John, Jesus, Elijah, and others that doing the next best thing may end in personal suffering.  But we also know that continuing to do that next best thing helps bring us just a little bit closer to that kingdom here on earth.  We go together.  Amen.

[i] Amy-Jill Levine, The Gospel of Mark:  A Beginner’s Guide to the Good News (Nashville:  Abingdon Press, 2023), 38-39.

[ii] Levine, 42.

[iii] Matt Skinner, “Commentary on Mark 6:14-29,” July 14, 2024, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-15-2/commentary-on-mark-614-29-6 on July 12, 2024.

[iv] Mark 6.29.

Sermon – Mark 6.1-13, P9, YB, July 7, 2024

17 Wednesday Jul 2024

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I realized recently that one of things I often say when I am asked how my family is doing is to offer a halfhearted compliment, “Everyone is staying in their lane.”   I think I started adopting that minimum standard, “staying in your lane,” because I have learned over the years how little control I have as a parent.  I may not be able to control what things my kids are interested in, I may not be able to control how well they perform in school, and I may not be able to control how they handle interpersonal relationships.  But if each family member is “staying in their lane,” then that means I have at least controlled their meddling with one another, their active misbehavior, or their making a scene anywhere else. 

That is what seems to be bothering the folks in Jesus’ hometown of Nazareth – Jesus is not staying in his lane.  At the beginning, there seems to be a modicum of respect for what Jesus is teaching in the synagogue – they compliment the wisdom he seems to have gained and the healing acts he has performed.  But the compliments end there.  Then the questions begin.  Where did he get this wisdom?  Isn’t he the carpenter’s son?  Isn’t he the son of Mary – a question dripping with criticism, as you would usually only refer to someone’s parentage through the father, not the mother.[i]  In other words, the people of Jesus’ hometown are basically saying, “Stay in your lane, Jesus!”

Passages like this can be so tempting for us.  We read about Jesus’ hometown and think, “Those silly folks from Nazareth!  They cannot see what God is doing right in front of them!”  As if “those” people and finger pointing is what the gospel calls for.  But when we start wagging our fingers at “those” people, we forget one kernel of truth about scripture:  we are always “those” people.”  Anytime something someone does in scripture makes us uncomfortable or sanctimonious, scripture is speaking straight to “us” not “those people.”  So, the people of Nazareth aren’t the only ones telling Jesus to stay in his lane.  We tell that to Jesus all the time.  When the Holy Spirit is calling us try a new ministry that feels daunting, we are tempted to tell Jesus to stay in his lane and let us do things our way.  When Jesus puts people in our lives that push us out of our comfort zones, we grumble to Jesus to stay in his lane and stop sending us prophets – I mean, annoying people.  When we hear that still, quiet voice speaking truth to us in places we like to keep in a box, we cut Jesus some nasty side-eye and tell Jesus to stay in his lane.

But as scholar Debie Thomas says, “The call of the Gospel is not a call to stand still.  It is a call to choose movement over stasis, change over security, growth over decay.”[ii]  Just last Sunday, we started a movie series about changemakers.  Last week, the film was The Philadelphia Eleven, the story of the unsanctioned ordination of the first eleven women in the Episcopal Church.  The vitriol of the bishops, clergy, and lay people who were opposed to those women’s ordination was shocking to the ears.  From the clergy person who stated with confidence, “Women can be anything they want – except a priest in God’s holy church.”  From the woman who lamented the ways those women had violated what God calls women to be and do in the world.  To the bishops held a public, scathing trial of the three male bishops who dared to ordain the first eleven.  The Philadelphia Eleven had waited time after time for the Episcopal Church to change – to chose growth, change, and movement instead of decay, security, and stasis.  And when the church refused to let these women out of their lane, the stepped out of their lane anyway.

Scholar Thomas concludes, “The scandal of the Incarnation is precisely that Jesus doesn’t stay in his lane.  God doesn’t limit God’s self to our small and stingy notions of the sacred.  God exceeds, God abounds, God transgresses, God transcends.  The lowly carpenter reveals himself as Lord.  The guy with the tainted birth story offers us salvation.  The hometown prophet tells us truths we’d rather not hear… [Jesus] will call out to us, nevertheless, daring us always to see and experience him anew.”[iii]  Our invitation today is let Jesus out of his lane in our life:  to not hold his lane as sacred, and to open ourselves to the ways his transgression of lanes is helping us to experience Jesus in new and fresh ways.  Maybe we do that in weekly worship, opening ourselves through song, prayer, and scripture to fresh experiences of God.  Maybe we come to the film series or Bible study this summer to see where God is exceeding, abounding, transgressing, and transcending.  Or maybe we let go of whatever boundary we are holding here at Hickory Neck to see what happens when we ask Jesus to please cross out of his lane.  The promise for us is a fresh experience of Jesus in our own day, time, and place.  Amen.

[i] Efrain Agosto, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 3 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 215.

[ii] Debie Thomas, “Hometown Prophets,” June 27, 2021, as found at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/3058-hometown-prophets on July 5, 2024.

[iii] Thomas.

On the Road to Getting It Right…

03 Wednesday Jul 2024

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Photo credit: https://azdiocese.org/2023/11/the-philadelphia-eleven-screenings-in-arizona/

This past Sunday, the local Episcopal parishes in my town gathered to watch the documentary, The Philadelphia Eleven.  The film details the history of women’s ordination in the Episcopal Church, and the first eleven women who were “irregularly ordained” in 1974 (i.e. ordained by Episcopal Bishops, but without the church’s General Convention sanctioning the ordination of women).  The question of women’s ordination had come before General Convention many times before, but was always defeated.  So, fifty years ago, a handful of women, along with male allies, decided they could not wait any longer.  The film tells the story of the outrage the eleven women created, the abuse and death threats they faced, and the way that their diverse ministries led to the sanctioning of women’s ordination by General Convention in 1976. 

I came into the Episcopal Church later in life.  Although deeply involved in the United Methodist campus ministry at my college, an ecumenical trip with the Episcopal campus minister was my first real exposure to the liturgy and polity of the Episcopal Church.  That campus minister was a woman, and at that point in my development, that did not seem abnormal.  Then, a couple of years after college, I stumbled into the Episcopal Cathedral, whose dean was a woman.  One of her assisting priests was also a woman.  Those early mentors did not just normalize women’s ordination – it never occurred to me that there was a time when women were not priests.  In fact, I remember an occasion when one of my own daughters as a young child asked me, “Can boys be priests?”

At this year’s General Convention of the Episcopal Church, we took the first steps to authorize the honoring of the Philadelphia Eleven in our set of honored saints we celebrate at weekday Eucharists.  In the same city, where 51 years earlier the General Convention had denied women’s right to ordination, we agreed to honor the saints who pushed us to be better versions of the Church.  All female clergy in the room were invited to stand to a roar of applause.  I looked at the other women, many of whom I know and love, and I looked at the male clergy and laity whose eyes and smiles were full of admiration and respect, and I realized a couple of things.  One, it is always a joy to celebrate when the Church gets something right – even if it takes a long time for the Church to get there.  And two, I can be in ministry as my most authentic self is due to the suffering and courage of men and women I may never meet. 

I share all this not to brag on the Episcopal Church – in fact, we still have a long way to go.  Income disparity between male and female clergy is still a problem, as well as access to comparable positions.  I have been the first female rector both times I have served as rector, and both times, people left the church when a woman was hired.  But I share this story more because I wonder who else have we excluded from the Table.  I share this story because I found myself wondering whether I would have risked being one of the Philadelphia Eleven, knowing the suffering that would come.  I share this story because as someone who really appreciates rules and boundaries, I wonder which of those rules and boundaries the Holy Spirt keeps bumping against.  While these may seem like big questions, or super-Church-nerdy questions, I think these questions are for all of us – an invitation to wonder who we have excluded in the communities of faith we love so much.  The Philadelphia Eleven seem to be still asking us these questions fifty years later.