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Sermon – Luke 5.1-11, EP5, YC, February 9, 2025

12 Wednesday Feb 2025

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On occasions of big life milestones, we tend to be a people who like to offer sage advice.  Whether the advice is about how to approach retirement after decades of work, how to handle parenting to a first-time parent, how to manage marriage, how to navigate divorce, or, like today, how to approach full membership in the body of Christ through the act of baptism.  As parents and godparents tentatively offer their children to the Church, in turn, we as a community offer advice and counsel – sometimes formally through things like the baptismal covenant, and sometimes informally over coffee and cake from our own lived experiences.

As I was reading our gospel lesson this week, I was thinking about one of those loved bits of wisdom that often comes up in the life of the Church.  I cannot tell you the number of times I have heard a parishioner say to me, “You know what they say the definition of insanity is, Jennifer?  Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”  Sometimes, when we just cannot get some momentum to overcome a problem at church, I find myself doing an “insanity check” because of that old adage.  So, imagine my surprise when I read today’s gospel and hear Jesus basically asking the disciples to do the exact opposite of what that bit of wisdom suggests about how doing the same thing over and over again never leads to meaningful change. 

Here we are, meeting Simon, James, and John in Luke’s gospel for the first time.  These career fishermen have had a rough day on the job.  They have been out on the water all night long, using all their normal tricks, fishing in all the right spots, and have come to shore, exhausted, disappointed, and likely more than a bit irritated to have nothing to show for their labor.  Into this despondency and frustration, this guy, Jesus, inserts himself and basically says the complete opposite of what that old saying says about doing the same thing over and over.  Jesus says to the soon-to-be disciples, “Go back and fish again.”  To weary, disheartened men, who have just spent all night doing this work, Jesus says, “Do the work again.” 

We do not know why Peter agrees.  But we do know the feeling Peter describes when he basically tells Jesus this is a terrible idea.  We may not be fishermen, but we know “what it’s like to work really hard at something that matters, and have nothing to show for [our] efforts when [we’re] done.  …I imagine we all know what’s it’s like to pour ourselves into a job, a relationship, a ministry, a dream — and come away exhausted, frustrated, thwarted, and done.”[i]  For that matter, after the last month we may be having those feelings right now.  Whether we are weary from watching the chaos and upheaval of these first few weeks of a new administration, or we are weary from having big conversations about church, we know how resistant we would be if Jesus were to tell us, “Just go back out into the world (or to Hickory Neck) and keep doing the same thing!”

But here is the thing:  Jesus doesn’t actually ask Peter to keep doing the same thing.  Though the physical action Jesus is suggesting is the same, something dramatic changes in the scene.  Yes, Peter, James, and John, are using the same nets, in the same waters, in the same location, using all their same gifts.  But this time, this time the text tells us that Jesus gets in the boat with them.  Jesus does not shout from the shore what the disciples should do.  Jesus gets on that weary boat with them, and heads out into the deep, trouble waters with them.  As scholar Debie Thomas says, “This is a promise to cultivate us, not to sever us from what we love.  It’s a promise rooted in gentleness and respect — not violence and coercion.  It’s a promise that when we dare to ‘go deep,’ to do what we know and love with Jesus at our side, God will enliven our efforts in ways we couldn’t have imagined on our own.”[ii]

As I have been looking at the chaos in the political sphere right now, and even as I have been looking at pretty big changes at Hickory Neck, I have been wondering if Jesus’ only words of encouragement are going to be, “Just get back out in the deep waters and keep doing the good work of the Gospel.”  Because lately that has just felt more like “insanity work.”  Instead, what our gospel lesson tells us that when we get back to the work Jesus has given us to do, knowing that Jesus is in the boat with us, it means not only will we not get the same results, we are going to be surprised with abundance.  Now, I’m not saying you have to accept the promise of abundance enthusiastically.  Even Peter protests and then acquiesces half-heartedly.  “Yet if you say so, I will,” Peter tepidly commits.  So Debie Thomas tells us we can commit too.  “Yet if you say so, I will try again.  Yet if you say so, I will be faithful to my vocation.  Yet if you say so, I will go deep rather than remain in the shallows.  Yet if you say so, I will trust that your presence in the boat is more precious than any guarantee of success.  Yet if you say so, I will cast my empty net into the water, and look with hope for your kingdom to come.”[iii]

When we baptize little Arthur today, and we decide what bit of wisdom we want to pass along to him, forget about that whole “insanity” advice.  Maybe instead, our advice can be something more akin to our gospel.  We can tell him, “Sometimes Jesus is going to invite you to do some crazy stuff – to do something that you are certain will lead to the same old results.  But just remember, Jesus does not send without getting in the boat with you.  Jesus does not send you without empowering you to do the work.  Jesus does not send you without the promise that abundance will come.”  Our invitation today is to not to just give the advice to little Arthur – but to hear and embrace the advice for ourselves too.  Amen.

[i] Debie Thomas, “Same Old Same Old,” February 3, 2019 as found at https://www.journeywithjesus.net/essays/2075-same-old-same-old on February 7, 2025.

[ii] Thomas.

[iii] Thomas.

Sermon – Isaiah 43.1-7, Luke 3.15-17, 21-22, E1, YC, January 12, 2025

12 Wednesday Feb 2025

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Some Sundays, Church is a bit hard.  Every Sunday, even the ones in Lent, are considered resurrection celebrations – days where we take a break from all that weighs on us and we celebrate the gift of a Savior.  But some Sundays turning our hearts to joy is difficult.  We may be mourning a loss, or watching a crisis like the fires near Los Angeles this week.  We may be struggling with anger or fear, or worried about an estranged child, or precarious relationship, or how we are going to make ends meet.  And yet, Sunday after Sunday, the Church says, “Rejoice, and again I say, rejoice!” 

That contrast is experienced brilliantly in our Old Testament lesson today.  The reading from Isaiah is the perfect pairing for our gospel lesson where Jesus is baptized, the Holy Spirit descends like a dove, and the voice of God speaks, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.”  The echoes of the prophet Isaiah are those words to Jesus.  God says to the people in Isaiah’s time, “Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine…you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you…I am with you.”  On the surface, these words sound like joy upon joy.  Who would not be thrilled to hear such affirmation and respond with songs of praise and jubilation?

But here is what you might not realize about chapter 43 of Isaiah.  At this point, the people of God are in exile in Babylon.  God is not speaking to0 the generation of people who were driven out of the land of promise into Babylon.  These words are spoken to the children and even grandchildren of those first exiles – some of whom were born in exile and only know the land of promise by legend.[i]  These words sound lovely, but must have been hard to hear.  The exiles may have even asked, “If God is with us…how did we end up in Babylon?”[ii]  God is speaking to a people who have likely lost hope or lost belief that God is even with them anymore.  Because if God is with us, how can suffering be? 

Today we will baptize two young boys – one, August, who is too young and innocent for such questions yet, and the other, Jonathan, who is just old enough to start asking the big questions:  who is God?  What is baptism?  If you are a priest, can you bless the water I drink too?  On a Sunday when we might be struggling to bring the joy with the world burning and freezing around us, a baptism might be just what we need.  Baptism is all about identity making – baptism is the moment we are acknowledged as full members of the body of Christ – as children of God.  Baptism is the day the church says, “You belong to God.” 

And so, when God says through Isaiah, “I have called you by name, you are mine…you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you…I am with you,” God means you.  Even the pronoun used in the text is the second-person-singular – as if God is speaking to each member of the community.[iii]  So you, Bob and Betty, are precious in God’s sight.  You, Nancy and David, are called by name and are God’s.  God loves you, Jonathan and August.  As one scholar writes, “Our sense of belonging comes not from the acceptance of our peers or the status of our communities but from the One who claims us and will never let us go.  What makes us worthy is not our individual achievements or the size of our congregational budgets, but God’s gracious love.”[iv]

In the ancient church, baptism looked a little different than it does today.  They did not have beautifully carved and crafted fonts with small amounts of water poured over heads or sprinkled among people.  The early Church had a deep, cruciform shaped pools with stairs on either end of the cross length.  So the candidate would walk down into the water at one end, totally submerge under the waters, and then emerge on the other end.  The symbolism was that your old self died in the waters of baptism, and you were born into the life of Christ, emerging from the womb’s water a new person.

We may not submerge Jonathan and August, but we do understand them as born anew today.  And in fact, each of us here today are born anew too as we reaffirm what happened in that new birth for us.  That’s how we tangibly grasp onto the hope and celebration of a resurrection Sunday – even in the midst of fire and freeze.  We grasp onto hope as the Church reminds us who we are and how we will be.  We promise today to “continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of the bread, and in the prayers.”  We promise to “repent and return to the Lord, to proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ.”  We promise to “seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves and to strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.”  Whether we brought joy with us today, or we are in need of joy, the Church promises that if we keep trying to live into those baptismal promises, live into that identity of beloved children of God, we will find our way into believing and feeling the truth of those words from God.  “I have called you by name, you are mine…you are precious in my sight, and honored, and I love you…I am with you.”  Amen.     

[i] Julia M. O’Brien, “Commentary on Isaiah 43:1-7,” January 12, 2025, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/baptism-of-our-lord-3/commentary-on-isaiah-431-7-6 on January 10, 2025.

[ii] Valerie Bridgeman Davis, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. C, Vol. 1 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 221.

[iii] Kathleen M. O’Connor, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. C, Vol. 1 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 219.

[iv] W. Carter Lester, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. C, Vol. 1 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 222.

Sermon – John 11.32-44, AS, YB, November 3, 2024

13 Wednesday Nov 2024

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I imagine if you were to poll a group of priests, most of them would say that one of their favorite liturgies in the Episcopal Church is the burial office – not because of the painful journey of grief and loss that leads to such an office, but because of what the liturgy and its scripture lessons accomplish.  In the midst of personal pain and gut-wrenching bereavement, the Church shows up with scripture lessons that point us toward ultimate things – that remind us of the ultimate source of hope for the faithful:  the promise of resurrection and eternal life.  Grief can upend your entire center, leaving you feeling lost.  But scripture, the burial office liturgy, and our faith are like a tether that hold us steady – that hold us close to Christ when Christ can feel absent.

Our lessons today on this feast of All Saints are all lessons traditionally recommended for a burial office – ones that have given us hope as we have lost spouses, parents, children, friends, and spiritual mentors.  They are lessons that give us hope for that feast of rich food and well-aged wines, where death is swallowed up forever, and God wipes away our tears.  They are lessons that promise that death will be no more, mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.  They are lessons that depict a Jesus deeply disturbed and deeply moved by our suffering. 

So why all this focus on end things?  Why this focus on ultimate things?  For one, as we honor the saints who have gone before on All Saints Sunday, these are lessons that remind us of what the Church has always believed about life, death, and eternal life in Christ.  As we will later recall in the service those souls closer to our own journeys and tie ribbons on the altar rail in their memory, the Church wants us to be ever confident in where those souls are and where we will go too.  And as we reaffirm our baptismal covenant today – that reminder of how in baptism we go down into the baptismal waters and die to self and come up again born anew in Christ, we are reminded that we are a kingdom people, living in resurrection not just in eternal life but in the here and now.

I am especially grateful for this feast of All Saints, on this day of remembering ultimate things, as we head into a week that feels especially weighty and consequential.  Not only are we each feeling our own anxieties and fears about how this presidential election will go (probably not all agreeing about which way would be best), I was also reminded yesterday as I watched the investiture of our new Presiding Bishop Rowe, that the rest of the world joins in our anxiety.  As a primate from South Sudan reminded us, our presidential election this week does not just impact us, but has ripple effects in countries around the world. 

Into this global anxiety, in this conflicted country, commonwealth, and county, we are gifted the same thing the Church gifts us with at every burial and every reminder of the saints:  the reminder of ultimate things.  We are reminded that in celebration and catastrophe, God is with us, wiping away tears.  We are reminded that in victory and defeat, death holds no power over us.  But maybe most importantly, we are reminded in anxiety, in relief, in hope, and in hope vanquished, Jesus is by our side, deeply moved and ever ready to continue showing us God’s glory when God’s glory feels long lost.

Today our lessons and our liturgy are powerful reminders that we have a sacred duty to live into our baptismal covenant.  That may not sound like much of a balm – maybe the command to honor our baptismal covenant feels more like homework than comfort.  But we are never baptized just into comfort.  We are baptized through comfort to live radical lives as Christ’s disciples – where we share the good news of God in Christ, where we gather in weekly worship and communion, where we seek and serve Christ in all persons, and where we strive for justice and peace, respecting the dignity of every human being.

Yes, this time feels so weighty on our shoulders that we feel like we may collapse under the weight of this time.  But the Jesus who weeps for Lazarus is the same Jesus who told us his burden is easy and his yoke is light.  The Jesus who is deeply disturbed is also the Jesus who troubles the water – the waters in which we died in baptism and rose to new life.  The Jesus who walked alongside Martha and Mary is the same Jesus who walks alongside you and me.  Our invitation today is take that baptismal covenant seriously – with the heft of ultimate things like death and resurrection and eternal life.  We stand in those baptismal waters this week, and we invite others to join us.  Those waters are our source of strength this week.  Amen.

Sermon – Proverbs 22.1-2, 8-9, 22-23, P18, YB, September 8, 2024

11 Wednesday Sep 2024

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Many of us grew up with parents or grandparents who were always trying to instill wisdom.  “A penny saved is a penny earned.”  Or, “The early bird gets the worm.” Or one that overlaps with faith, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”  I think the hope has been to create mantras that will remind us to be good human beings.  In a lot of ways, that is what we do in baptism.  Certainly, the main purpose of baptism is to welcome people into the community of faith.  But every baptism is also an educational moment – an identity-making moment.  The liturgy of baptism (and especially the renewal of our baptismal covenant which we will do later today) is chock full of wisdom about how to live faithfully as a Christian:  continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of the bread, and in the prayers;  resist evil, and, whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord; proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ; seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself; and strive for justice and peace among all people, respecting the dignity of every human being.  The baptismal covenant may not be as catchy or memorable as those phrases your grandparent used, but they do the same thing:  teach us something about being people of faith.

That is what our lesson from Proverbs is doing today too.  Truthfully, many of those proverbial sayings we learned from our elders come from scripture or even the book of Proverbs directly.[i]  Today’s lesson from Proverbs is all about wealth.  Now I know what you are thinking, we just baptized a little baby – why in the world do we need to talk to them about money?  Besides, isn’t that a little uncouth?  Much as we polite southerners might not like to admit it, Holy Scripture always has a lot to say about money.  For Jesus, money was the topic he talked about the most in Scripture.  But Jesus comes from a long line of people and scriptures that talk about wealth.  He was probably shaped just like we were by elders trying to give us wisdom.  But before you get too squeamish, just remember that talking about wealth is not just a concern about personal behavior or morality.  In the instance of our lesson from Proverbs, talking about wealth helps us understand how to live in community – how to be a people of faith together.[ii]

Let’s take a deeper dive with these verses today (feel free to go back to your bulletin as we read along).  The first verse talks about how a good name is much more valuable than great riches.  Now that does not mean we need to literally pick good names for our children – although Nathan, who was baptized earlier, is a beautiful name (quite biblical, actually!).  But what the original Hebrew means by “good name” is “good reputation.”[iii]  In other words, people need to know that you are a decent human being more than they need to know you have high levels of wealth.  In the second verse, the proverb goes even deeper, suggesting that whether we are rich or poor (or somewhere in between) we are all equally loved by God.  We are all beloved children of God.  Now if our equally beloved status is true, and how we treat others matters most, then our main job in life is to care for one another.  If we happen to be wealthy, we are encouraged to share our wealth.  As a community, we share our resources to support the work of ministry – verses eight and nine as well as 22 and 23 tell us how important our care for one another is.  That right prioritizing with wealth and community puts us in right relationship with God.  And Lord knows, Nathan, or any newly baptized, is going to need to navigate that reality in their lifetimes. 

That is what baptism does.  Baptism helps us remember first and foremost what we want to teach the newly baptized.  Whether the baptized is an adult or an infant we will communally raise, we want people like Nathan to know what being a person of faith is, and how that identity impacts the whole of our lives – from our weekly gathering in worship, to our caring for the poor, to the ways we steward our own resources. 

Secondly, baptism reminds us as a community what we need to remember.  Just because we were baptized once, or have reaffirmed our baptisms multiple times, that does not mean we have mastered faithful discipleship.  Even in our baptismal covenant, we do not say, “if we fall into sin,” we say, “whenever we fall into sin.”  Being a person of faith means working at being faithful over and over again – always with the help of fellow people on the journey, but certainly the work is ongoing.

That is why today, in addition to celebrating our baptism, we are also turning our hearts again to the topic of stewardship.  As we kickoff another program year, we are reminded that generosity is at the heart of faithful living.  Verse nine that we read today says, “Those who are generous are blessed, for they share their bread with the poor.”  Generosity, as one scholar explains, is “here imagined as sharing bread with the poor; that is, sharing those things that are necessary for a safe life.  In the ancient context, ‘sharing bread’ is not just dropping money in a cup, but is an expression of solidarity.  Those who share what they need for life (bread) find that they will have what they need for life.”[iv]   Our invitation today, as water is sprinkled on all our heads, is to consider how we might embrace a generous life – how we might, recognizing our blessedness, share our bread with others.  For when we live generously, we find we have all that we need for life.  Amen.

[i] Susan T. Henry-Crowe, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 4 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 26.

[ii] Stephen C. Johnson, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 4 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 27.

[iii] Megan Fullerton Strollo, “Commentary on Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23,” September 8, 2024, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-23-2/commentary-on-proverbs-221-2-8-9-22-23-6 on September 4, 2024.

[iv] Ronald J. Allen, “Considering the Text:  Week 4, Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, 8 September 2024” Center for Faith and Giving, as found at centerforfaithandgiving.org, 27.

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 – John 10.11-18, E4, YB, April 21, 2024

01 Wednesday May 2024

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In a few moments, we will baptize Abby and Laela, sisters who are ages 6 and 7 respectively.  What’s interesting about a baptism for candidates who are not infants is there is much more cognition, curiosity, and craving.  In a sense, Abby and Laela understand more profoundly that their baptism is a sacrament of belonging – a welcoming into full membership in the body of Christ.  One of Hickory Neck’s strongest gifts is the powerful gift of welcome.  You talk to any newer or longer-term member, and they will likely tell you that Hickory Neck’s warm welcome was what drew them in and made them linger.  There was a sense of inclusion and care that made them want to stay.

For a community so skilled in welcoming and especially as a community who will be welcoming Abby and Laela today, we hear a powerful word from John’s gospel about life with the Good Shepherd.  For people familiar with the lectionary, the fourth Sunday of Easter, affectionally known as Good Shepherd Sunday, is a favorite Sunday.  Every year on this Sunday we hear about Jesus’ proclamation of being the Good Shepherd.  This year’s text from John tells us how Jesus the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep; how Jesus will protect the sheep; how he knows the sheep and the sheep know him; and that there are other sheep that do not even belong to the fold that Jesus will bring into the beloved fold.  When we hear a text like this, we get a warm-fuzzy feeling[i] – the kind of feeling of protected belonging that we want Abby and Laela to always feel with Jesus and the church community.  That feeling of care and belonging has inspired artwork, song, liturgies, and sermon alike.  This Good Shepherd Sunday reminds all of us of what inspired us to keep coming back to this modern incarnation of the Good Shepherd’s fold here at Hickory Neck.

The challenge about the warm-fuzzies that come with belonging is that chasing a sense of belonging can become consumeristic:  a pursuing of a feeling that is received without any expectation of reciprocity.  The pursuit of belonging makes sense.  As one scholar suggests, “Forming authentic and holistic community is hard work – we dole out parts of ourselves in stingy bits and pieces, avoid being vulnerable with each other, hold back our feelings and thoughts, are afraid to confront each other, judge each other without mercy, hold grudges, set impossibly high standards for ourselves and each other…We have a difficult time trusting each other,” making real and life-giving community hard.[ii]  But belonging with Jesus and within the faith community is not something that is just received.  Belonging comes with obligation.  No longer are we individuals feeling alone – now we are a part of a larger whole.  Though beautiful, that whole does not work without each of its members.  Receiving the warm-fuzzy feeling of belonging results in the action of giving:  of contributing in your own right to the community.[iii]    

The good news is that although we use language about welcome at Hickory Neck, we actually mean belonging.  Yes, we were likely greeted warmly, maybe given a welcome gift or sent a greeting by mail soon after our first visit, and often we were recognized and engaged after the service or at Coffee Hour.  But I cannot tell you the number of people at Hickory Neck who have also told me about how accessible involvement and even leadership are here.  From stories of being recruited to lead Fall Festivals within the first year of membership, to hopping in as an usher or reader, to being invited to a Bible Study, service opportunity, or a Foyer Group, to becoming a financial supporter of programming:  you are not just welcomed here – you are invited into belonging here.  Though we may not use the strong word of “obligation” or “responsibility,” we teach through our behavior that warm welcome means full membership in the body of Christ.  We join in not because we have to, but because the warmth of the Good Shepherd’s inclusion of all overwhelms us into wanting to give back – both here inside these walls and outside these walls in the wider community.

And that is what we have been teaching Abby and Laela about baptism.  Today, as the water is poured over their heads and the oil rubbed into their foreheads, they will be welcomed into full membership in the body of Christ.  And even though age six and seven might seem too young for the “obligations of membership in the body,” we need their gifts just as much as they need the gift of belonging.  So, when they bring forward the communion elements, or participate in Godly Play, or join in singing and song, they make our community complete.  They remind us of the broadness of God’s inclusion, the power of being known, and the resultant discipleship that springs out of all of us – no matter size, age, or ability.  Today, the Good Shepherd welcomes Abby and Laela into the fold – into the body of Christ.  Today, Abby and Laela invite us to renew our sense of belonging in that same fold and all that belonging entails.  And for that, we give thanks to God.  Amen.

[i] As described by Matt Skinner, on the Sermon Brainwave podcast, “#961: Fourth Sunday of Easter – April 21, 2024,” April 14, 2024, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/podcasts/961-fourth-sunday-of-easter-april-21-2024 on April 18, 2024.

[ii] Barbara J. Essex, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year B, Vol. 2 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 451.

[iii] As described by Karoline Lewis, on the Sermon Brainwave podcast, “#961: Fourth Sunday of Easter – April 21, 2024,” April 14, 2024, as found at https://www.workingpreacher.org/podcasts/961-fourth-sunday-of-easter-april-21-2024 on April 18, 2024.

Sermon – John 20.19-31, E2, YB, April 7, 2024

01 Wednesday May 2024

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Photo credit: Hickory Neck Episcopal Church. Reuse with permission only.

For those of you who have worked with me for a while now, you know that I am easily excited by new ideas.  So, when Ed and Tyler suggested the Sunday after Easter for Quinton’s baptism, I excitedly said, “Yes!”  I knew we would be still experiencing the high of Holy Week and Easter from last week, I knew that baptisms are traditionally celebrated throughout Eastertide, and I knew having another reason to celebrate this Sunday would be fun.  What I failed to double-check was the lectionary.  As soon as I saw the gospel for today, I groaned.  Who wants to talk about Doubting Thomas when we are performing a sacrament of belief and belonging?!?

At first glance, John’s Gospel text today, is in fact, a terrible text for baptism.  First of all, the disciples are making a very poor showing about what the community of faith is supposed to look like.  You would think after seeing the empty tomb and hearing Mary Magdalene’s testimony, “I have seen the Lord,” the disciples would be hitting the ground running, doing the work of spreading the good news, or at least throwing a raucous party.  Instead, we find the disciples huddled in a locked room, cowering in fear.  The text says they are afraid of the Jewish leaders, perhaps afraid the same people who killed Jesus would try to kill them too.  But I think there is more to their fear.  I think they are afraid to face others, because they feel they have failed.  Perhaps they believe their pick for Messiah did not seem to be the Messiah after all.  I think they are also behind those locked doors because they are ashamed that they failed to protect Jesus, to keep him alive.[i]   Those locked doors are not just for safety – those locked doors are for hiding the shame, the disappointment, and the fear of facing others that the disciples have. 

And then we have the famous Doubting Thomas.  That we even call him “Doubting Thomas” is indication enough of the communal disapproval of his behavior.  Why couldn’t he just believe?  If not Mary Magdalene, at least his fellow disciples, who use the same words as Mary’s own testimony, “We have seen the Lord.”[ii]  Even Jesus seems to disapprove when he asks, “Have you believed because you have seen me?  Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”[iii]  We do not exactly seem to be setting the stage well for little Quinton, or anyone new to the Church today.

But the more I thought about this text, and the more I read, the more I realized this is actually the perfect text for someone new to the community of faith.  As little Quinton grows up, I do not want him to think that faith is about perfectly believing, perfectly behaving Christians, who perfectly go to Church.  And although I want Quinton to know about doubt and to have a super healthy sense of curiosity and questioning, the truth is our labeling of Thomas as “Doubting Thomas,” gets in the way of what John is trying to teach new believers.  Instead, New Testament scholar Karoline Lewis explains, “The primary definition of the term doubt, however, has to do with uncertainty.  Uncertainty, as a category of belief, does not really exist in the Fourth Gospel.  One is either certain or not certain; in the light or in the dark.  Jesus invites Thomas to move from darkness to light, from lack of relationship to intimacy.  There is no middle ground with it comes to believing in Jesus.”[iv] 

Now, stay with me on this, because I realize that dichotomy sounds even worse than doubting.  Instead, what John’s gospel is doing is not about exclusion, but about radical inclusion.  John is not conveying something about belief but about incarnation:  “to be incarnated demands relationship.  As a result, you are either in one community or another, but you cannot be not in community.  Life, especially abundant life, is dependent on the reality of multiple expressions of connectivity and belonging, whether that be on-on-one or in various sizes of communities…Even God was not alone in the beginning…”  So, when Thomas says, “My Lord and my God,” he is not talking about his own belief or even an individualized theology, but rather “the intimacy this Gospel imagines between believer and Jesus…”  As Lewis goes on to say, “To give witness to a personal relationship with Jesus is immediately to enter into a community of intimacy between Jesus, God, the Paraclete (a fancy word for Holy Spirit[v]), and the believer and between the believer and the new community, the flock, that Jesus as the Word made flesh has made possible for the world.”[vi]

One this day, when Thomas the Twin teaches us all about what belief really means – that is, incarnate, intimate relationship with God and with one another – I cannot imagine a better word for us today.  When we baptize Quinton today, we invite him into the relationships already present in this community – the real ones that sometimes cower in shame and doubt – but also the ones that lead to abundant life and blessing.  When we pour water over his head and rub oil on his forehead and commit to supporting him and one another in this journey of faith, we are claiming him not as someone who will always have things figured out – because we do not always have things figured out.  But we do commit to the intimacy of relationship:  with the three persons of the Godhead, with one another, and with the community of faith.  I cannot think of a better reminder on this second Sunday in Easter as we deepen our own intimacy with the risen Lord than to baptize and reaffirm our baptisms – as we acclaim today, “I will! (with God’s help).”  Amen.

[i] M. Craig Barnes, “Crying Shame,” Christian Century, vol. 121, no. 7, April 6, 2004, 19. 

[ii] Karoline M. Lewis, John:  Fortress Biblical Preaching Commentaries (Minneapolis:  Fortress Press, 2014), 248.

[iii] John 20.29.

[iv] Lewis, 249.

[v] My words, not Lewis’ words.

[vi] Lewis, 250.

Sermon – Matthew 1.18-25, A4, YA, December 18, 2022

21 Wednesday Dec 2022

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I have always loved stories and images of Mary and the Christ Child.  Mary is revered around the world, a patron saint to many, an intercessor for others (just think of all the “Hail Mary”s said globally), and a spiritual companion to some.  I remember in the Holy Land visiting a chapel honoring Mary, the mother of Jesus.  The chapel commissioned artists from around the world to depict their unique cultural version of Mary and Child.  The walls are lined with these floor-to-ceiling renderings of the sacred pair.  I was so taken with the images that I now have my own collection of Mary and Child paintings in my office. 

I also remember that same day in the Holy Land, after spending what felt like hours meditating with these stunning paintings, then going down the road to a chapel dedicated to Joseph.  The chapel was much smaller, rather nondescript, and quite frankly, easily forgettable.  The only real memorable thing about the chapel is how distinctly different the Joseph chapel is from the Mary chapel. 

I am struck this year, particularly as we baptize little Melody, how glad I am that we get Joseph’s story this Advent as opposed to Mary’s.  On baptism Sundays with children, we have two realities.  The first reality is the adorable, belovedness of the child, the glossy photos with family and fonts, the perfect hopefulness of initiating a child of God into the family of faith.  We often skim over the second reality.  We will hear right at the beginning of the baptism some questions for the family about renouncing Satan, evil powers of the world, and sinful desires.  I often joke with the family how inappropriate talking about evil seems at a child’s baptism until you remember those painful sleepless nights of new parenting.  But the reason we talk about that second reality is because we are initiating someone into the life of faith, and for those of us who have been at the life of faith for a while, we know the life of faith is not all roses, glossy photos, and cake.  There will be real struggles.

And that is why I love that we start off Melody’s journey with a story about Joseph.  We are told Joseph is a righteous man.  He is devoted to God and lives an ethical life.  He represents reality number one of baptism.  But then, Joseph is presented with reality number two.  When he learns Mary is pregnant before their marriage is consummated, he has three options:  the harsh one would be to have her publicly held responsible, most likely by stoning; the generous one he plans to choose of quietly divorcing her, which saves her life, but will leave her in poverty with child in tow; or the unheard of third one, especially for a righteous man, of marrying her anyway and living forever in scandal.  As one scholar explains, “In choosing Joseph to be Jesus’s earthly father, God leads a righteous man with an impeccable reputation straight into doubt, shame, scandal, and controversy…[God] requires Joseph to embrace a mess he has not created, to love a woman whose story he doesn’t understand, to protect a baby he didn’t father, to accept an heir who is not his son.  In other words, God’s messy plan of salvation requires Joseph – a quiet, cautious, status quo kind of guy – to choose precisely what he fears and dreads the most.  The fraught, the complicated, the suspicious, and the inexplicable.”[i]

I would much rather Melody start her faith journey off with a story that lets her know, honestly and unequivocally, how messy this journey will be.  We have a hint of that messiness in Matthew’s gospel from the beginning.  In the verses before what we heard today, is a long list of Joseph’s forefathers: from Abraham, who almost kills his son Ishmael and twice risks the life and safety of his wife Sarah, to Jacob, the trickster who steals his inheritance and livelihood twice, to David, who steals another man’s wife and has her husband murdered, to Tamar, who pretends to be a sex worker, and Rahab who is one.  The genealogy of Christ is a “long line of broken, imperfect, dishonorable, and scandalous people.”  As Debie Thomas explains, “The perfect backdrop, I suppose, for God’s relentless work of restoration, healing, and hope.”[ii]

That’s what telling Joseph’s story does for Melody and all of us today.  Joseph reminds us that our faith journey will be messy.  Our faith journey will not take us where we think our journey will.  Our faith journey will invite us to love people we never thought we could.  Our faith journey will sometimes seem meaningless or small, like that Joseph’s chapel in the Holy Land.  But as the angel tells Joseph, so the angel of the Lord tells us today, “Do not be afraid.”  Do not be afraid of the messiness of this journey.  Do not be afraid of going where society may deem too messy.  Do not be afraid to love with abandon, even if your loving is not seen by the crowds, or recognized all over the world.  When we come out of the waters of baptism, we walk right into the mess – because the mess of the world is where God is.  And we want to be there too.  Amen.

[i] Debie Thomas, Into the Mess & Other Jesus Stories:  Reflections on the Life of Christ (Eugene, OR:  Cascade Books, 2022), 12.

[ii] Thomas, 13.

Sermon – Isaiah 58.9b-14, P16, YC, August 21, 2022

05 Wednesday Oct 2022

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Last night, we baptized Becky Breshears in the waters of the Chickahominy River.  When most of us think of baptism, we imagine the baptism of an infant or child, someone for whom godparents make promises to raise in the life of the faith, much like we did with baby Olivia a few weeks ago.  The sacrament of baptism for a child is certainly considered being fully initiated into the family of Christ, but we make pronouncements and promises on behalf of the baptized.  And as the baptized grows up, we continue to shepherd and guide her, answer her questions, and help her claim her faith as her own.  There is an endearing, almost romantic, notion to baptism, full of idealism and hope. 

At least, that seems to be true in Episcopal Churches, where we quite primly and gently pour water from beautiful fonts over the heads of babies – the messiest part being if the water accidently runs into the baby’s eyes.  Of course, adult baptism is totally normal in our tradition too, we just do not do adult baptism as frequently.  When we do adult baptism, we become much more like other denominations, who have always understood baptism to be a mature proclamation of one’s own faith.  In some ways an adult baptism is more exciting because an adult baptism is not about something we hope and pray will develop into a faithful life, but adult baptism is the fully developed proclamation now – a set of pronouncements and promises on one’s own behalf.  An adult baptism is bold, dramatic, and, especially in instances like last night, much messier!

But adult baptism, especially in the Episcopal Church, are not about proclaiming one has her faith life all figured out – that she has some sense of earned clarity and certainty that has led her to baptism, as if baptism is the end of a journey of discernment.  Quite the opposite; baptism is a beginning for Episcopalians.  The baptized does not proclaim she knows all there is to know about faith and salvation.  Instead, the baptized claims that she is starting a new journey with Jesus, with a community of faith who walks with her.  And part of the act of baptism is giving the newly baptized tools to walk that journey.

That’s why I love the lesson from Isaiah today.  Instead of scripture capturing a moment (like a baptism), scripture today tells us what the baptized journey will be like.  Isaiah describes five things that are critical to the life of baptism.  First, the faithful will “remove the yoke from among you” – or in modern language, be an agent of economic liberation for the oppressed, not taking advantage of others.  Second, the faithful will refrain from “pointing the finger,” or take responsibility for one’s own actions, not accusing others but acting to change the self.  Third, the faithful will “refrain from speaking evil,” because “speech, when it is careless or deceitful, can be destructive and injurious.”[i]  Our words have power and are to be used for good.  Fourth, the faithful are to “offer food to the hungry.”  The life of the faithful is a life of self-sacrifice and sharing what we have learned to call our own.  And finally, we are to “satisfy the needs of the afflicted” – not just helping others or solving their problems but letting the disadvantaged “define their own needs and letting them set the criteria for deciding whether our help is effective.”[ii]

What the prophet Isaiah tells us is that as the faithful, we structure our lives differently than the secular, self-interested world might have us live.  That includes honoring even the sabbath – this holy day, not as just a day to go to church (though I hope you all will regularly – either in person or online), but also to be a day of honoring God through letting go of the self and focusing on the Lord and on the cares of those in need.   That’s why in our gospel lesson Jesus’ actions of healing others on the sabbath is so controversial – because Jesus reminds us the sabbath is a day of selflessness, healing, and giving glory to God.

Last night, Becky committed herself to that life, and we, as fellow baptized recommit ourselves this very day, to a life lived differently – a life lived in the light of Christ.  The prophet Isaiah tells us that when we live faithful lives, our light shall rise in the darkness, the Lord will guide us continually, will satisfy our needs in parched places, make our bones strong, and we shall be like a watered garden – a spring – whose waters never fail.  We shall be repairers of the breach, restorers of the streets to live in. 

Earlier I used the language of self-sacrifice.  What the Holy Spirit does in baptism and what the Church tries to continue to do on every sabbath is relocate the self from the center of our universe and place us firmly within a community of faith who cares for one another while placing God in the center of our universe.  When we take that step in baptism or renew the step our parents took for us, and in gathering in weekly worship (whether gathering in person or gathering virtually), we commit not to having this faith thing figured out – but just that we want to live a life where our parched places are always quenched through the living waters of baptism, and where our lives become bigger than they have ever been – where our lives shine the light of Christ in the darkness.  Amen.

[i] Jon L. Berquist, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. C, Vol. 3, Supplement for P16 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 4.

[ii] Berquist, 4.

Sermon – John 13.31-35, Acts 11.1-18, E5, YC, May 15, 2022

25 Wednesday May 2022

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Every three years, the entire Episcopal Church gathers for what is called General Convention.  Eight lay and ordained people from every diocese in the Episcopal Church and all the bishops gather in two houses to pass legislation that will govern the whole of the church.  Issues range widely, from authorizing new liturgies, to promoting social justice issues, to human resources issues for clergy and lay staff, to who will guide and govern the church.  One topic that is coming around again this year is whether the Episcopal Church should remove the baptism requirement for the reception of Holy Eucharist.  Even though practices range pretty widely, technically the canons of the Episcopal Church reserve communion for those who have been baptized.  The issue is highly contested, has been written about widely, and I could spend a whole hour teaching on this topic.  At the heart of the debate are issues of belonging, identity, hospitality, and evangelism.

 As I have watched some of the initial debate heat up in the Episcopal Church, I marvel at how, as much as the Church has changed over the years, much remains the same.  After Jesus’ ascension, and as the disciples and apostles began to spread the Good News far and wide, Peter and the other disciples begin to debate the issue of membership – whether uncircumcised Gentiles could become full members of the body of Christ without being circumcised.  In our reading from the Acts of the Apostles, we hear the story of how the apostles call Peter in and question his fellowship with uncircumcised Gentiles.  Peter launches into a story about a vision he had and what God said to him about “membership” in the body of Christ.  After hearing Peter’s testimony, there is silence.  The weight of such a change hovers in the silence – issues of belonging, identity, hospitality, and evangelism hanging in the air.

So much about this story today is human.  Time and time again, from the beginning of time, we have debated who is in and who is out.  There are benign ways and malicious ways of defining those boundaries, but ultimately those boundaries help us know who we are so we understand who we are not.  We agree to a set of behaviors and activities every time we reaffirm our baptisms.  Clubs and civic groups have criteria for admitting members.  Colleges have criteria for who can be a student, and what can get you expelled.  Even retirement communities have rules about what age you can be before you can move into the community.  But the malicious ones are trickier.  Redlining is a practice that has kept people of certain races and ethnicities from owning homes in certain areas.  Women are unable to serve as ministers in certain faith traditions.  LGBTQ identifying individuals were denied the same spousal rights and parenting rights as straight individuals.  The question becomes how do we define who we are and what we are about without harming or maligning others?

Some have argued Jesus gives us the answer in John’s gospel today.  Jesus says, “I give you a new commandment, that you love one another.  Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.  By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”  The instructions sound simple enough.  Our Presiding Bishop preaches nothing but the gospel of love.  But the instruction to love one another so people will know we are disciples does not make the issue of membership simple.  I love my Jewish and Muslim brothers and sisters but that does not make them Christian any more than their love of me makes me Jewish or Muslim.  I remember in seminary an interfaith dialogue between our Episcopal Dean and a Muslim leader in the community.  When they were establishing the ground rules for the conversation, the Muslim leader said, “We both enter into this conversation with deep respect for one another.  But for either of us to say that we are not trying to recruit the other would be a lie.  Of course I want you to become a Muslim:  I would not be a good Muslim if I did not think being a Muslim was the right path.  The same is true for you.  If you are not trying to convert me, I would wonder about the ferocity of your faith.”

What the texts do today is invite us into a challenging space.  By telling us to love one another, Jesus is not telling us that love denies who we are.  Likewise, by the disciples arguing about who can be Christians and who cannot, and coming to a conclusion that the Holy Spirit is doing something new does not mean that the disciples are diminishing their identity or the identity of the community.  Peter does not water down the gospel.  He simply invites the disciples to reconsider who could ascribe to that gospel.  What these two texts do together is remind us that loving one another means both holding fast to the gospel, while trusting the Holy Spirit enlivens the gospel.  The two texts together remind us that loving one another means we can be both generous and orthodox.  The two texts together remind us that loving one another means we can say yes and no, and find a gracious gray area where love abides.  What Jesus simply asks is that in the silence of the question – the silence that stood between Peter and the disciples before they made a decision – we allow love to do love’s work, so that our discernment of the Spirit can flourish.  Amen.