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Sermon – Matthew 6.25-33, Thanksgiving, YB, November 22, 2012

23 Friday Nov 2012

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Today is one of those Norman Rockwell days.  We pull out old family recipes, we gather in the kitchen to cook and share in reminiscences.  We watch the Macy’s parade, hoping to sneak a glimpse at The Rockettes.  We map out which football games we will watch.  The table is set in festive ware, and the food is not only delicious, but also brings back the memories of so many other Thanksgiving meals.  We smile, laugh, and our hearts are full of gratitude.  This is the day that the Lord has made.

Or at least that is how we always fantasize Thanksgiving will look.  Instead, we have been scrambling around, making sure we have all the ingredients we need, trying to figure out what to serve to Cousin Sam’s vegan girlfriend.  We worry that Uncle Fred will be as rude and obnoxious as he always is, and whether the kids will get too impatient and cranky before the meal begins.  We worry that the turkey will be dry or that the recipe that we entrusted to our sister will not be as good as Grandma’s.  We struggle to find just the right outfit that is flattering enough for pictures, but comfortable enough for the full belly we will have after the meal.  And quite frankly, having finally mostly recovered from the Hurricane, we have barely had time to turn our thoughts to Thanksgiving, and our nerves are a little frazzled.

So as we rush into Church today, our minds full of to-do lists and worries of the day, what do we hear from Jesus?  “Do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear.  Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing?”  Jesus scolds those who are gathered for that very human experience of anxiety, implying that their worries are rooted in a lack of trust in the God who can just as easily care for birds and lilies as God can care for them.

I have always had a love-hate relationship with this passage.  I discovered this passage as a teen, and have returned to the passage time and again when I felt the waves of anxiety crashing over my head.  The passage is oddly comforting and frustrating at the same time.  The passage has a way of making me feel guilty about my anxiety – as though I should be ashamed of my worries and concerns.  I can almost hear the scolding tenor of Jesus, like a nagging mother.  But like most mothers who know best, the words are simultaneously comforting because I know that they are true at the deepest levels of my being.  I find comfort in these words because they force me out of the mire that is usually self-imposed, and turn my heart to where my heart belongs – to God.

Luckily, we are in good company.  Our modern consumerist society does not make us as different from those in Biblical times as we might think.  Clearly those following Jesus stressed as much as we do about putting food on the table and the latest clothing styles.  In fact, this fear is present throughout scripture.  How many times have we heard that command, “Fear not.”  “The order not to fear is perhaps not only the most reiterated in Scripture, but also the least obeyed.”[i]  What Jesus sees and why Jesus scolds is because Jesus knows that those anxieties pull us away from the work that God has given us to do.  When those doing God’s work get distracted by their worries and fears, they have little time or energy left to actually do God’s work.  This is what Jesus is trying to communicate – to redirect energy from that inner storm of worry, fear, and anxiety, to the productive work of God’s kingdom.  For, as Jesus explains, “Can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life?”  Worry pulls us inward – which is completely the opposite direction that the Church sends us after every Eucharist.

Today, instead of letting myself wallow in guilt or seeing Jesus as a scolding parent, I will think of Jesus as a great yoga instructor.  In yoga, one of the primary goals of the practice is to clear your mind.  Any good yoga instructor will admit that you cannot clear your mind by willing your mind to be clear.  Thoughts and distractions will continue to invade your practice.  The trick is to acknowledge the thought, and let the thought go, returning your focus to your practice.  Uncle Fred worrying you?  Release the fear from your body.  Perfect Thanksgiving meal weighing on you?  Let go of the anxiety from your mind.  Rowdy children and messy dishes stressing you out?  Free your heart to love without limit.  These are the words I imagine Jesus, the yoga instructor, offering us today.  Today is not really about any of those things anyway.  All of those things – food, loved ones, and rest – are gifts from God:  the same God that desires for you to do the work of seeking and serving Christ in others.  The rest is gravy!  Amen.

[i] Jason Byassee, “Theological Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. A, vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 406.

Thanksgiving…

22 Thursday Nov 2012

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Last night, I joined with the clergy and members of local synagogues, churches, temples, and a mosque to celebrate Thanksgiving.  I have been meeting with the Plainview-Old Bethpage Interfaith Clergy Council for about a year.  In that time, the Christian churches have shared Lenten and Holy Week offerings; the Rabbis and Cantors joined the Christian clergy to celebrate my installation as Rector at St. Margaret’s; and all of us have served side-by-side as we make sandwiches for our local soup kitchen.  But this worship service was the first time I have experienced a joint worship service in a language that would appeal to all of us.

I must admit, I was a little uncertain of whether the service would work.  Although our faith traditions share many core tenets, we as clergy are constantly learning about each other’s faiths and discovering significant cultural differences.  As we processed into the Lutheran church, and as I touched the baptismal water with a rabbi at my side, I was not sure whether we could make the service truly meaningful for all those gathered.

What I found, though, was that in worship, our similarities and our differences made our worship whole.  Our prayers and scripture readings centered my heart in thanksgiving.  Our coming together to praise God for our many blessings made me remember what this National holiday is actually about – at least for those of us who are persons of faith.  Thanksgiving for us is a day set aside to praise God from whom all blessings flow.  Thanksgiving is a day when, no matter what our faith, our prayers are focused on the adoration and praise of God.  Whether it was a cantor’s song, a mufti’s prayer, or a reformed pastor’s blessing, our worship last night was just the centering worship I needed in what has been a chaotic month.

Thank you, interfaith community of Plainview-Old Bethpage.  Thank you for turning my heart to deep thanksgiving, praise, and adoration of the God who sustains me.

A prayer from my tradition:
Accept, O Lord, our thanks and praise for all that you have done for us.  We thank you for the splendor of the whole creation, for the beauty of this world, for the wonder of life, and for the mystery of love.

We thank you for the blessing of family and friends, and for the loving care which surrounds us on every side.

We thank you for setting us at tasks which demand our best efforts, and for leading us to accomplishments which satisfy and delight us.

We thank you also for those disappointments and failures that lead us to acknowledge our dependence on you alone.

Above all, we thank you for your Son Jesus Christ; for the truth of his Word and the example of his life; for his steadfast obedience, by which he overcame temptation; for his dying, through which he overcame death; and for his rising to life again, in which we are raised to the life of your kingdom.

Grant us the gift of your Spirit, that we may know him and make him known; and through him, at all times and in all places, may give thanks to you in all things.  Amen.

-Book of Common Prayer, 836.

Sermon – 1 Samuel 1.4-20; 2.1-10, P28, YB, November 18, 2012

20 Tuesday Nov 2012

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I have been thinking a lot about prayer this week.  Prayer is one of those parts of my life that is always a struggle.  I have learned all sorts of methods of prayer over the years and have leaned on various methods when I needed certain kinds of guidance.  But there are times when I can tell that my prayer life has gotten off track.  One of the recurring questions that every spiritual director has asked me is, “Have you lifted this up to God in prayer?”  I always hate when that question comes up, because inevitably the answer is no.  I am the kind of person who will diligently work and struggle to figure something out or will bear pain alone for quite some time before the thought occurs to me to offer up my burden to God.

A video has been circulating on the internet lately called, “Coffee with Jesus.”  In the video, a man meets Jesus for coffee, which is his prayer time.  The video shows a two-minute montage of prayer requests, attempts to pray the Lord’s Prayer, and requests for superficial things, all the while with Jesus waiting patiently to speak.  When the man finally stops talking and takes a breath, Jesus leans forward to speak.  But before Jesus can start, the man cuts him off – closing his prayer with an abrupt “amen,” and running out of the coffee shop for his next appointment.[i]  The video of this man’s superficial, wandering, disjointed prayer that makes no space for listening to God is both funny and painfully uncomfortable.  The truth is that many of us resist deep, abiding prayer that is vulnerable and that cedes control to God.  Only when we hit rock bottom do we finally come to God in authentic and meaningful prayer.

As we read Hannah’s story today, I wonder if Hannah did not have the same problem with God.  Hannah is barren.  Now if you remember, in biblical times, barrenness is a condition that excludes women from community.  By not producing a child, not only is the woman seen as less than others, there are often accusations made about her sinfulness:  barrenness was believed a form of divine punishment.[ii]  So Hannah is cut off from society.  Then Hannah has the great misfortune to have Peninnah as a co-wife.  Now, co-wives were a given at that time, but this co-wife was the worst.  As if Hannah’s shame and sadness were not enough, Peninnah taunts Hannah about her barrenness.  Perhaps Peninnah treats Hannah horribly because she is jealous of her husband’s love for Hannah, but nothing excuses Peninnah’s behavior.  Peninnah, mother of many children, flaunts her fertility in the cruelest way.  Hannah’s husband, Elkanah, is not much better.  He certainly tries to care for Hannah – he gives her a double portion for sacrifices, and he deeply desires to personally fill the void created from a lack of children.  But Elkanah’s way of supporting Hannah only shows that he does not fully understand the experience of barrenness.[iii]  And as if all of this was not enough, even Eli, the priest, is equally unsupportive.  Eli sees her silent prayers in the temple, and he accuses her of drunkenness.  With everyone in her life against her, we hardly have to imagine how Hannah ends up in the temple, deeply distressed and weeping bitterly.

What I wonder though is why Hannah takes so long to go to God.  We do not hear of Hannah going earlier in life to God about her barrenness.  We do not hear about Hannah going to God about Peninnah before years of taunting accumulate.  We do not hear about Hannah going to God about her marriage.  Instead she copes with tears and refusing to eat.  I can almost imagine the spiritual director asking, “Have you taken any of this to God?”  Hannah has to become completely overwhelmed before she finally cedes her utter devastation to God.  Only when the burden is so overwhelming that she can no longer muscle the burden herself does she finally go to God.

We all follow the pattern of Hannah at some point in our lives.  We have some strange notion of being so in control of our lives that we should only burden God once things have gotten out of control.  We have all spent our prayer time without being truly, nakedly vulnerable with God.  We refuse to cede control to God even when only the two of us are in the room.  We are so stubborn with God – so guarded, so non-trusting, and so territorial.  I am reminded of that ol’ time hymn, “What a friend we have in Jesus.”  The hymn is all about our prayer life, but one line in particular says, “O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, All because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.”

Luckily God shows us all what can happen when we finally take everything to God.  Hannah finally breaks down and gives her pain to God.  She comes to God with the raw reality of pain.  She is not afraid of what others will think of her prayers, even if they assume she is drunk.  Hannah’s willingness to come before God, to give everything to God out of her utter isolation, results in the birth of Samuel.  Samuel not only relieves Hannah’s burden, Samuel is a gift back to God, and a gift for the entire people of Israel.  God’s blessing for Hannah is not just the fulfillment of a bargain.  God acts through Hannah to offer promise for all God’s people.  In fact, through Samuel, Israel’s first king, Saul, will be appointed.  Israel will become great, and their great king, David will rise from a lowly shepherd boy to become their leader.[iv]

We understand the enormity of this action when we hear Hannah’s song that we read today in lieu of a psalm.  Hannah’s song is only partially about her own personal victory.  Hannah’s song is about the victory of God in the face of uncertainty.  Hannah’s song illustrates how God acts in a way that totally upends the entire social order.  “He raises up the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap, to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor,” proclaims Hannah.  Samuel’s birth is not just for Hannah; Samuel’s birth is a promise for the entire people of God.  We see in Hannah’s experience in prayer that when we finally do give everything to God in prayer, God’s response can be more immense than we could ever ask for or imagine.

Hannah’s story gives us several gifts this morning.  First, Hannah reminds us of the joys of a rich prayer life with God.  Hannah’s prayer life is not perfect, and neither will ours be, but when we dare to be fully vulnerable with God in prayer, Hannah shows us the abundant blessings that await.  Second, Hannah reminds us that God responds to us.  We may not hear a booming voice from above that tells us the right thing to do or we may not receive an email confirmation that our request has been received, but God does respond to us in tangible ways.  The answer may not be what we want to hear, but God will respond to us in a way that offers us comfort.  Finally, Hannah reminds us of the dramatic ways that God is acting in the world around us, even when those needs are the furthest from our minds.  Hannah did not ask God to subvert the social order, but in God’s action to restore Hannah to fertility, God manages to do so much more by restoring all the people of God through the birth of Samuel.[v]  Our invitation today is to follow Hannah’s lead, to let down our guard with God, and to marvel at the wonderful deeds that God has done.  Amen.

[ii] Frank M. Yamada, “Exegetical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 291.

[iii] Martin B. Copenhaver, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 292.

[iv] Kate Foster Connors, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 298.

[v] Connors, 298.

Prayer…

14 Wednesday Nov 2012

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Save me, O God, *
for the waters have risen up to my neck.

I am sinking in deep mire, *
and there is no firm ground for my feet.

I have come into deep waters, *
and the torrent washes over me.

I have grown weary with my crying; my throat is inflamed; *
my eyes have failed from looking for my God.

One of the things that got disrupted when we lost power for a week was my morning routine of praying Morning Prayer in the Church once my husband is off to work and my daughter is off to school.  Before I let myself get overwhelmed with the day’s tasks, I try to center my day with Morning Prayer.  Part of what I love about Morning Prayer is that it keeps the scriptures actively in my prayer life.  From time to time, a text that I would never have picked out myself jumps out at me with vital meaning for the day.

That happened last week when I was finally able to get back to some semblance of normalcy after the Hurricane and Nor’easter.  Psalm 69 was the assigned psalm, and before I could even get past verse one, I was overwhelmed with the images of the past two weeks:  destructive waters covering homes and businesses; the waves of water sweeping away children; the tears as homes burned to the ground.  Scripture, and especially the psalms, does not often literally describe what is happening in modern times.  But on this day, in this time, this psalm seemed to be an ode to those of us recovering from Hurricane Sandy.

But the psalm also beautifully did what psalms always do – metaphorically capture the struggles and joys that we face.  As I prayed this psalm, the waters became the anxieties that were up to my neck.  The mire was the mess of emotions left behind as life did not return to normal.  The deep waters were the struggles that seemed insurmountable, whose torrents kept pushing us under.

“In your great mercy, O God, *
 answer me with your unfailing help.

Save me from the mire; do not let me sink; *
 let me be rescued from those who hate me and out of the deep waters.

Let not the torrent of waters wash over me, neither let the deep swallow me up; *
do not let the Pit shut its mouth upon me.

Answer me, O LORD, for your love is kind; *
in your great compassion, turn to me.”

And like any good psalm, in addition to venting my pain, the psalm invited me to turn to God, giving words to my prayer.  But the prayer was not just my prayer.  The prayer was a prayer for all of us.  For parishioners still without power, for parishioners facing the cost of cleanup, for neighbors not so far from us who lost everything.  The words not only offered a tender request to God, they also offered the urgency that I felt in the depths of my heart.  I am so grateful for Holy Scripture in times like these – in times when the people of God have been there before and who give me permission to be fully human and vulnerable with God.

Sermon – Ruth 3.1-5; 4.13-17, Mk. 12.38-44, P27, YB, November 11, 2012

12 Monday Nov 2012

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This week, once our power was finally restored, Simone and I caught an episode of our favorite show, Sesame Street.  Typically I am running around the house getting us ready for school and work during Sesame Street, but this week, I found myself glued to the television.  In this particular episode, Sesame Street experienced a hurricane, and Big Bird’s home was destroyed.  All the neighbors of Sesame Street came out to help Big Bird.  But Big Bird struggled with their help.  Although he appreciated all their hard work, he was so fraught with sadness and despair that he could hardly focus on their generosity.  Although they put him up for the night, their houses were not the same as his.  Although they fed him meals, the food was not quite as he would want.  You could tell that he appreciated their efforts, but what he truly missed was his independence.  He did not like depending on others, especially because their care took him out of his comfort zone.

To be honest, I almost could not watch the episode.  The story was a little too close to home.  We have all been struggling with the battle between independence and dependence these last two weeks.  We have been dependent on the generosity of our neighbors and friends who have given us breaks from the cold, a space to recharge our electronics, a warm meal, or a place to clean laundry.  We have been dependent of the workers of LIPA and electrical workers from around the country to help us get our electricity restored.  We have been dependent on the availability of gasoline for transportation and for the few of us with generators.  Almost all of us have experienced episodes of dependence over the last two weeks, and we do not like it!  Receiving help feels awkward, throwing off the balance of power that we have with others.  We do not like the lack of control that dependence creates.  In fact some of us have stayed in cold homes, avoiding shelters or the offers of friends and neighbors just because we want some modicum of control over our disrupted lives.

With this internal struggle with dependence, our lectionary lessons today then are almost salt in our wounds.  First we hear from the concluding chapters of Ruth.  Ruth is often seen as one of the most independent, strong-willed women in scripture.  But in the portion of text we hear today, we hear the other reality of Ruth’s life – Ruth’s life is marked by dependence.  Ruth is dependent upon Naomi, who conceives of a plan to save them both; she is dependent upon Boaz, who can support her and sustain her; and she is dependent upon the community, who understands the roles of women and community in very different ways than we do in modern America.  In some ways, Ruth goes from being the central woman of fierce independence, to the dependent wife, mother, and daughter-in-law who fades into the life of the community.

Then we get the widow in our gospel lesson today.  Here is a woman, who barely has anything, who, as a widow, is inherently dependent upon others for support, and who is found putting the two final coins in her possession in the treasury.  Jesus praises her because she gives not out of her abundance like the others, but because she recognizes her total dependence upon God, and freely gives away everything.  The lesson we hear from Jesus today about this woman is that we are to be “dependent on nothing but the grace of God.  We are to be people without any resources except the riches of God’s mercy.”[i]

And this is where we all get more than a little bit uncomfortable with Jesus’ words and Ruth’s actions.  We replay these past two weeks and worry that if we cannot get comfortable depending on our neighbors, how are we ever to get comfortable with depending fully on God?  Or our practical brains kick in and we immediately begin to argue with God.  How are we supposed to function on our own without a penny to our name?  Are we just supposed to walk away from everything, standing on the street, saying, “Okay God, I am dependent upon you.  Take care of me.”  In our independent American culture, the idea of dependence is uncomfortable and almost feels impossible to us.

For guidance, I go back to our lessons.  First, I listen again to Ruth.  Instead of imagining Ruth as the woman oppressed by a patriarchal system, I like to imagine the joy that comes from Ruth’s life – the joy that is found when an entire community comes together for the sake of survival.  When Obed is born, everyone rejoices, everyone wins.  Maybe Ruth is not a liberated, independent woman – but are any of us truly so liberated that we do not need others in our lives?  Ruth chooses dependence – she willingly chooses dependence because she trusts that God will make everything right.  In fact, her independent self chooses dependence throughout her blessed story.

Next, I look back at the widow.  She irrationally gives everything to God – her very last pennies.  But we should be honest.  When all you have are pennies left, those little coins are not going to dramatically change your life anyway.[ii]  Her utter poverty and dependence upon others who care for widows allow her to see what the wealthy cannot – that everything belongs to God anyway.  What she teaches us is not to feel guilty or irrational about wealth and giving, but to realize that we will have to choose dependence upon God – because dependence never comes naturally.

When I worked at Habitat, I remember having a conversation with the financial consultant to our homeowner families.  In looking at one homeowner’s budget, she saw that the homeowner was giving about ten percent of her income to her Church.  The consultant was frustrated, because she knew that all that giving to the Church was hurting the homeowner’s children.  But the homeowner would not budge on the issue.  The homeowner insisted they would just have to find another way to balance the budget, because God was getting that ten percent.

The truth is that our lessons are not condemning wealth or independence.  What the lessons are trying to teach us is that both wealth and our own egos can trick us into thinking that we can truly be independent.  They can trick us into thinking that we do not really need God.  That is why the Stewardship Committee and I have been talking about our relationship with money this past month.  We have not been talking about money because we need to bring in enough to pay the bills, or because we want us to feel guilty about our wealth.  We have been talking about money because we want us all to see how our relationship with money can impact our relationship with God.  When we cling to our money or our independence so tightly that we blind ourselves to the blessings that can bubble out of letting go of those things, we miss out on opportunities for the Holy Spirit to work on us, to help us see through the lens of Christ.  Although some may connect dependence with oppression and depression, Ruth and Jesus show us that our dependence on God leads to joy and thanksgiving.[iii]

As I think back on these past two weeks, I will also remember the blessings.  I will remember how a hot bowl of soup or a warm pot of spaghetti warmed not only my insides, but also warmed my spirits.  I will remember the camaraderie of people gathered at the public library, charging electronics and helping kids blow off steam.  I will remember the ways in which our mutual dependence led to conversations with people that normally would have been superficial but were now full of meaning and shared support.  I will remember the great comfort of sharing an impromptu coffee hour with those of us who could spare the gasoline to get here last week, and how overjoyed I was just to see your faces and hear your stories.  If anything, this horrible storm has shown how we are more dependent than we all might like, but also how that dependence has led to incredible blessings.  Our invitation today is to embrace our dependence on God in the same way that we are embracing our dependence on one another.  Amen.

[i] Mary W. Anderson, “Widow’s Walk,” Christian Century, vol. 20, no. 22, Nov. 1, 2003, 18.

[ii] Anderson, 18.

[iii] Anderson, 18.

Sermon – Job 42.1-6, 10-17, P25, YB, October 28, 2012

28 Sunday Oct 2012

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After a month of reading through the book of Job on Sundays, you would think today would feel victorious.  Finally, Job is rewarded for all his suffering!  The text tells us that God restores the fortunes of Job and gives Job twice as much as he had before.  Family members return to greet him and shower him with gifts, and he is blessed with ten new children.  For any of us who have been through a time of suffering, this should feel like great news.

But this week, as I have been praying on this text, I cannot shake the hollow feeling of this good news today.  Sure, Job has ten new children, but they can never erase the memory of the ten children he lost.  Sure, all his wealth is returned, but after losing everything, having his friends and family abandon and blame him, and sitting covered in boils, surely wealth had lost its value and importance to Job.  The good news of this text has left me feeling hollow because I just cannot imagine how Job lives into this good news.  How can he conceive children with his wife who mocked him and God, risk loving again, and know that his children will never know the reality of the suffering he experienced.  And his family and friends who return with gifts – where were they when he needed them?

I struggle too because we do not really get answers today from Job or God.  We never really find out why God allows Job’s blessings to be taken away.  The only semblance of an answer happened last week when God railed against Job for assuming that Job could understand the ways of God.  But an answer does not come in the blessings either.  The last verses of the book of Job do not “say that God restored Job’s fortunes and relationships in response to Job’s words of repentance and humility.  Instead, God’s reasons for giving things to Job are as unexplained as the reasons they were taken away.  God does not explain suffering, but God does not explain beatitude either.”[i]  We are left at the end of a month of Job no clearer about suffering and blessing than we were when we started.

Maybe this ending to Job feels hollow to me now because I have seen and experienced too much of Job’s journey.  I have held in prayer friends, family, and parishioners who have sat in the ashes of suffering with neither of us finding satisfactory answers.  I have listened to St. Margaret’s stories of pain and suffering that happened in the years before my arrival.  And I have had more friends than I wish to count who have lost a child in pregnancy.  Many of us here have lost teen or adult children.  Having journeyed with friends, I know that you can never replace those children.

I think also the ending of Job feels hollow to me because the ending does not address Job’s relationship with God.  God and Job have been on incredible journey.  Job moves in the book from talking about God with his friends to talking more and more directly to God.  What was once a theological concept is now an intimate relationship.  Job manages throughout the journey to hold on to “God with one hand and shake his fist at God with the other.  He stays in relationship with God, addressing God directly even from the depths of despair.”[ii]  But the ending of Job does not really give us a clue about what that relationship looks like going forward.  Are they back to square one?  Does Job go back to being blessed and on good terms with God?  Now that his blessing is doubled, does God slip back into the background, unnecessary or at least not thought about too much?

As I have struggled with this text, I finally began to find footing in the small details of the text today.  The first details are in Job’s confession at the beginning of the lesson.  Job confesses that his relationship with God has changed.  Job says, “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you.”  In other words, Job declares that he had heard about God, but now he knows God.  This journey of suffering and pain changes Job’s experience of God – from being a relationship of dutiful obedience and distant reverence, to a deep intimacy and knowledge.  He no longer simply knows God cognitively; Job knows God in the depths of his being.  As Job experiences utter devastation, loss, abandonment, and pain; as Job rages at God in anger and fury; as Job moans through his misery – Job never pushes God away.  Through some forty chapters of pain, Job manages to grow into deeper love of God.

The other small detail in Job where I find footing today comes in how he orders his life in the midst of his restored fortunes.  Job does not tell his family and friends – the abandoners – to go away, holding a grudge against them that can never be healed.  Instead, he receives their gifts without protest.  Job does not live a guarded life.  Instead, he risks new life with his wife which results in the birth of ten children.  And Job does not return to the same old way of doing things.  Instead he gives his daughters an inheritance just like his sons.  That may not sound like a big deal by modern standards, but giving an inheritance to his daughters is a huge deal.  This act by Job is a radical and innovate way of extending his own transformation by transforming the social order for his daughters.[iii]  The way that Job orders his life during his restored fortunes says a lot about how this ordeal has transformed him.

In the midst of what can feel like a hollow ending, we two can find hope for our own spiritual journey.  We learn two things from Job.  First, our relationship with God is indeed a journey.  The experience of Job gives us permission to be angry with God, to question God, to be a fully and ignorantly limited human with God, and to humbly stand with God.  We can do all of this not as defeated individuals but as transformed individuals – so transformed, in fact, that we can be a people who endeavor to risk love.

The other thing that we learn from Job is to redefine our understanding of blessedness.  We never hear in the text about how Job feels about being doubly blessed.  I like to imagine that Job is sober about his second blessing, his experience of suffering coloring the blessing.  On Simone’s first day of school in Delaware, when I met her teacher, we both were shocked by the recognition.  Simone’s teacher was a Habitat homeowner who had gone through the program when I worked with Habitat for Humanity.  Here was a woman who had gotten into a situation of housing instability.  Her income was 25-50% of median income.  Her children were squeezed into one room at a friend’s house.  Their anxiety and stress had been overwhelming.  But she put in hundreds of hours of sweat equity, she built a home, and she stabilized her family.  Simone’s teacher could have gone back to school to find a higher-earning job.  But she stayed with this school, forming and shaping one- and two-year olds into loving, caring toddlers.  Simone’s teacher was one of the most amazing women I have ever met, and she transformed my daughter’s life at a formative time.  Simone’s teacher could have been distant, cut-off from extending love, or resentful for her time in poverty.  But instead, Simone’s teacher was full of life and love.

Job, like this teacher, learned that he could use his blessing to transform others.  Job invites us to also consider the ways that we can use our blessings to transform others – to become a blessing.  In our stewardship campaign this year, we have been talking about how we are blessed to be a blessing.  Job shows us the way of living into this life.  Yes, I want you to consider how you can be a financial blessing to St. Margaret’s.  But I also want you to see the great invitation of transforming your spirit into one of blessing.  We all have a laundry list of things that could make us bitter, guarded, or careful.  But Job and God invite us to instead live the blessed life that blesses others.  We are promised today that we can live into a blessing life through the example of Job – a man who had every reason to abandon hope, love, and God – but who instead is strengthened in God, renewed in hope, and overflowing with love.  We too can embrace Job’s embodiment of being a blessing in this life.  Amen.

[i] Martin B. Copenhaver, “Risking a Happy Ending,” Christian Century, vol. 111, no. 28, Oct. 12, 1994, 923.

[ii] Kathryn Schifferdecker, http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?tab=2&alt=1, as found on October 26, 2012.

[iii] Dale P. Andrews, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 199.

Blessed…

24 Wednesday Oct 2012

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As we journey into our stewardship season, we continue to reflect as a community about how we have been blessed.  This week, Fal Gibson offers a reflection on her own gratitude to God for the many blessings in her life.  I hope you will enjoy the blessing of Fal in her words as much as we enjoy the blessing of her presence every week!

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Beginning each day with “Thank you, God,” I set the tone for the entire day.  Whether I am going to work, or looking forward to a time of celebration with family or friends, starting today with an attitude of gratitude reminds me that God is the source of all blessings. I am thankful for blessings large and small, for expected and unexpected ones, and for the special people in my life.

I am blessed to be a part of St. Margaret’s church family, so I asked myself the question, what shall I return to the Lord for all his bounty to me?  I need to support my church financially. I offer with joy and thanksgiving what God has first given me – my family, time and possessions. “Giving is a privilege, something we appreciate being able to do as a result of God’s grace.” (2 Corinthians 8:4)

Our church cost money to operate and, thus depends on the contributions of our members to meet the expenses.  The expenses that come with our lovely St. Margaret’s church: utilities, maintenance, upkeep, our educational programs, materials and equipment, St. Margaret’s newsletters and mailings to members and/or others in the community. The Bible says that everyone is to give “according to means” (2 Corinthians 8: 3, 11).

I pray for all of God’s children and see each one being divinely blessed.  I pray for all members of St. Margaret’s Church and for the beauty, joy and wisdom we all share as being part of a beautiful church family. Everyone is a unique and purposeful creation. I pray that every member is blessed with love, food, shelter, and safety.  I pray that the Episcopal Church of St. Margaret, with its red, welcoming doors will continue to be an important part of your spiritual journey. “Giving is a witness to the gospel, demonstrating the genuineness of the church’s love,” (2 Corinthians 8: 8, 24).

During our Stewardship campaign, I ask you to take some time and pray about how you can use the blessings, you received from God to further HIS Kingdom.  I think as receptive Christians you will be moved by scripture and the spirit to go beyond providing such support to give up a further portion of your money as a sacrifice.  Support and sacrifice: the first is our duty; the second our delight. I knew a member of our parish, Miriam Emerson, who made it her duty to make sure that the children at the Lillian Valley School in Barefoot, Idaho received school supplies, and the seafarers through the Seamen Institute received knitted hats and scarves every year with great delight.  Miriam was indeed a blessings to the St. Margaret’s church family and many others, and I was truly blessed to have known her.

I like to say that stewardship puts into practice our faith in God as our Creator, our Redeemer, and our Sustainer. Everything we are and everything we have belongs to God.  Can you feel the Holy Spirit at St. Margaret?  Can you count your Blessings and name them, one by one?  I can.  I pledged.  Wouldn’t you pledge and help Rev. Jennifer do the work within our parish and the outer community as God has called her so lovingly to do?

~ Fal. Gibson

Blessed to be a Blessing…

17 Wednesday Oct 2012

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Blessed to be a blessing.  This is the theme that the stewardship team has adopted this year as we begin to reflect on the abundant blessings in our lives and discern how we might use those blessings to be a blessing to others.  I have had the great pleasure of working with six other parishioners from St. Margaret’s since this summer, and we have all been discerning how our relationship with God and money are connected.  We have debated and discussed whether and how our faithful financial stewardship impacts our relationship with God.  We have helped one another draw the connections between our relationship with money and our relationship with God.  This work is on-going among us, as we continue to pray through this issue as we discern our own pledges this year.  Some of us have already witnessed how sacrificial giving can be life giving.  Others of us wonder how our attitude toward money can impact our relationship with God.  And so we continue to pray – for our own discernment, for each other’s discernment, and for St. Margaret’s.  We know that St. Margaret’s has been a blessing to us, and so we both want to be a blessing to St. Margaret’s, and we want St. Margaret’s to be a blessing to our community.  We invite you into this circle of blessing!

To help you get a better idea of the content of the Stewardship Committee’s discernment, I invite you to read articles in The Message, our parish newsletter, found on our website; and for the next three weeks, to see guest blog posts from Committee members.  This week, Debbie McGee offers her reflections.

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Although the calendar tells me it is October, the lingering warm weather triggered happy memories of warm and sunny days spent beachside this summer.  The soft, cool breezes, the gentle lapping of the waves and long quiet walks upon the sand gave me pause to the presence of God and the beautiful world he blessed us with.

God blesses us with many gifts – abundantly – and does so without any strings attached.  It is up to us to choose to be good and faithful stewards – to express our gratitude for all God’s blessings.  As we enter into Stewardship season, it is an opportunity for all of us to praise God through whom all blessings flow.

Join me in being a faithful steward – be generous with your treasure!  I feel so very blessed by the beautiful environment that God has created for us that I want to be a blessing to St. Margaret’s.  It is important to me that St. Margaret’s parish continues to thrive and makes a difference in the lives of our local community and beyond, while still providing the spiritual home so many of us treasure.

All good gifts around us

Are sent from Heaven above…

So thank the Lord, oh thank the

Lord for all his love…….

I really wanna thank you Lord!

 (Stephen Schwartz Lyrics & Music)

-Debbie McGee

Sermon – Mark 10.17-31, P23, YB, October 14, 2012

15 Monday Oct 2012

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For those of you paying attention to the gospel lesson today and who realize we are kicking off Stewardship Season this week, I promise I did not pick the lessons today!  We are blessed by a lectionary that guides us through our sacred scripture every year, and the use of the lectionary is one of the many things that attracted me to the Episcopal Church.  That being said, since Jesus so conveniently brought up the subject of money, it only seems fitting that we talk about money today.

We know that the issue of money was important to Jesus.  All three of the synoptic gospels tell a version of the story we hear today.  We know the story well, and tend to avoid the story like the plague.  At some point or another, we have convinced ourselves that this text does not really apply to us.  We do not see ourselves as rich – we can all think of someone who has more than we do and we all struggle with our finances at times.  But in the depths of our hearts, we know that Jesus is talking to us.  As Americans, we constitute five percent of the world’s population, but consume twenty-four percent of the world’s energy.  Americans eat roughly 200 billion more calories a day than we need, which is enough to feed 80 million people every day.  We consume about 159 gallons of water a day, while more than half of the world’s population lives on 25 gallons.  We have more shopping malls than high schools.[i]  Whether we prefer to admit the truth or not, we are the rich person that today’s gospel lesson is addressing.  And if Jesus is talking to us, Jesus is also asking us to give up our wealth because otherwise, we, the camels, have no chance of getting through that needle’s eye.

But before we go too far down the road to guilt or panic, let’s look at what Jesus is really saying in our gospel lesson today.  This young man is a righteous man who approaches Jesus with a genuine desire to ensure he is on the right path to eternal life.  He approaches Jesus humbly, racing to Jesus and kneeling before him like so many other sick people have.[ii]  He must have been fairly certain that his life was not whole to pursue Jesus like this.  What he may not have expected is what Jesus tells him.  Jesus tells him that he is living a righteous life – with one small exception.  His wealth, his possessions, his “stuff” is getting in the way of salvation.  His possessions and wealth have become a source of separation from God.  This is what Jesus is really after today.  Having money is not in and of itself evil.  We need money to survive.  But our relationship with money has the potential to separate us from God.

Wealth can separate us from God in one of two ways.  When we have abundant resources, we eventually assume that whatever needs to be done, we can do.  But this kind of self-sufficiency and self-produced security cuts us off from grace.  Life becomes an achievement earned or a commodity purchased rather than a gift gratefully received and shared.  God becomes unnecessary or simply another commodity.  And if security and worth are rooted in achievements and resources, amassing more becomes our driving motivation.  We cannot let up.  We cannot relax.  We cannot give sacrificially.  Wealth becomes addictive.[iii]

The other way that wealth can separate us from God is that wealth can separate us from those who are impoverished.  Our wealth makes avoiding the poor possible, keeping them out of sight and mind.  As we have been working through our hunger curriculum on Wednesday nights, we have all said at one point or another that we simply do not run into the poor that often in our daily lives.  As one bishop explains, the reason why that socioeconomic divide separates us from God is because, “We cannot know the God of Jesus Christ apart from relationships with the poor and the powerless.  God has chosen the poor, the least, the most vulnerable, those whom the world considers ‘the weak’ as special friends.”[iv]  If we want to grow closer to God, we must grow closer to those whom Jesus cared for the most.  And in order to grow close to the poor, we must examine our relationship with our own wealth.

Now all of this is not to say that Jesus is mad at the wealthy man or sees him as lost.  Mark’s gospel tells us that, “Jesus, looking at him, loved him…”  Now if you remember, Mark is usually the most succinct of the gospel writers.  Neither Matthew nor Luke includes this small detail.  So if Mark is including this detail, the detail is important.[v]  We need to know that Jesus loves this young man because in his loving gaze we learn that Jesus believes the young man has a chance.  The young man has a chance not because he can achieve this new life style.  In fact, when the disciples ask Jesus about this very issue of who can overcome the hurdles of wealth, Jesus says, “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.”  The young man cannot change his relationship between wealth and God alone.  That relationship can only be changed with God – because with God, all things are possible.

Today we kick off our stewardship season at St. Margaret’s.  For the next several weeks, we will be examining our own relationship between wealth and God.  In order to help us with that discernment, the Stewardship Committee has chosen the theme, “Blessed to be a Blessing.”  We chose this theme because we do not want us to have a guilty or conflicted relationship with wealth.  We want to see our individual wealth as a blessing that enables each of us to be a blessing to others.  All of us at St. Margaret’s have been blessed.  We have our basic needs met – a place to live, food to eat, and clothes to wear.  Most of us have been blessed beyond our basic needs – with cars, entertainment, and technology.  And we have been blessed spiritually by this community.  We have a community of faith where we can come and seek a deeper knowledge and understanding of God.  We have a community that engages us in the faith journey, challenging us to grow into the love of God.  And we have a community that sends us out in the world, showing us the real meaning of God’s love through our service of others.

This stewardship season is not a season to wallow in guilt and beat up ourselves.  But this season is a season to act.  God blesses us so that we can be a blessing.  So where do we start this work of being a blessing?  We start that work by righting our relationship between God and our wealth – our blessings.  As you are pondering your own experience of that relationship, I want you to consider how your pledge this year might be a spiritual discipline that rights that relationship; how this community might help each other right our relationships with wealth and God together.  Now I know we do not like to talk about money with other people.  But if this is a place of spiritual discipline, prayer, teaching, formation for our children and adults, and reaching out and loving our neighbors, where else is a better place to talk honestly about our relationship with money.  This community is forming each of us to be faithful disciples; but we cannot be fully formed unless we are willing to work on our whole being, including our relationship with wealth.  Our discipline of giving more generously and sacrificially – more out of blessing than obligation – can help us to loosen our grip on a relationship with wealth that separates us from God.  Your financial giving to Church is as much of a discipline as your prayer, your study, your serving, your seeking, and your worshiping in this place.  If we can put energy in those areas, we can put some work into our financial stewardship.

In the coming weeks, you will hear from every member of the Stewardship Committee about their own struggles with wealth.  You will hear about how looking at their relationship with money and God is transforming that relationship into one of blessing.  You will see Message articles, blog posts, and updates on our new stewardship bulletin board.  This committee of seven people is intentionally looking at how they feel blessed to be a blessing, examining the quality of their own relationship between wealth and God.  Their invitation to us is to engage in this reflection with them, to discern how God is moving in our lives, and to act.  We can do this work together, because with God, all things are possible.  Amen.

[i] Frank Thomas, “Can Rich People Be Saved?” Ex Auditu, vol. 22, 2006, 219.

[ii] Barbara Rossing, “Healing Affluenza:  A Sermon on Mark 10:17-27,” Currents in Theology and Mission, vol. 22, no. 4, August 2006, 300.

[iii] Kenneth L. Carder, “The Perils of Riches,” Christian Century, vol. 114, no. 26, Sept. 24 – Oct. 1, 1997, 831.

[iv] Carder, 831.

[v] Stacey Elizabeth Simpson, “Who Can be Saved?” Christian Century, vol. 117, no. 26, Sept. 27 – Oct. 4, 2000, 951.

Let my prayer be counted as incense before you…

11 Thursday Oct 2012

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On of my new favorite places is the prayer candle station at St. Margaret’s.  I was first introduced to prayer candles at my field education parish in Alexandria, VA.  I always marveled at the beauty of the candles burning, but never understood the practice fully.  Then, a year and a half ago, I went on pilgrimage with my parish in Delaware.  A colleague shared with me her practice of lighting candles and praying for people throughout the pilgrimage, and I became an immediate convert.  I started carrying coins and small bills just so that I had something to put in the donation box at each church as I lit candles along the way.

So you can imagine my excitement when I discovered that St. Margaret’s had a prayer candle station.  I love those candles for so many reasons.  Sometimes my prayers or my silence in prayer just is not tangible enough.  Lighting a candle makes me feel like I am doing something.  But once the candle is lit, it does so much more.  Watching the flickering of the candle calms the “doer” in me.  The flame’s flicker makes my prayer feel active – as if the prayer is alive outside of my heart.  Sometimes just staring at the flame allows me to quite myself enough to listen to God.  The active flame allows my energy to be somewhere outside of me so that I can be thoroughly silent.  There is also great comfort in the way that the flame burns for hours after I leave.  Even though am not bodily present, my prayer lingers on without me.

But what I especially love about our prayer candles is that they are not just for me.  Parishioners use them all the time – remembering those who have died, worrying about the health of a loved one, or lifting up their own struggles to God.  Having just blessed several pets, I imagine there has been a candle or two for a beloved pet.  I see our young children lighting candles.  I do not know if they fully understand the practice, but I sense that they understand that something holy is happening when they light those candles.  We often have family members of those buried in our cemetery on Sundays, and they often light a candle.  My favorite, though, happens when I walk into the nave at night, when all the lights are out, as I am rushing to another meeting.  I catch in the corner of my eye that one or more candles are burning.  At those moments, in the darkness, I pray to God for whoever has lit the candle, knowing that I am witness to the sacred conversation between someone and God.

Last week we celebrated St. Francis, and as I prepared to preach about him, I discovered that he asked that Psalm 141 be read to him as he was dying.  Verse two of that psalm has been replaying in my head all week, “Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as an evening sacrifice.”  Sometimes, I think we assume our prayers are only a mental exercise – words we craft for God.  But our prayers involve all our senses – our hands that light candles, touching the flame to the wick; our eyes that watch the life of our prayers in the flame; our noses that smell the fragrance of incense lifted to God.  How is God inviting you into prayer this week?  What sensory practices feed your journey with Christ?