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Homily – Advent L&C, A1, YC, December 2, 2018

05 Wednesday Dec 2018

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This school year, our younger daughter’s preschool offers a weekly yoga class.  She has shown me all sorts of fun poses, but my favorite part is the yoga breathing she is learning.  The first time she showed me, I was so excited.  I have wanted to give my children the gift of cleansing breathing since they were born.  That same breathing had gotten me through each pregnancy in my prenatal yoga classes.  I knew how restorative that kind of breathing could be.  But I was not sure the practice would stick – I mean, how many mellow, breath-controlled preschoolers do you know?  So, imagine my surprise a few weeks ago, when my daughter was in the midst of an epic ramp up and all of a sudden, she stopped and said, “Wait!”  I froze, and watched her close her eyes, take in a deep breath, and slowly let the breath out.  “Do you want to do another one?” I tentatively asked, afraid to spoil the magical moment.  She closed her eyes again, drew in a slow breath, and let the breath back out.  She opened her eyes and smiled at me.  Temper tantrum and tension gone, a renewed, calmed child remained.

I do not know about you, but I find myself longing for the deep calming breaths that Advent can offer us too.  Normally, we as a country take a sacred moment at Thanksgiving, gathering with loved ones, sharing a meal, saying prayers of Thanksgiving.  But we only get the one day – sometimes only a half-day.  Because the retail industry wants us to forget about Thanksgiving, and jump right into Christmas shopping.  They lure us in with sales and deals, and they know we either need to occupy all those loved ones who came into town – or we need to escape them, and so we hit the pavement, get bombarded with Christmas tunes, see trees and towns already decorated, and our minds start to cloud with a huge, percolating to-do list.

But this year, with Thanksgiving earlier in November, we got an extra week – an extra Sunday that was not Advent 1, an extra week before we even entered December, and an extra week to breathe before the chaos really begins.  Our secular calendar seems to finally be in sync with our liturgical calendar – the calendar that tells us to use this season of Advent as a time, not of preparing the hearth, distributing the gifts, and attending the parties, but instead, preparing our hearts, distributing acts of grace, and attending the path leading to the Christ Child.  The secular calendar seems to be inviting us to do the same thing the liturgical calendar invites us to do – to take a breath, to ground ourselves, to breathe in some peace.

That is why we start Advent today with Lessons and Carols.  Lessons and Carols is a service different from other Sundays.  We do not introduce the lessons in the same way.  We hear more music.  We squeeze in moments of silence.  We do not receive the holy meal.  The church offers us this totally different service as a way of saying this season is totally different.  And then, the service walks us through all the ways this season is different.  This season is not just baby Jesus in a manger.  This season is remembering Adam and Eve’s sinfulness, remembering the promises God makes over and over to redeem God’s people, remembering the amazing, terrifying moment when a baby in a womb was the worst and best thing to ever happen, and then to remember that in the child we are anticipating, the kingdom of God comes near.  In order to even consider that grand, sweeping narrative, we have to let go of some things – let go of how we always do things so that we can be graced with the way God is doing things.

That is my hope for you this Advent season.  That you might take a cue from the extra week you just received from the secular calendar and use that week as your grounding for a calmer, more intentional, more life-giving, breathing season.  Breathe in the presence of our God, and breathe out the self-doubt, self-criticism, and self-pity.  Breathe in the coming of the Christ Child, and breathe out the busyness, consumerism, and forced good cheer.  Breathe in the calming, unifying Holy Spirit, and breathe out the sins, disrespect, hurtfulness of yesterday.  You might open your eyes and realize the gift of Advent is way better than any gift you will get this Christmas.  Amen.

Sermon – Isaiah 40.1-11, Mark 1.1-8, A2, YB, December 10, 2017

13 Wednesday Dec 2017

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This Advent, I have been sensing in myself a need to prepare for the Christ Child a little differently.  The busyness of life has me longing for a season of quiet reflection, of anti-consumerism, of less…well…busyness.  In some ways, the church has made accommodations for that desire.  The music in Advent is a bit more muted and quietly beautiful.  The offerings of yoga or even the Blue Christmas service make room for quiet meditation and reflection.  Even my Advent devotion this year of taking daily photos based on a provided word has forced me to look around more intentionally at life.  When I heard Isaiah’s words this week, “Prepare the way of the Lord,” my spirit had been hoping Isaiah’s preparation meant slowing down and creating an inner openness to the Holy Spirit.

Although I am sure Jesus would be all too happy to have me slow down a bit, my Advent longings may be a bit too passive for what Isaiah and John the Baptist are trying to accomplish.[i]  Of course, you can see where I may have gone astray.  Isaiah is speaking to a people in exile:  far from their homeland, oppressed by a foreign power, being forced to assume a foreign culture, God finally speaks a word of comfort to God’s people.  “Comfort, O Comfort my people,” says the Lord to Isaiah.  They are soothing words to a downtrodden people.  They are words of affection to an affection-starved nation.  They are healing words to a broken group of followers.  But those words of comfort are not followed by a cozy bed of meditation and contemplation.  Instead, those comforting words are followed by a call to action, “In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”  God is about to do a new thing, but in order to do that new thing, the people of God must prepare the way through repentance.  Now I know we usually reserve repentance talk for Lent, but in this season of preparing for a new thing – of preparing for the Christ Child – the prophet tells the people of God they need repentant hearts.

One of the courses of study for parish priests and counselors is called family systems.  The study of family systems looks at human behavior through the lens of behavior within families, looking at ways families handle conflict, how they engage one another, and how they solve problems.  Patterns we learn in our families are taken into other systems.  One of the main lessons we learn from family systems is that you cannot change the behavior of others; you can only change your own behavior.  But changing your own behavior is not as easy as the change sounds.  Any of us who saw our mother behave like her mother, only to one day see that same behavior in ourselves realizes how hard changing our patterns can be.

When we talk about repentance, that is the kind of deep change we are talking about.  Repentance is not wallowing in guilt, feeling badly about something we said or did (or keep saying or doing).  Repentance is acknowledging our sinfulness and working to change our behavior.  The word “repent,” actually means to turn around; to turn away from sinful behavior and walk another way.  So when John the Baptist recalls Isaiah’s words, saying, “Prepare the way of the Lord,” he’s not saying, unpack your creches, put up the greens, and buy some presents.  Prepare the way of the Lord means making sure your heart is ready for the coming of the Christ Child – a feat you cannot accomplish if your heart is heavy with sin and regret.[ii]

Now do not get me wrong – I have pulled down the boxes of Christmas decorations, hung a wreath, and have purchased some gifts.  Those are honored traditions that bring us great joy, and I believe God wants us to be a people of joy.  But I suspect that if your heart is heavy-laden with the sins of life, or if you are so busy with the busyness of life that you have disconnected from God, your joy this year at the arrival of the Holy Child will not be as deep as your joy could be.

I have met many a church member who loathes the season of Lent for the focus on repentance.  I am sure they would be cringing today by the ways I am squashing Advent too.  But here is the reason why we have to talk about repentance today.  The gospel lesson we read from Mark contains the very first eight verses of Mark.  Mark introduces his gospel with these words, “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”  The reason John the Baptist is so excited, and is quoting Isaiah in our text today is that he knows what is coming is good news.  And so, when John quotes Isaiah with the words, “Prepare the way of the Lord,” he really means two things.  First, he means do the active work of preparing your heart for the Lord.  Not just the awesome, touchy-feely stuff of centering yourself or finding a quiet space, but the hard stuff of repentance.  And second, John means do the work of sharing the good news.  The work of Advent and the joy of Christmas is not just for us.  When your heart is bursting on Christmas Eve with joy because you did the tough work or repenting and returning to the Lord, don’t you want someone with which to share your joy?   One of the ways we prepare the way of the Lord is to share the good news of God in Christ with others.[iii]

Now I know what you are going to say, “Here she goes again, talking about inviting people to church.”  Or maybe you are thinking, “Yeah, but people who come on Christmas Eve usually only come once a year, so why bother?”  The good news about spreading the good news is that you are likely going to spread that good news in spite of yourself.  You see, when we do the work of repentance, of changing our hearts, minds, and hands to doing the work of God, a renewed spirit is kindled in us, and a deep joy burns in us.  The work of repentance creates in us a clean heart, and renews a right spirit within us.  And when we feel the love of God overwhelming us, we cannot help but let slip to our neighbor, “I know you have a church home, but I just want to share how awesome my experience at church has been lately.  If you ever want to come with me, I would be happy to bring you.”  Or when your friend is expressing his deep sadness and sense of loneliness, you find yourself saying, “I have been there.  But I have to tell you, every time I leave church, something about my encounter with God and community makes me feel less alone.”  Or when a stranger is ranting about how awful the church and Christians have been lately (which, we know some awful things are happening in the name of Christ lately), you find yourself saying, “I totally agree.  That is why I love my church so much – because they show me another way of witnessing to Christ.  I would love to show you sometime!”

I realize you may have been hoping for a word of comfort and permission to quietly prepare your heart for the Christ Child today.  Lord knows I have been longing for that this week too.  But turning my busyness into purposeful preparation:  for repentance and sharing the good news sounds much more fulfilling and life-giving.  The coming of the Christ Child, the fulfillment of the prophecy of Isaiah, is a life-altering event.  Today, the church prepares us for not arriving at the manger with check-lists done, gifts in hand, and arms full of stuff.  Instead, the church prepares us for arrive at the manger with open arms, free of the burdens that are weighing our spirits down, surrounded by others who have similarly prepared, and those who heard a good word from you, and wanted to drop their baggage at the manger too.  Come, prepare the way of the Lord.  Amen.

[i] Karoline Lewis, “Wilderness Preaching,” December 3, 2017, as found at http://www.workingpreacher.org/craft.aspx?post=5018 on December 6, 2017.

[ii] Martin B. Copenhaver, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, Vol. 1 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 47.

[iii] Richard F. Ward, “Homiletical Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, Vol. 1 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 31.

On Repentance, Joy, and Journey…

06 Wednesday Dec 2017

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Photo by Jennifer Andrews-Weckerly

One of the long-standing debates among clergy and scholars is whether or not Advent is a penitential season or not – a mini-Lent, if you will.[i]  There are arguments both ways, some saying absolutely yes; to prepare our hearts for the birth of Christ, our job is certainly to repent of our sinfulness.  Others who disagree with Advent being a season of penitence argue the season is more about joyful expectation and anticipation, and is distinct from the penitential season of Lent.  Meanwhile others argue that the both Lent and Advent are for both penitence and joy.

I am not sure I have made up my mind about these debates.  What I can tell you is that in the decluttering of my heart in preparation for the Christ Child, and in listening to the lesson appointed each Sunday, I know I am, and the world around me is, in need of some repentance.  As case after case pours in of sexual harassment and abuse, I am aware of how far we have drifted from the ways in which Christ longs for us to treat one another.  From the ways that we eviscerate one another online, or talk behind our neighbor’s backs, I know that we have lost a groundedness in Christ Jesus’ message of love.  From the ways in which we have stormed away from the communion table, I feel how deeply broken we are as a world.  I play a part in not correcting those sins, and sometimes actively participating in them.

And so, this Advent, my preparation feels a bit like a journey.  The first step is going to involve a bit of grief – for every woman or man who felt shamed or silenced by a society who would not affirm that they are created in the image of God, and should never suffer bodily violation; for the loss of an ability to see shades of gray instead of seeing black and white; for the hateful things we say and do to one another.  The second step is going to be some real repentance – not just naming the grief, but claiming my role in the degradation of others.  And then, hopefully, by the time we get to Christmas Eve, I expect to arrive at the manger, not with an armful of gifts, but the open arms of humility, repentance, and renewal.  I may not have words, but I long for the evening when I can bow in front of the Christ Child, rejoicing in the gift of love, forgiveness, and transformation that Jesus is for all of us.  Whether that means this Advent is a season of penitence or not, I am not sure.  All I know is this year, I am grateful for the journey.

[i] https://livingchurch.org/covenant/2016/11/29/is-advent-a-penitential-season/

On Making Room in the Inn…

29 Wednesday Nov 2017

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As my family approaches the holidays this year, life is a bit different.  We decided months ago that we would visit our California family over Christmas break.  Now that we are traveling with four, we realized the travel expenses would set us back quite a bit.  Having noticed the last couple of years how much we are spending on gifts for the kids, we decided that the trip will function as our Christmas.  My in-laws are also gifting the family a couple of days at Disneyland, which we agreed would function as their Christmas gift.  So instead of “stuff” we are concentrating on “adventure” or “experiences.”

It took some explaining and questions, but we seem to have everyone on board with the new concept.  Personally, I did not mind giving up gifts.  But what took me by surprise was how much I would miss having a live Christmas tree.   I love everything about decorating a live tree:  the smell, stringing the lights, recalling the memories of each ornament, all while sipping eggnog and listening to Christmas songs play in the background.  But the danger of the fire hazard while we are away means the tree-related boxes will stay sealed this year.

For the last week or so, I was grieving the change in our Christmas traditions.  But this week, as Advent rapidly approaches, I realized that my grief is fading, and instead, a sense of relief has overcome me.  You see, instead of running around getting gifts, I am able to imagine the calm of Advent that I always preach about, but rarely get to experience.  Instead of working frantically to get a tree and find a meeting-free night to decorate the tree, I can pull out our Advent wreath, Advent devotional, and our creches from around the world to decorate the house.  I have often heard the encouragement to simplify for Advent, but have rarely figured out how to accomplish the goal.  This year, the unintended consequences of decisions have done it for me.  And I could not be more grateful.

Now I am not suggesting you chuck all your holiday traditions about the window.  But I wonder what things or thing you might let go of this year in order to relieve some of the pressures we find in Advent.  Too often we take the “prepare” message of Advent like Martha does with Jesus.  We run around buying, baking, partying, planning, decorating, and distracting.  Maybe this Advent we can be a little more like Martha’s sister Mary, finding ways to sit at the feet of Jesus – or perhaps at the empty manger – preparing our hearts for his nativity.  I suspect that the extra room you create in your heart might be just the room Jesus and his family need when they can find no room in the inn.

 

 

Sermon – Acts 16.9-15, E6, YC, May 1, 2016

06 Friday May 2016

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One of the things that the Search Committee, Vestry, and I all talked about during our time of discernment was church growth.  Now church growth is a loaded topic because inherent in the conversation are a lot of assumptions.  One assumption is that we can talk about church growth without talking about change.  Many churches say they want to grow, but what they mean is that they want to find fresh meat for volunteer positions and new pledgers for the budget.  But inherent in church growth are not just bodies to fill out needs:  church growth means incorporating new people who will have new ideas, new dreams, and new ways of doing things.  The second assumption when we talk about church growth is that we can go about church growth passively.  In other words, as long as we have a good website, we have good programs, a shiny new Rector, and we are nice to people once they arrive, we will grow.  While those things are important and necessary, those things do not fully address how we get people to step on our property, how we encourage people to come back after a first visit, or how we incorporate newcomers fully into the life and ministry of the church.  The final, and my personal favorite, assumption is that church growth is done by the Rector.  The Rector can certainly help lay the foundation of a strong system of invitation, welcome, and incorporation.  But the primary way that church growth happens is through Church members inviting others to church.

All that is to say that my response to the Search Committee and Vestry went a little like this:  I am more than happy to give Hickory Neck all of the infrastructure Hickory Neck needs to grow; but Hickory Neck is going to have to work, be open to change, and get real comfortable with talking about their faith in the neighborhood.  Now I know many of you may be sitting here right now, cursing the Search Committee and Vestry for signing you up for some hard, scary work ahead.  But let me let you in on a little secret:  church growth (or evangelism, if we are feeling really sassy) is not that hard or scary.  That is the great thing about the readings from the Acts of the Apostles during Eastertide:  they are all about the growth of the church.  Last week we heard about how Peter began to understand that God was calling him to share the Good News with the gentiles.  Today, we hear about how Paul is diverted to Europe to share the Good News with the people of Macedonia.

Many of us get a little uncomfortable talking about apostles spreading the Good News because the stories about Peter and Paul seem strange and foreign.  They involve dreams or visions in which God tells them what to do.  They involve going to foreign lands to talk with strangers.  And they sometimes involve, as we will hear next week, getting arrested and sent to jail.  Most of us hear these familiar stories and assume that the stories do not really apply to us because they are historical, ancient stories.  But after the drama of being diverted to a foreign land and searching for a place to join with sympathetic people, what happens to Paul in our text today is not actually all that foreign or unrelatable.  The story tells us that on the Sabbath day, Paul and his companions go find where faithful people are gathered and simply start talking.  The text does not say that Paul gives a presentation about the merits of converting to Christianity.  The text does not say that Paul leads a worship service, with music and the holy meal.  The text simply says that Paul sits down among those gathered, and starts talking.  While Paul is talking, a woman in the group, Lydia, who we understand from the text is an independent woman of wealth[i], overhears what Paul is saying and is so compelled by what Paul says that she and her household are not only baptized, but insist that Paul and his companions come stay with her during their stay in Philippi.

Soon after I became a rector for the first time, I realized I had a lot to learn about church growth.  I read books, poured through research, and talked with experts in the field.  One of my favorite conversations about church growth was with a friend who does church consulting on growth.  In her formation, she had a professor who insisted as part of her training that she needed to go out into town and just start talking to people about Jesus.  She was terrified.  For the first few weeks of class, my friend, now a priest, lied to her professor.  Each week he would ask her how the project was going, and she would tell him that the project was going well.  Finally, the professor called her bluff and insisted that she immediately go somewhere and do her assignment.  So my friend went to a coffee shop, wrote on a piece of paper, “Talk to me about Jesus and I will buy you a cup of coffee,” and then set up her laptop in the hopes that no one would take her up on the offer.  Much to her chagrin, a patron came up to her and said, “I’ll talk to you about Jesus, but I’ll buy the coffee.”  The conversation that ensued was full of the stranger’s story – about how she used to go to church, how she still believes, how the church hurt her, but how she still misses having a church community.  My friend listened to the story, honored the stranger by acknowledging how hard her journey had been, and then did the one thing that is key when talking about church growth.  My friend acknowledged where she saw the presence of God in this stranger’s journey.  And, for good measure, my friend told her that if she ever wanted to try church again, she knew a great place that might just work.

That is the funny thing about church growth.  Church growth happens through real people having real conversations in real time.  Paul sits down with a bunch of women and starts talking.  My friend sat down with a stranger and listened and reflected back on the stranger’s journey.  That is the same invitation that I will be giving us to do over and over again in my time here at Hickory Neck:  that we start having real conversations with real people in real time.  Now I know what some of you may be thinking.  First, you may be thinking, “I cannot believe the Search Committee and Vestry decided to hire this priest who is going to make me do this!”  Second, you may be thinking, “I have no idea how to have real conversations with real people in real time!  What does she expect me to do?  Start talking to strangers at the coffee shop, on the golf course, and at the Little League game?”

Before you get too anxious, I want to give you a little piece of comfort from scripture.  In Peter’s story last week, in Paul’s story today, and in the texts coming up next week and at Pentecost, we learn that all of these encounters happen with the Holy Spirit going before, making a way for the encounter to happen.  In today’s story, Paul has no intention of going to Macedonia.  In fact, in the verses we did not read today, Paul and his crew actually had plans and made attempts to go to other places, but their plans were thwarted by the Holy Spirit.  Finally, Paul has a vision that he was supposed to go to Macedonia.[ii]  Once he and the group decide to follow that vision, everything becomes smooth.  Their travel is not thwarted, they easily find their way to Philippi, they stumble onto a group of women who are believers, and out of nowhere, just through conversations about faith, Lydia steps up and not only desires baptism, she demands that Paul and his company accept her hospitality.  That is the reality about growth:  yes, growth involves putting ourselves out there to have hard conversations, and yes, growth involves being vulnerable and uncomfortable, and yes, growth will even involve change to us personally and to our community as a whole.  But God shows us through the story of scripture, that the Holy Spirit is ever before us, making the way smooth.  When our intentions are simply to share our story, to listen to the stories of others, and to honor the ways in which God is already active and blessing us, then the rest flows smoothly.

We are probably going to be talking about church growth a lot in the years to come.  We will talk about how to grow, we will make changes that will create a strong foundation for invitation, welcome, and incorporation, and we will get out there and talk to our neighbors.  But at the heart of all that work is the promise that the Holy Spirit is ever before us, making the way smooth, calming our nerves so that God can work in spite of us, and showing us how our holy conversations will be a source of blessing to us as much as those conversations are a blessing to others.[iii]  We will do this work together:  you, me, and the Holy Spirit.  The work will be hard, scary, and beautiful.  The work will be a blessing to us all and allow us to be a blessing to this community.  We can do this work together, because the Holy Spirit goes before us.  Amen.

[i] David G. Forney, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Year C, Vol. 2 (Louisville:  Westminster John Knox Press, 2009), 476.

[ii] Brian Peterson, “Commentary on Acts 16:9-15,” May 5, 2013, as found at http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx?commentary_id=1627 on April 27, 2016.

[iii] Peterson.

Sermon – Isaiah 40.1-11, A2, YB, December 7, 2014

10 Wednesday Dec 2014

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This sermon was delivered on the occasion of our Annual Meeting. 

This time of year, I do a lot of preparing.  Though the setup takes a lot of work, I particularly love preparing our house for Christmas.  Unpacking and hanging all the ornaments is a tradition I shared with my family, and that I now can share with my girls.  I love telling my oldest daughter the stories behind certain ornaments and helping her decide where they should go.  I also put out our international crèche collection.  They remind me of travels I have made or friends from far away places.  Each inspires something different in me, reflecting the culture and artistry of different countries.  And of course, my daughter loves helping me hide away the baby Jesuses until Christmas day.  We even take down some artwork on our wall to make room for the cards which friends from far and wide send to us.  There is something homey and comforting about the whole process of preparing for Christmas, and I love the way that the preparation makes me feel grounded and joyful.

In our Old Testament lesson today, the text says, “prepare the way of the LORD.”  In this season of Advent, we are to prepare for the arrival of the Christ Child.  Now certainly, unpacking ornaments, advent wreaths, and crèches are one way to prepare.  But God is talking about a different kind of preparation today.  God is not talking about an outward change – like decorating our homes.  God is talking about an inward preparation – an inward change in anticipation of the LORD.  I am reminded of how one of our parishioners just recently prepared himself for the LORD.  Several weeks ago, one of our young parishioners decided to receive his first communion.  He prepared by reading about the Eucharist at home with his family, asking questions, and talking with them about their experiences.  He worked on memorizing the Lord’s Prayer, so that he might fully participate in the prayer life of our community.  And then he sat with me as we walked through the Eucharistic liturgy, talking about what each part means, why that part is significant, and what all those crazy things on the altar are called.  Finally, he chose someone to present him before the entire community, where he and we all declared that he was prepared to be in full communion with this community.  He waited and worked to prepare himself for the consumption of our LORD.  And now, each week that I have placed the body of Christ in his hand since then, I have felt a sweet, deeply abiding satisfaction when he reaches his hands toward me to receive Christ’s body.

The kind of preparation that our young parishioner did is a small taste of the kind of preparation God calls for in our Old Testament today.  Isaiah says that in order to prepare, we need to make straight in the desert a highway for our God, lift up every valley, make low every mountain and hill, level the uneven ground, and make plain the rough places.  This passage is so familiar to us, that many of us miss the magnitude of what God is saying.  When was the last time you tried to fill in a valley or level a mountain?  Of course, God is not telling us to literally take the winding roads of deserts and make them straight.  But in the metaphors, God is telling us that preparing for God is not easy work.  In fact, preparing for the LORD is a monumental task.  Preparing for the LORD is not like preparing our homes for Christmas, where we can make a basic checklist and slowly check the items off the list.  When given the hefty work of preparing ourselves inwardly for God, the task of leveling our valleys and mountains and smoothing out our rough places is much more difficult.

In some ways, I have watched St. Margaret’s do a lot of this interior work.  Over the course of the last year, our Vestry and Buildings and Grounds Committee have made level the mess that had become our Undercroft.  Though taking on an expensive project, they together worked to clean out harmful mold and mildew, solved a drainage problem to prevent that kind of damage again, and reimagined how that space could be utilized by us and our community.  Meanwhile, our educational offerings have been totally made low in this last year.  We revamped our Sunday School program after years of struggling to find the best way to raise our children in the faith.  We reworked our worship schedule so that adults could claim an hour in their busy lives to ponder their faith and make straight paths in the desert.  We have filled in the valleys by marching in parades, sponsoring baseball teams, eating pancakes at local diners, and inviting total strangers into our midst so that they might help us fill in those valleys.  Of course, anyone who knows St. Margaret’s also knows that you are only a stranger here for about one Sunday before our wonderfully welcoming community has made sure they know your whole life story before your coffee cup is empty.

All of those have been wonderfully positive things in our lives, but not easy work.  I cannot tell you the number of people who worried and fretted over our Undercroft expenses, complained about how long the work was taking, and questioned the wisdom of the work.  I cannot tell you the number of times I myself considered whether we should halt educational offerings altogether due to low turnout.  I cannot tell you how many times I needed each one of us to invite someone to church and instead heard someone say, “Oh, well isn’t that what our new website is for?”  We have been making progress toward straightening paths, filling in valleys, and leveling mountains.  But we have also gotten very dirty, been impatient and frustrated with each other, and sometimes have dropped our shovels altogether.  That is what happens when you do this kind of preparation for the LORD.  The work is not easy.  The work is monumental.  The work is, well, work.  And work is what God is inviting us into today.

The good news is that today’s text is one of those “both-and” texts.[i]  Yes, God is inviting us into some hard work today.  As we reflect on another year of service, at the mounds of dirt we have already moved, God is charging us to roll up our sleeves and keep digging.  And yes, God promises that the work of preparing will not be easy work.  But God also makes a promise while we are in the mire of making roads straight.  Our text today from Isaiah says, “He will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms, and carry them in his bosom, and gently lead the mother sheep.”  This last sentence has been lingering with me this week.  Maybe because I am a nursing mom, or maybe because this is the only time that scripture talks about the work of a mother sheep, but I find myself riveted by these words.

Just this week, I had one of “those” nights at our house.  I do not know whether she was teething or just had a rough day, but I lost count after the fifth time I woke up to my infant’s crying one night.  The next morning, I woke up bleary-eyed, almost falling asleep while eating my morning cereal, spilling my coffee on my computer, and generally having a rough time trying to focus.  That is the life of a mother with young children.  And I assume, the life of a mother sheep is not much easier – constantly using her body to protect and feed her lambs.  To that wearied mother sheep, God says that God will gently lead her.  In fact, not only that, God will gather up her lambs, embracing them in God’s bosom, and then God will gently lead the mother sheep.  I am reminded of the many times someone has scooped up my daughters when they were losing their cool.  I am reminded of the individuals who have forced me to go take a date night while they watched my kids.  I am reminded of the encouraging words and sympathetic nods I have received over these last five years.

That is the kind of care God promises us in the midst of our work.  God says, “Go out there and get dirty filling valleys, leveling mountains, and straitening roads.  And when you are weary from the work, I will scoop up your little ones, and gently lead you by my side.”  As I look forward to the coming year, I hear both a charge and a comfort for us today.  We all have more to learn, more people to serve, more spreading of the gospel to do.  But we also have a shepherd who tenderly encourages and comforts us – and then kicks us right back into the ring.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.

[i] George W. Stroup, “Theological Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. B, Vol. 1 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 28.

Sermon – Luke 21.5-19, P28, YC, November 17, 2013

27 Wednesday Nov 2013

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“Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning:  Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.”[i]  So on this day, when we celebrate Holy Scripture, praying one of my favorite collects, a day that we hear, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest, imagine my intense dissatisfaction when I opened up the gospel lesson for this week.  I have been reading, marking, learning, and inwardly digesting all week, and this text still makes me uncomfortable.  On this day of celebrating Scripture, who wants to hear of collapsing houses of worship; false prophets that can lead us astray; wars, natural disasters, famines, and plagues; great persecution, including being betrayed by our very own family members?  And what is our reward for all this suffering?  All of this calamity will give us an opportunity to testify.  I do not know about you, but after having my church destroyed, navigating false prophets, fighting disasters, and dealing with persecution, testifying would be about the last thing on my mind.  In fact, I know a few Episcopalians who might even add testifying as one of the major types of tortuous, painful experiences. 

At Diocesan Convention this weekend, we watched a video about the Diocese of Long Island’s response to Hurricane Sandy one year ago.  The video began with news coverage leading up to the storm, during the storm, and immediately after the storm.  I have no idea why, but I found myself tearing up during the coverage.  I had forgotten all of the anxiety and stress that came from that storm.  I forgot about the utter despair and the feelings of helplessness – having friends try to contact me about how they could help, and yet, not even having power to be able to watch the news and see what was going on all around us.  I remember wanting to know what had happened to churches in the areas most impacted by the storm, but the Diocesan offices being crippled by their own lack of power and employees’ inability to get to work.  I remember wanting to help, but not being sure how to do that without electricity ourselves.  I remember being so cold at night without heat, and yet knowing that I was lucky to have an undamaged roof over my head.  I remember anxiously watching my car’s gas gauge approach empty – knowing the panic of gas lines, and how quickly stations ran out of gas.  The video brought all of those emotions bubbling up to the surface. 

But the video also offered a testimony.  After the storm, churches began opening doors for collections, housing, and powering stations.  Teams from churches headed to devastated areas to help demo and begin repairing homes.  Those too far from the action, offered up their space to electrical workers who had volunteered to help, but had been given no place to stay at night.  Our hospital in the Rockaways treated patients for three weeks solely on generator power.  A year later, people are still being helped as they repair homes, find new places to stay, and deal with the emotional ordeal.  In a time of great darkness, the Episcopal Church on Long Island began to find a way out of the darkness and into the light. 

One of the coordinators of the effort from the Diocese said that one of the things the Church had to learn to do was not to go into areas telling them how they were going to help – but instead had to simply show up and ask what people needed.  The representative said that this model made the work and efforts much more chaotic, but in the end, brought about the change that people really needed.  I could hear echoes of today’s gospel lesson in his words.  Jesus says, “Make up your minds not to prepare your defense in advance, for I will give you words and a wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict.”  This strange gift of being able to testify is made even stranger by Jesus’ words – not only is our gift to testify in the midst of suffering, we are to force ourselves to not even prepare the testimony on the way – no thinking of anecdotes, no making outlines, no trying to even think about what we might say.  We must simply show up and trust that God will give us the words.

One of my favorite hymns is “Precious Lord.”  “Precious Lord,” is one of those songs that I can close my eyes to and just overflow with love and gratitude toward God.  Of course, my favorite version is not the version sung out of the hymnal, but by the great Al Green.  He breathes a life and joy into the song that we can rarely muster in church.  But this week, my appreciation for this favorite song grew infinitely when I heard the story behind the song.  The song was written by Thomas Dorsey.  Born in 1889 in rural Georgia, Dorsey was a prolific songwriter and excellent gospel and blues musician.  As a young man, he moved to Chicago where he worked as a piano player in churches as well as in clubs and theaters.  After some time, Dorsey finally devoted his talent exclusively to the church.  In August of 1932, Dorsey left his pregnant wife in Chicago and traveled to be the featured soloist at a large revival meeting in St. Louis.  After the first night of the revival, Dorsey received a telegram that simply said, “Your wife just died.”  Dorsey raced home and learned that his wife had given birth to a son before dying in childbirth.  The next day his son died as well.  Dorsey buried his wife and son in the same casket and withdrew in sorrow and agony from his family and friends.  He refused to compose or play music for quite some time. 

While still in the midst of despair, Dorsey said that as he sat in front of a piano, a feeling of peace washed through him.  That night, Dorsey recorded this testimony while in the midst of suffering:

Precious Lord, take my hand,

Lead me on, let me stand;

I am tired, I am weak, I am worn;

Through the storm, through the night,

Lead me on to the light;

Take my hand, precious Lord,

Lead me home.[ii]

In the midst of that darkest of times, Dorsey did not sit at that piano with a song all planned out.  In fact, if you had asked him to testify at that moment, he might have railed at the way that God and the world were treating him.  And yet, empty and vulnerable, God filled Dorsey with words that would touch people eighty years later, and would be sung by countless famous people over the years.

In the midst of darkness – of destruction, pain, suffering, persecution, even betrayal by those we love most – God gives us a testimony too.  And even more than a testimony, Jesus promises that we do not even have to prepare this testimony.  God will provide the words and the wisdom when we need them.  Our only mandate today is to hold fast to God in the midst of trials, to remain open to the movement of the Spirit, and to speak those words of truth and wisdom when we feel them spilling out of our mouths.  That time of testimony may not be before some king or governor demanding to hear about our faith.  But our testimony might spill out with a grieving widow or mother, a traumatized victim of natural disaster, or a friend who has felt disenfranchised by the Church.  We cannot prepare the testimony.  We cannot even try to craft a basic testimony story to be ready whenever we need the story.  Jesus tells us to “make up our minds not to prepare.”  This is perhaps one of the hardest challenges Jesus will give us, and yet, as we see in Dorsey’s testimony and the many other testimonies we have heard, when we yield that power to Christ, the real, vulnerable beauty of our story gives life to others and to us.  Amen.

[i] BCP, 236.

[ii] Story of Dorsey take from Nancy Lynne Westfield, “Pastoral Perspective,” Feasting on the Word, Yr. C, vol. 4 (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2010), 312.