Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

Pentecost + 3 - Year A

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

Many of us have been attending or following the Wisconsin United Methodist Church trial of Rev. Amy DeLong this last week. It is good to have that completed so wonderfully well with the trial court bringing a restorative justice decision that so minimized a so-called "penalty" that it actually became an Opportunity. Rev. Amy has been asked to lead the conference where it has not been able to go on its own - to find unity in inclusiveness.

Up to this point, the Wisconsin Conference has been very narcissistic, just like "spoiled children whining" [The Message]. Everyone has gone their own way, picking one out of many streams of tradition that suits an individual's bias, and demanding it be the only legitimate way to interpret the future. This is like trying to drive forward by only looking in the rearview mirror. There is not going to be a pretty outcome.

Captive to ideology, both left and right, it becomes impossible to recognize the release of "power" ["dynamis" - inherent power, power residing in a thing by virtue of its nature, or which a person or thing exerts and puts forth]. Everyone has been captured by their own "Law". This is a continuation of Mt. 5:18, in the Common English Bible, that indicates Law functions "until everything there becomes a reality". In the meantime Law, whether yours or mine, blinds us to a reality already among us (the rapture has already happened, G*D's presence is already here - listen to Janet Wolf). When we take our eye off the miracle of reality, we are ripe for capture by one Law or another, masquerading as some end-all or be-all.

Here are two signs of health from the just concluded trial.

A trial court able to bring a restorative justice opportunity instead of a "penalty" and  A T-shirt graphic by Rev. Amy that doesn't demand she be you or you be she.

With these we can dance together rather than demand another dance for us by shooting at their feet.

be clear

Pentecost - Year A

be clear

your words are

revealing 

a deep heart’s core

varietal

gifts and skills

ministries

each building on each

vocation

comes and goes

common good

lingers sweetly

law

gathers fear in one place

grace

sends peace forth again

clarify

dreams and prophecy

reveal

torah’s reincarnation

1 Corinthians 12:3-13

Pentecost - Year A

1 Corinthians 12:3-13

To say “Jesus is Lord” without using that phrase “for the common good” is a misuse of the affirmation.

That same process needs to be in play when it comes to claiming a vocation. If you see “Jesus is Lord” standing behind the building of community, it also stands behind an individual’s participation in that community.

For a moment consider that every vocation has aspects to it regarding: wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy, discernment, and interpretation. Every vocation can help build the common good and some folks will even say every vocation reveals that “Jesus is Lord” when that common good is actually built.

This is built on the understanding:

• Jesus is Lord comes from Holy Spirit.
• Common good comes from Holy Spirit.
• Activity/Vocation comes from Holy Spirit.
• This connects Jesus with communal common good and individual vocation as long as one understands and values Holy Spirit.
• Otherwise just go ahead and build the common good by attending to the virtues of your task.

Psalm 104:24-34, 35b

Pentecost - Year A

Psalm 104:24-34, 35b

If we are going to see G*D as reliably creative, we will soon find ourselves moved aside from partnership with G*D to someone who sits up and begs (v 28). We become dependent upon G*D to the exclusion of being able to stray from the orthodox, official, tradition claimed to be the guarantor of our next handout.

Thus we don’t mention sin and wickedness in verse 35a. We need to ban even half-a-verse that takes the focus off of verse 31 - “The glory of God—let it last forever! Let God enjoy his creation!” [The Message].

Where did these consumed sinners and wicked folks come from? The same place as Cain and Seth’s wives? The image of G*D from creation?

Pentecost is not about praise, praise, praise in a secluded room. It is about face-to-face encounters with that which is different and finding a common link between. A too happy Psalm puts more focus on tongues of fire and less on tongues of reconciliation.

Acts 2:1-21

Pentecost - Year A

Acts 2:1-21

Amazing how surprised we can get as we gather for one purpose and a Python comes out of the sea to collapsingly announce, “It’s” time for something completely different. Why were the disciples gathered? Not just to huddle together, but to honor the tradition of Pentecost, otherwise known as Shavu’ot (rejoicing not just in Passover/Exodus from Egypt, but the giving of Torah - not simply the narrow Books of Moses, but the entire body of Jewish teaching - that organizes a new community). Judaism 101 says: “It is noteworthy that the holiday is called the time of the giving of the Torah, rather than the time of the receiving of the Torah. The sages point out that we are constantly in the process of receiving the Torah, that we receive it every day, but it was first given at this time. Thus it is the giving, not the receiving, that makes this holiday significant.”

Gathered for honoring the giving of Torah (translating G*D-speak to human community organizing) there is a surprise that the theory of constantly receiving a given Torah involves such as ourselves. On this day of translation another giving begins to be received. A gift of languages (translating human experience to human experience) sets folks on growing another branch of a beautiful tree meant for the healing of the nations.

To hear Torah and more than Torah in one’s own language is a soul-stirring moment. It brings out the best in us to hear G*D’s mighty works of power - forgiveness, mercy, steadfast love. These contine to break new territory, to not be bound by the usual limits that separate us.

To hear Torah and more than Torah in one’s own language, can also scare the bejezus out of us and set up resistance to such weak elements when we have staked our lives on our own power, privilege, entitlement.

Between growing Torah and limiting it, we find the responses to this roomful of yeasty people who throw open closed doors to turn strangers into friends by giving themselves away - not insisting others learn their language, but starting with the language of the other.

Question: Is the given gift of Pentecost received into your life everyday? Which strange Neighbor or literal Enemy have you spoken with in their language that they may hear the power of forgiveness, mercy, steadfast love? It may draw you closer together or it may cause a greater rift. These outcomes, however, are not at issue. Our only question is whether we will receive and act on a waiting new gift or be satisfied with the old ones.

Pentecost/Shavu’ot, calls us to receive something already given - a latent translation, experience to experience, of a larger vision than simply repeating today, that everyone, everyone, will be whole and whole, again.

John 20:19-23

Pentecost - Year A

John 20:19-23

What is recorded in the scriptures has a rhetorical purpose - to persuade you to orient your heart and life in a particular direction. It would be good to have that up front rather than at the tail end of this significant passage regarding the continuance of people’s experience of Jesus past the mystery of an empty tomb.

A key, because it is prominently mentioned twice is the issue of “Peace", “Relax”, “Settle down”, “Chill”, or whatever the latest word is to reduce tension. Tension only heightens battle lines and is not helpful in relationships unless it is used to further investigate the relationship and resolve the particular tension at hand.

Secondary is the issue of “belief”. Here it is evidence based belief that shapes a direction of action. At this remove we have turned the action into a correct answer to a confirmation regimen or assent to membership. Our divorcing of belief from action is one of the hallmarks of a hierarchical institution and/or fundamentalistic literalism.

So, hooray for Peace. Hooray for action based on experience. Use care regarding free-floating belief.

ultimatization

Easter 7 - Year A

ultimatization

from my experience
to a universal theorm
enlarges perception from
real molehill to fantastic mountain

inquiring minds
are easily tempted
to find an easy way out
of this fiery ordeal or that

desire protection
call out for assurance
for power that abides now
and doesn’t fade into the distance

temptations arise
busy work even good work
distract us from fears and hurts
so rise up and settle back to reality

life goes on
avatars come and go
and go and come and go
and you and I are next in line
 

1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11

Easter 7 - Year A

1 Peter 4:12-14; 5:6-11

Anyone here surprised at the “aft agley”ness of the world? Anytime you set about trying to create something in the image of a community it seems there is going to be at least one pyschopathic personality amongst the creative “our”.

If you wish to connect whatever gets defined as a “fiery ordeal” with Christ, that certainly has the potential to sharpen one’s sense of meaning. If you find another way to look at fiery ordeals, that is also alright. One of those other ways is the simple one of “discipline yourselves”.

Keeping faith with one’s grander meaning and larger view of the world takes much joyful discipline. If it is simply discipline we find ourselves with a dour mein. If only joy, there is no connection with reality. Here it is helpful to keep this oxymoron of joyful discipline in creative presence and tension with itself.

If you need some form of restoration to justify your suffering, then eternal glory may well be a helpful way to go. Simply know it is not the only option available. Eternal crucifixion is a far side, and yet still a side, of what may eventuate. In addition there are good old “lukewarm” ways to ignore any correction needed to move beyond the current scene.

The due time for exultation is not Tomorrow or Rapture Day in a couple more months. Exultation can only be a present action. Likewise, restoration is present oriented. We don’t have to think of these as earnings based on gritted teeth, but living in the model of Jesus’ life. This is not “test”, but growth. If you are not growing as you take a test, you are just repeating the past. In some ways tests are the logical next step of becoming.
 

Psalm 68:1-10, 32-35

Easter 7 - Year A

Psalm 68:1-10, 32-35

“O G*D, when you went out before your people, when you marched through the wilderness - the earth quaked, the heavens poured down rain....”

Images of earthquakes and rain are images of rebirth. It is through a crack in a cosmic egg that the light gets in, that new images become available. The old must be left behind. A shakenness, a chaos, predates a subsequent round of new solidity. Rain touches the seed within and we shift and blossom again.

Don’t ask when, simply now that now is an acceptable time to appreciate a quake and a flood that provide a new place to stand and bloom. [given the spate of tornadoes and the need to breach some levees to save others, this may be difficult imagery, but transformation never seems to arrive without difficulty]

Acts 1:6-14

Easter 7 - Year A

Acts 1:6-14

“When will you restore the kingdom?”
“When will I experience power?
“When will we feel protected?”

This you don’t know, won’t know.

All that is available is to be a witness of a better way. In simply following where this leads we will stumble, again and again, into protected space, with renewed time, revealing expansive resources.

Here the methodology contained “prayer” and focusing on the “all” of a community, not a privileged portion thereof. Enjoy your methodology to cast a vision beyond our current horizon and to enact some portion of such largess.
 

John 17:1-11

Easter 7 - Year A

John 17:1-11

A long operatic or western death scene can go on interminably. There is just that one last word or recapitulation that needs to be gone over. The past and present is never seemingly enough, there needs to be an Aesop’s moral added in.

If Jesus is going to “ask” for us, why must we ask, seek, or knock?

If we cut to the chase we might hear, “Protect them”.

If you were to trust that you are protected/assured, what might you be bold enough to try that so far you have been able to avoid? What trouble would you risk in and for life?

This begins to push at us as it has been weeks since Easter and the images are beginning to fade. Where we had initially begun to catch a picture of Jesus protected from death’s finality, we are feeling our own frailty again.

Instead of putting on armor as protection, how about the invisible cloak of glory within and all about that pulls and pushes us toward a better future. Might “glory” tie us back to the energy of an empty tomb and energize us toward a freedom to engage others “as we are” - one.

Imagine an invisible glory that, instead of allowing us to skulk among others, would better reveal ourself? Danger Will Robinson, you are closing down again, rolling a rock over emptiness rather than reveling in it, remember your cloak that isn't.