Matthew 6:24-34

Epiphany 8 - Year A

Matthew 6:24-34

In today’s world we might translate, “You cannot serve God and Corporations.”

If that is not self-evident, I’m not sure what can be done to help focus this. The issue of wealth or money is built on a zero-sum principle of competition to get your piece of the pie. And, since it is a competition, there is no end to the size of the piece that one needs. The operative word is a drivenness of “more”. There is no sense of a joy of “enough”.

Today’s inward/outward quote is pertinent here:

The Spiral of Materialism
Matthew Fox
The spiral of materialism is eternal and never ends.... The materialist is never satisfied. For the heart is not made full or satisfied by any, or even all, of the things that the religion of materialism and its preachers of advertising want so desperately to sell us. "Where your treasure is, there your heart will be," warned Jesus. And the treasures that lead to compassionate living are not buyable because they are less objects than they are experiences.... Greed never asks when is enough, enough? It knows nothing of limits. Therefore, it knows nothing of the true pleasures that life is about. It is utterly ignorant of celebration.

If you value relationship, growth, and celebration more than accumulating resources, you might be interested in a new opportunity to band together to return corporations to their functional state and remove them from competition with people’s well-being. Russ Feingold and many others have begun an attempt at challenging the current and growing power of corporations. You join me in signing on at: http://www.progressivesunited.org/ .

This is larger than Russ, though he is a face for it. It is larger than you, though your action is as crucial as anyones. This is for all those who are tired of striving’s vanity. This is for those who understand the freedom of G*D and healthy relationships are the starting points for knowing how to live with enough today that more will have enough tomorrow.

Here is a key question: What is more about? Is it about food, clothing, security, happiness, satisfaction? What do you need more of? Is it assurance of blessedness? Is it trust in meaning beyond that which passes too quickly away? Is it simple beauty, a graceful movement through the opportunities and challenges of any ordinary day? What do you need more of?
 

But I say to you

In keeping with Jesus dealing with popularized statements with "But, I say to you . . . ." Here is a link to a series of "But, I say . . . ." responses regarding an on-going revelation about sexual orientation.

I wish you well in being able to evaluate the conversations swirling around you and being able to bring the conversation back to what gives more and more life to people.

Bishop's Counsel to Church

"Good News" Response

My Response to "Good News"

What are you saying these days?

1 Corinthians 3:10-11, 16-23

Epiphany 7 - Year A

1 Corinthians 3:10-11, 16-23

There is much trust needed in being connected with a religious institution. No matter how well we build new foundations in a new day, someone else will eventually build well or poorly on that foundation.

Paul suggests that the foundation is Jesus and yet we don’t have the same foundational understanding of Jesus as evaluator of each foundation. Consider how far we are from a near-future parousia. Paul saw things one way, and millennia later we see things another way. Consider, also, the variety of Christian sects and the variety within each of them. It would be a very strange Jesus that could be deduced from the variety of religious expression in just one community.

Perhaps the strongest image here is that of connecting with one another. We have wrestled with an image of Trinity for a long, long time. Imagine a trinity of G*D, Jesus, and You. We become interconnected with Jesus and G*D and, through this, with one another.

Realize that G*D is present in you as well as with you. Nothing will look the same again.
 

Psalm 119:33-40

Epiphany 7 - Year A

Psalm 119:33-40

Choose your teacher.
Work toward understanding.
Travel toward basics.
Practice an outward oriented heart.
Practice an inward oriented eye.
Receive assurance.
Avoid disgrace.
And so confirm your desire for meaning.
 

Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18

Epiphany 7 - Year A

Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18

Those of you in Wisconsin know the new governor is playing games with the jobs of public workers. Threats are made to jobs themselves, wages, benefits. Threats are made to bring in the National Guard.

It is difficult to read this passage and then face ideologues whose sense of economic realities is as small as their compassion.

Paul Krugman in yesterday’s New York Times speaking of national politics disguised as economics also describes our state political environment.

Which brings me back to the Republican dilemma. The new House majority promised to deliver $100 billion in spending cuts — and its members face the prospect of Tea Party primary challenges if they fail to deliver big cuts. Yet the public opposes cuts in programs it likes — and it likes almost everything. What's a politician to do?

The answer, once you think about it, is obvious: sacrifice the future. Focus the cuts on programs whose benefits aren't immediate; basically, eat America's seed corn. There will be a huge price to pay, eventually — but for now, you can keep the base happy.

Paul calls this "Eating the Future" and ends his column, "And so they had to produce something like Friday's proposal, a plan that would save remarkably little money but would do a remarkably large amount of harm."

Do you hear in this that there is nothing left for the gleaners, for the poor, the alien? Do you hear the defrauding, slandering, and profiting from the blood, pain, loss of your neighbor?

We have here a huge grudge borne against Neighbor. We have here a denial of community. We have here a false idol of Market.

And so the people do as G*D does, rise in opposition to theft of common-wealth. Demonstrations Today and Tomorrow!
 

Matthew 5:38-48

Epiphany 7 - Year A

Matthew 5:38-48

How does "do not resist an evildoer" feel today after recent events in Tunisia and Egypt?

How does "love your enemies" sound today after recent events?

A part of the difficulty we always face with biblical quotes is their applicability to situations that swirl around us and their connection to other biblical passages.

Presuming a sense of parallelism in this whole sermon, we can begin substituting phrases to see what gets added to Jesus' guidance.

Is "do not resist" comparable to "love"? Play these back and forth.

Now remember last week. How would you play back and forth between "do not resist", "love", "do not murder/be angry", "do not commit adultery/lust", "Do not divorce/be unchaste", "Do not swear by anything outside yourself/say yes or no". If you can't work "love" into a parallel statement, what are you left with?

What are we to not resist? What are we to love?

Parallelism can not only expand meaning, it can also narrow a choice. This will be seen in next week's pericope contrasting G*D with Wealth.

How do you support those in their own version of Egypt (whether run by a Pharaoh or a Mubarak or a Majority)? What would you tell them? For how long would you counsel patience before sending the equivalent of a plague of frogs or citizens? Have you noted the long-term effectiveness of non-violence in contrast to the short-term gain of authorized, institutionalized, violence?

rats

Epiphany 6 - Year A

rats
I thought the rules
were settled
and I had them figured out

Jesus
thought the rules
were lax
and I am unsettled

Jesus
"You have heard it said . . . ."
oh-oh
"But I say to you . . . ."

rats
a choice has been set
forever
and I'm off again
 

1 Corinthians 3:1-9

Epiphany 6 - Year A

1 Corinthians 3:1-9

The realization that we are on differing paths and that those on the same path may be at differing locations on it reminds us that we are living growing beings. If we are going to have any flesh, it is flesh that changes and grows. If our spirit is in anyway tied to our flesh, it, too, will change and hopefully grow.

Perhaps there is a stage of growth we still need to go through to get back to the Garden of Eden relationship with G*D, presuming it is desirable to regress that far - not milk, or meat, but vegan. What might it be like to be fed with food directly from the earth? Might it make the adam - adamah or human - humus stronger after we learn our milk and meat lessons about connecting self - neighbor beyond differing source authorities.

Blessings on discerning a common purpose with friend and foe, alike.
 

Psalm 119:1-8

Epiphany 6 - Year A

Psalm 119:1-8

What a difference a comma can make. Good for the UCC folks to use the comma in reference to what we are still learning about G*D and our relationship with same. Here, verse 3 continues to speak of those who are blessed when it describes those "who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways."[NRSV]

A first tired reading missed the comma and tied “wrong” with “walk in his ways”. After shaking a weary head it finally came into focus. This reading of G*D's ways are wrong has brought forth a flurry of books in recent years about how wrong are those who seek the usual stereotypical god. Another flurry of resources have come for those who are going so much further than said stereotype, but are tarred with the same brush.

A key here is walking in G*D’s ways. Note the plural “ways” of G*D. Note that walking in these ways is not the same as claiming one of them is universal. Note that walking is not static and it is not creedally constrained. Walking in the ways of G*D requires more faith than certainty, more hope than Realpolitik, and more love than personal salvation.

There is room for a goodly community to walk within G*D’s ways, each with an upright heart and all with room for each other. So it is we may live long in the land.
 

Deuteronomy 30:15-20 and Sirach 15:15-20

Epiphany 6 - Year A

Deuteronomy 30:15-20 and Sirach 15:15-20

Jesus' "You have heard it said, but . . ." statements remind us that G*D's nickname is Freedom. Today's New York Times reviews the last 14 days in Egypt. Key is a statement by the newly released Wael Ghonim. After being kidnapped by government forces and held for 12 days he said, "This is not the time to settle scores. Although I have people I want to settle scores with myself. This is not the time to split the pie and enforce ideologies."

Here is a choice as stark as those between the scripturally heightened rhetoric of "Life and Good" or "Death and Evil" or "Fire and Water". Here we have "Violence and Retribution" or "Freedom and Cooperation".

We have heard and lived in cultures of "Power Over" and again we see the gift of "Freedom Growing" from beneath. After remembering an old Egyptian poem, "The Nile can bend and turn, but what is impossible is that it would ever dry up", Professor Mamoun Fandy remarked, "The same is true of the river of freedom that is loose here now. Maybe you can bend it for a while, or turn it, but it is not going to dry up."

The choice to be free, to hear “you have heard it said, but . . .” is basic to life and therefore to G*D and therefore to us as a goal. To not choose beyond enforced consistency is the hobgoblin of little lives (no matter how large they project themselves).

Simply put, we have not been commanded to side with or be wicked, nor have we been given permission to tear down others to aggrandize our self. We are in this together. I rejoice when you can stand tall for the Freedom of G*D [rendered into olde english as “Kingdom of G*D] right where you are. It encourages me to stand tall where I am. I’ll do what I can to return the favor.

A G*D of Freedom again sets before us a choice, settle scores or build new blessings.
 

Matthew 5:21-27

Epiphany 6 - Year A

Matthew 5:21-27

Ah, the literalist approach to salvation - trying to get into heaven by narrowly defining rules to one’s own advantage. Picking and choosing and narrowly defining statements just enough to always be just on the inside side of the cut. Knowing you don’t deserve heaven because of your wretchedness, what else can be done but to do everything in your power to redefine the rules to their letter and excusing behavior because of intent.

The “But I say to you . . .” lines from Jesus are critical to what it means to be a person on a journey to wholeness. Here murder is no longer limited to the physical but the emotional and the relational. Adultery is not just a final act but a desire, culminated or not. It is this same desire that makes one unchaste and open for divorce.

Jesus is not a letter-of-the-law partner with G*D. This relationship is also not one of good G*D, bad G*D.

How are we going to keep following a “Yes, but I say to you . . .” leader? If our intent isn’t simply a desire to learn the latest, revisionist ropes in order to game the system and advance, what is it? Are we those literalists mentioned above, just over different pasages?

Which is why this pericope ends with an examined life and ability to trust a Jesus Spirit to prompt us to say “No” to bad stuff and “Yes” to good stuff without such being part of a programmatic approach to living or a blowing in the wind. Want to keep your saltiness, continuing to add flavor to the world? Want to send a shining ray far down the future’s broadening way? Learn how to listen to “But I say to you” and, in turn, to say it and live it.
 

Beyond Choice

Epiphany 5 - Year A

intentionally fast
or put the best spin
on involuntary starvation
a lack is a lack

there is a power difference
between putting down
and having nothing
nothing to pick up

for a moment note
you have a choice
beyond fasting
or starvation

to claim your aura
no matter how thick
a basket cover
brilliant

to claim your saltiness
no matter how diluted
a homeopathic
solution

rejecting sustenance
or failing to find food
we come to life
beyond choice

eventually we stand
beyond choice
dilute salt is not lost salt
confined light is still light

we don’t need either/or
not even both/and
simply four
revelations

cut injustice loose
reject exploitation
reverse oppression
demolish class

share bread and community
personally shelter those without
spin cloth for self and others
rejoice in differences

and Lo and Behold
flavor returns
lights come on
a new path opens

we are not playing games
nor thinking strategically
just being a revealer
reveling in just being
 

1 Corinthians 2:1-12, (13-16)

Epiphany 5 - Year A

1 Corinthians 2:1-12, (13-16)

15 - Those who are spiritual discern all things, and they are themselves subject to no one else’s scrutiny.

This may well have been Paul’s experience and claim for authority. For Paul and the plowing and seeding of a Church, he may have felt the need to set up a separation of spirit and flesh, grace and law (short-term effective, long-term problematic). This sort of clarity and either/or was probably helpful in his time and for his purposes, but 2,000+ years later - not so much.

The experience here is that the more spiritual we are the more worldly we must be. Barbara Brown Taylor’s book An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith is an excellent source of this perspective. She notes, that currently church people seem to think that the only “more” available to them is more of the same.

Somewhere along the line we bought - or were sold - the idea that God is chiefly interested in religion. We believed that God’s home was the church, that God’s people knew who they were, and that the world was a barren place full of lost souls in need of all the help they could get. Plenty of us seized on those ideas because they offered us meaning. Believing them gave us purpose and worth. They gave us something noble to do in the midst of lives’ that might otherwise be invisible. Plus, there really are large swaths of the world filled with people in deep need of saving.

The problem is, many of the people in need of saving are in churches, and at least part of what they need saving from is the idea that God sees the world the same way they do. What if the gravel of a parking lot looks as promising to God as the floorboard of a church? What if a lost soul strikes God as more reachable than a lifelong believer? What if God can drop a [Jacob’s] ladder absolutely anywhere, with no regard for the religious standards developed by those who have made it their business to know the way to God?

Somehow we need to rebind the world to G*D and G*D to the world. Out of this encounter, sparks will fly.
 

Psalm 112:1-9, (10)

Epiphany 5 - Year A

Psalm 112:1-9, (10)

Want to keep your saltiness? To shed light into the darkness still around us?

Verse 5 may be what you are looking for - “It is well with those who deal generously and lend, who conduct their affairs with justice.”

The communal and parallel behaviors of sharing and fairness go a long way to keeping steady hearts in the presence of fear producing events such as those who would gnash their teeth at you or otherwise attempt to throw you to lions.

Facing some duress? It’s probably not something you can handle on your own. If it is, it probably isn’t duress? If it is duress, you may want to remember its antidotes: sharing and fairness. These are not short-term cures for anything, but they are long-term health for one and for all.
 

Isaiah 58:1-9a, (9b-12)

Epiphany 5 - Year A

Isaiah 58:1-9a, (9b-12)

From what would you fast if your fast were to be evidenced by sharing your bread with the hungry? Privilege?

Yes, sharing with others means less for you. Yes, that means this kind of fasting as a result of sharing does have consequences. Yes, we are up to facing them (both others and less).

For what would you fast if your fast were to be evidenced by sharing your bread with the hungry? Healing?

Do you want you food to be correctly seasoned? Share. This is how saltiness is maintained.

Do you want to see your food, because we eat with our eyes before eating with our mouth? Share. This is how your light stays lit.

Obviously this kind of fasting goes beyond food. It encompasses every basic need. Only when we are engaged in the process of kindliness and care do we season one another's life and light the way for one another. To avoid a need is tasteless and darkening.
 

Matthew 5:13-20

Epiphany 5 - Year A

Matthew 5:13-20

Good old Popeye, "I 'yams whats I ams, and dats all that I 'yams". Quite a salty guy and light unto a thimble of a world. Popeye takes a lot, but as he sinks into the lowland, lowland, low he has his spinach resurrection that returns him to "all that I 'yams".

How salty are you? Will you allow yourself to be yourself?

Now that a trial date is set, I would speak to you of a friend of mine, a United Methodist clergyperson who will be tried on April 11 for not allowing the church to dilute her saltiness by reining in her celebration of Holy Unions and for letting her lesbian light shine. Amy has come to do what she can to complete a vision of Expansive Love. There is still a long way to go until all is accomplished and Grace is revealed in fullness.

Think for a moment what Jesus says is the basis of all the Law and Prophets. Is it not to love G*D with all one is and has (an expansive love) and to love Neighbors, Self, One Another, and Enemies with that same Expansive Love? If so, this is the law that will not be put aside. If we can still remember the Belovednesses from last week, we might say they are the "grace in-law" which cannot be avoided.

If you would like to learn more about Amy and be in support of her, I invite you to go to LoveOnTrial.org. In reading some of her material, may you find your saltiness restored (yes, it can be restored through healthy relationships) and your courage to be yourself strengthened unto light.
 

beloved

Epiphany 4 - Year A

beloved are the poor, ready for fulfillment
beloved are mourners, ready for dawn
beloved are the gentle, already living their inheritance
beloved are those who yearn for wholeness, satisfaction has begun
beloved are the mercy-full, their joy overflows
beloved are those forgiven, they see G*D everywhere
beloved are those steady in peace, images of G*D for others
beloved are refugees, their home shall travel with them
beloved are those reviled for good, their worthy work will reveal them

beloved are the fair-hearted, they ground reality
beloved are the kindly-lived, they enhance creation
beloved are the humble-minded, they reveal the future

beloved are you, period
beloved am I, comma

beloved, be loved, be love, be
 

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Epiphany 4 - Year A

1 Corinthians 1:18-31

Those with Power claim they has wisdom on their side. How else would they have been “entrusted” with the power they have, if they did not represent the wisest possible way to go. We hear that expressed in one way or another by every winner of a power position. Power and meekness or power and humility do live well together.

At play is a large movement from the nothingness of chaos to everything being vain. We live between and do what we can to hold briefness lightly and with all the gravity we can muster. It is this heavily invested and laughably usable moment that makes a difference.

Paul would equate this with his language of a cross that measures the meaning of creation and re-creation. Paul’s cross image stands to show up power, of whatever ilk. It stands as a bookend to belovedness which lifts up the powerless. And we stand in this moment between a so-solid melting before our eyes and a yet ephemeral future casting a faint path, one less travelled, one day to be recognized as an avenue we all need to tread. And we make a difference.

A conversation with death reminds us how frail is our sense of power and how far from wisdom we yet are. This throws us back on how we choose to live. Our choices will be noted by their grounding. Will we live in light of such qualities beyond the collusion of perceived power and accepted wisdom as the following?

poverty
mourning
meekness
desire
mercy
purity
peacemaking
persecuted
reviled
justice
kindness
humility

The ancients say, “Aye”, The present says, “As soon as we can, but not until we have surety our wisdom is safely in charge”, the future says, “Yea”. This movement can help us stand prophetically in the present whether from Paul’s vision of “Cross” or another creation-centered or eschaton-engaged perspective.

Psalm 15

Epiphany 4 - Year A

Psalm 15

So what are the quizes from Jesus and Micah about. They are practical ways of training our hearts to be ready for healthy responses in very difficult situations.

When we begin to be ready for the next quiz and face a very human choice, that quiz can surface quickly because it is already anticipated. Engaged with questions of meaning will allow us to avoid an opportunity for slander because we are looking to be kind. Likewise, engaged with the deeper cycles of life will have us sidestep getting every tax break we can, every opportunity to get more at another’s expense, every occasion to take advantage. In light of desiring mercy, we will offer it.

Those who are willing to be quizzed again and again, end up solid in their learning, their growing toward G*D (theosis).

Micah 6:1-8

Epiphany 4 - Year A

Micah 6:1-8

Talk about your on-going pop-quiz! Justice! Kindness! Humility!

Or should that be: justice. kindness. humility.

This is one of the lesser known passage regarding the honesty, integrity, judgment of the environment.

G*D is plaintiff and you and I and we are defendents, one and all. G*D’s case is very straight-forward and is placed before judge and jury - creation.

What are the mountains hearing about the way we treat the air, water, land? It is the canary in the mine for the way we treat one another and resources of exchange between us.

G*D’s complaint seems to be about the way we have treated G*D. The suit turns, however, on our relationships with one another. Were these to be characterized by justice, kindness, and humility the case would be thrown out. The mountains and hills could return to their everyday business, G*D’s relationship with us would be restored - as is done to a Neighbor, so it is done to G*D.

And so today’s quiz: Are you and yours any more just/fair than you were yesterday?

And so tomorrow’s quiz: Are you and yours any more kind than you were today?

And so a quiz for the day after tomorrow: Are you and yours any more humble/loving than you may think possible tomorrow?

And so the quizes continue, opportunity by opportunity.
 

Matthew 5:1-12

Epiphany 4 - Year A

Matthew 5:1-12

These wonderful words of the Sermon on the Mount are addressed to those apprenticed to Jesus, “the committed”, as The Message has it.

If just tossed out to anyone, they lose their power. Aphorisms, platitudes, and the like are more likely to act as barriers to learning.

Rather these are are part of a periodic snap quiz, variously constructed.

1) Give evidence that the following statements are blessings.

2) Rank the following blessings in your life from the most evident to the one you are most uncertain of.

3) Note an intermediary blessing between each of the following that connects the blessing before it with the one that follows.

4) What would change were Pilate or Herod to recognize these blessings were the expected outcome of their rule?

5) For each blessing, note 3 people who are doing better than you are with acting out of that blessing and then go to them for further instruction.

6) What is another blessing that should be added to the list for at least a day?

7) Complete the sentence: “Blessed are the blessed, for they . . . .”

When these blessings are engaged as part of an on-going self-study, they deepen one’s spirit. When joined into as a community journey, they widen the reach of the common good. Note that these are not conclusions, but quizes of our life and lives.
 

job creation

Epiphany 3 - Year A

repent
the end is near
by end I mean
a preferred future
is arriving

follow me
new relationships are near
by new relationships I mean
perfection turns out
to be wholeness

together
a push from the past
a pull from the future
redeems arrests
with new vocations
 

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

Epiphany 3 - Year A

1 Corinthians 1:10-18

Church quarrels go back to our very beginning. They are part of our DNA. We are still splitting ourselves into various constituencies.

Has Christ been divided or is that a necessary component of a Christ that engages this particular creation. We do tend to idealize our leaders, whether Paul, Apollos, Cephas, a particular Pope, Martin Luther, John Wesley, the Jesus of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Thomas, Mary, or yourself. What do you make of our ancient or contemporary quarrels? How many Saints were burned as Heretics and how many Heretics have been elevated to Sainthood. What is the half-life of a Creed? What is the cost/benefit ratio of any given Creed?

If Jesus told us to go and baptize and Paul explicitly says he was not sent to do so, what does that mean for you? How else might you join Paul in foolishness beyond a literalism of red letters?

Are you following Jesus and baptism, Paul and the cross, Kairos CoMotion and expansive love? One of these? Two? All three? Another? Blessings to you on following your call, even if not understood by the institutions (formal and informal) around you.

Psalm 27:1, 4-9

Epiphany 3 - Year A

Psalm 27:1, 4-9

What does it mean to live in the “house” or “rebuilt tent” of G*D?

Here are some responses of the Psalmist to that question:

• to behold beauty
• to inquire of meaning
• to receive shelter
• to have a good view
• to be supported
• to be joyful in service
• to seek clarity
• to have presence

Are these characteristics of the congregation you are with?

What mechanisms do you use to experience, see and act on, a heart full of courage? Hopefully they include at least one from column A, another from column B, and yet a third option from column C. That is, that you are not limited to religious responses, even if asking a question to which religion is all too quick to respond.
 

Isaiah 9:1-4

Epiphany 3 - Year A

Isaiah 9:1-4

It is good to hear about “no gloom”. Even as nations and regions are brought back to life, we hear, in the midst of their circumstance, a new call beyond themselves. This passage speaks of a joyful harvest, which could be imaged as putting together all the various fruits of the sea and land and air in a net.

What this passage is waiting for is our response to participate in bringing this picture of the future into the present. We may not be able to harvest the future in all its fullness, but we can do our part in our present part.
 

Matthew 4:12-23

Epiphany 3 - Year A

Matthew 4:12-23

Stories of call can be seen through a number of different lenses. This week we hear about Jesus being proactive in recruiting followers. Last week it was Baptizer John who was instrumental in connecting followers with Jesus.

In both cases there is Good Action behind the calls. John has Jesus say “Stay with me” which means, stand with me, see what grounds me. Matthew notes the grounding is good news about our living and loving together - healing of the public - and healing of individuals.

This Good Action is still available for us to participate in and reveal to others. Whether you then name Jesus or not, Good Living will continue to draw people toward G*D and one Neighbor after another.

Likewise, “fishing for people” is not about forming exclusive clubs. To fish well is to identify and use every available Good Action (our lure, our net), public and private. Blessings upon your being alluring.
 

Universal Background

Epiphany 2 - Year A

After a week of finding a reason to say “Yes” to the opportunities that come our way and also finding that there is no little Friday condensation leaping full-blown from a lowly forehead, one of the sources I’ve invited into my email space brought a poem that said what I would affirm and thought you might appreciate it, too.

G*D says Yes to me

Read it and do a small dance while a Cosmic Background Radiation, with slightly more matter than anti-matter, sets a lively beat. 

1 Corinthians 1:1-9

Epiphany 2 - Year A

1 Corinthians 1:1-9

“Called to be saints”, is a line worth remembering as well as simply membering - being mindful of something important, like being beloved.

We might translate this phrase, “Intended to be beloved”. Note that this is addressed to a congregation and not just an individual. When was the last time you dealt with the plural reality of “saintliness” or “belovedness”?

A result of revealing mindful saints is the giving of thanks. May someone be thankful for your individual saintliness and our common belovedness.

Psalm 40:1-11

Epiphany 2 - Year A

Psalm 40:1-11

I waited and waited and waited for God. [Psalm 40:1a, The Message]

Remember how far it is from Jesus’ birth to baptism. It is far longer than Christmas to Epiphany. Traditionally it was a 30 year wait. Less than the 40 year wait in the Wilderness, but still a long time. How many died for no good reason during that wait? How many were born? How consistently perfect were our heroic figures?

“At last God looked; finally God listened. [Psalm 40:1b, The Message]

The wait was about a direct encounter, a sense of belovedness strong enough to stop waiting. Enough, G*D, of the active listening. Enough, G*D, of the appreciative inquiry. Enough, G*D, of the anticipatory waiting. Enough.

Now, with a firm understanding of mercy beyond repentance, Jesus rises out of chaotic waters (even as Moses put his sandals back on after that mystery of an unconsumed burning bush). And you? No matter how great your repentance it will always be outdone by mercy. So you might as well get on with it - receive great mercy, give great mercy.

So it is we move to the end of the pericope, “Do not, O Lord, withhold your mercy from me; let your steadfast love and your faithfulness keep me safe forever. [Psalm 40:11, NRSV] No matter how long it has been, living the moment in mercy more than balances all the years of waiting (well, if your view is long enough and you don’t want to apply fairness or justice to each opportunity faced). Perhaps we only need to affirm that mercy is a more wholesome approach to life than is an insistence on repentance.

May you find a new song of mercy on your tongue and in your life.

 

Isaiah 49:1-7

Epiphany 2 - Year A

Isaiah 49:1-7

Being called before being made is a marvelous image of the pull of the future working its way into the present and, if you are bold enough, into the past. Pushing a picture into the future of a preferred way of being is another way to talk about this same mystery that connects space and time with all parts of time and space.

Note that this work of deep calling to deep - whether forward or backward - is not intended for such minutia as finding a parking space or extra dollars. If deep is going to call deep, it is for much deeper effect than the personal (not that such is excluded, just that the personal will be included within a larger context).

You and I and we together are lights and light beyond ourselves. There is a temptation to use the comic phrase of “Flame on!” except that it is all to easily understood as abusive language precursing violence. Mere heat is not what is looked for, rather light that illumines an original choice - not simply knowing good and evil but actually choosing the good when it is inconvenient to do so.

Tomorrow desires us to light today that tomorrow might better shine.

John 1:29-42

Epiphany 2 - Year A

John 1:29-42

Simply being born a child of G*D does not seem to be enough to have us care for children.

Recognition by the poorest menials, rich foreigners, or a prophet such as Anna brings no additional shift from cultural expectations.

Simply having good 12-year-old questions of authority does not seem to be enough to have our spirit nurtured.

Witness of a spirit returning to one’s breathing being (instead of leaving) still leaves questions of commitment beyond belief. John can affirm Jesus for John’s disciples, but seemingly not for himself.

As you look around, where do you see the Spirit descend and remain? On a person? A group? An ecosystem? That is a call to be present there, not to send money or others, but to be personally present.

As you see the light dawn, be the light.

 

a long way

Epiphany 1 - “Baptism of the Lord” - Year A

I’ve come a long way

Galilee to Jordan

takes intentionality

not to mention

time and energy

I’ve come a long way

and then I hear

I’m to give

what I came to get

and I say no

I’ve come a long way

now I have only one word

now is the time

now go ahead anyway

now now now

I’ve come a long way

did I mention

Galilee to Jordan

don’t try to get out of

doing your job now

I’ve come a long way

from Galilee to Jordan

from refusal to accord

from underwater to heavenly height

from be-loved to beloved

I’ve come a long way

Galilee to Jordan

isn’t so long any more

Jordan to Jerusalem

is now a longer way yet

Epiphany Church

This morning I posted comments about the Matthew lection for Epiphany.

This evening I was reminded of a sermon by Janet Wolf about being an Epiphany Church. Her sermon begins 3 minutes into the podcast. It is worth 50 minutes of your time.

Matthew 2:1-12

Epiphany - Year A

Matthew 2:1-12

http://edges.canadahomepage.net/2011/01/05/953/

In addition to Jim Taylor’s column, be sure to read the last of the “Your Turn” comments.

 

Acts 10:34-43

Epiphany 1 - “Baptism of the Lord” - Year A

Acts 10:34-43

G*D shows no partiality - except, of course, to us.

G*D ”allowed” Jesus (that rambunctious child in need of learning propriety regarding spreading grace willy-nilly) to appear to us, to the chosen. And Jesus (having apparently learned his religious etiquette) is set to judge lack of grace.

Forgiveness is no longer individually received through ritual or communally received on an annual basis. Now it is a Jesus commodity, part of his conglomerate, his corporation.

Peter had a wonderfully expansive insight and then backed off extending it past those he had personally encountered.

 

Psalm 29

Epiphany 1 - “Baptism of the Lord” - Year A

Psalm 29

Even though it is 10 verses to 1, a basic balance between Creator and Creature continues. The first 10 verses “Ascribe to the Lord...”. The 11th verse “Ascribes to the people...”.

Even with all the praise language, honor is still given to the people. They have belovedness on their side and, with that, a basic core strength that is precursor to peace. With their belovedness, the people are able to stand firm in peace, not needing to rely on violence, even a redemptive kind.

Don’t be fooled by the verse count. This Psalm affirms the importance of blessing and being blessed, of acting with peaceful strength.

 

Isaiah 42:1-9

Epiphany 1 - “Baptism of the Lord” - Year A

Isaiah 42:1-9

Here is one version: “You are beloved.”

Here is another: “You will be just.”

Justice is not extraordinary action. You do it without raising a ruckus. Steady - don’t faint. Be a light where you are to reveal better choices.

So here is the thing: You are beloved; you are just. Go ahead, reveal it.

Matthew 3:13-17

Epiphany 1 - “Baptism of the Lord” - Year A

Matthew 3:13-17

So often we would prevent others from receiving what we have. Somehow or other we play an exaggerated zero-sum game when it comes to ourselves - If “they” get some of what I have, I won’t have anything!

Here Baptizer John has a variation on with that by preventing himself from offering what he has. He plays a “poor me” game.

Jesus has a helpful approach to change - “For the moment, let’s just try it as an experiment and see what happens. If it turns out the way you say, I’ll do it your way. If it turns out what you have to offer is more than you think you have, we’ll just take the results.”

The Baptizer consented to this approach and baptized Jesus for repentance of sins.

Turns out that the Baptizer’s baptism brought forth a great deal - belovedness restored.

Now the game is afoot. Angels singing of “Peace on Earth” is one thing, a dove’s coo of “beloved” is quite another. The first takes responsibility away from ourselves and the second energizes us to take one more step toward a healing of our past (see Healing of Memories by Dennis and Matthew Linn) that our present and future might blossom and grow.

www

Christmas 2 - Year A

www

world-wide web

word’s wonder-way

witnessed water/wine

wickedness wills weeping

we worship wounds

what when where

want whole who’s

watch wise women

write with wind

~ wisconsin wesley white

Ephesians 1:3-14

Christmas 2 - Year A

Ephesians 1:3-14

Always with the particularlizing.

Christmas turns out to not be a joy to the world, a sign of peace to all people. One way and another, laying a baby in an open manger transfers the significance from angelic song to joy and peace for all to only being available through one personification of an expansive and expanding G*D.

What new lens is needed to see everyone as adopted? Are we all in this together, or not? What value is there in continuing to make “wisdom and insight” smaller in scope rather than larger?

Read your Rahner again to see that everyone is marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit.

Was your Christmas for you and yours? Was there an element of it being for everyone? If the last 2,000 years are any indication, an end to us will not happen before another celebration of Christmas. This gives a year in which to better celebrate a wider joy and a deeper peace. Blessings on your journey from an echo of a previous Christmas to the implementing of a next Christmas of “every blessing”.

 

Psalm 147:12-20

Christmas 2 - Year A

Psalm 147:12-20

“He declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and ordinances to Israel.”

One of the questions of our day is about a correlation between our realities and the scriptures. In a three-storied universe this laser-like action of G*D from above looks different than a distributed universe filled with horizontal uncertainty principles, quantum indeterminacy, and evolutionary processes.

As we celebrate a new year, how might we celebrate a new approach to and appreciation of ancient wisdom that does not constrain a future to the past or enter a future forgetful of its past?

Christmas is not just remembrance, but a continued anticipation of the new breaking into the settled and returning it to its in-breaking energy, releasing it from accreted constraints.

Jeremiah 31:7

Christmas 2 - Year A

Jeremiah 31:7-14

Feel like you are part of a remnant? I suppose there are plenty of reasons that could be given for such an interpretation of your experience. The surrounding bounty doesn’t seem to translate into bringing folks back together but has been used by those in power to further divide creation from itself and the rich from the poor.

Feel like you are part of a remnant? Recalculate. A gathering beyond our ken is already begun. We are asked to live as though this gathering is more real than our fears that we are spinning apart, never to return.

Let’s return to a translation of yore - KJV.

9 They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them: I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble:

12Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together to the goodness of the LORD, for wheat, and for wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow any more at all.

Track the parallels - weeping to singing, the water (rivers and gardens), and souls (no stumbling, sorrow). Choices here make a significant difference in how we engage opportunities.

Feel like you are part of a remnant? Get over it.

 

John 1:(1-9), 10-18

Christmas 2 - Year A

John 1:(1-9), 10-18

"Word" was in the world.

The world came into being through "Word".

The world didn't know "Word".

Wrap your heart and mind around that series and you can take the rest of the year off.

 

Christmas Day

Christmas Day - Year A

John 1:1-18

The light of a sign continues to radiate. Neither time nor distance dims its packets of waves. Our time and space asks of us to be conscious of a ray of light and a willingness to point it out, to pass it on.

A light here, a light there. Pretty soon all are enlightened. Children of G*D here, children of G*D there. Pretty soon our common experience of grace and truth opens us to one another. Everyone sees G*D and Neighbor (one does not stand alone). We all become everyday children of G*D and Neighbors of one another.

May the people who have received Jesus rejoice in their reception and equally rejoice with those who have received other signs of G*D. Every child of G*D shines glory on creation, becomes a Light unto the nations. Thank you for releasing your light.

May this day of rejoicing in Jesus soon be a day of rejoicing, period.

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve - Year A

Luke 2:1-20

Kings don't want a sign that will confirm there is a change a-comin'. Change is always dangerous to their position.

Shepherds don’t want a sign that will confirm there is a change a-comin’. Change means a big risk.

Those in power don’t want to lose any authority. Those out of power fear being even lower on the authority scale. Signs are difficult for everyone for they require a response. Better if a sign is not asked for nor recognized.

This night we remember the Shepherd part of the equation. A sign of the Messiah come to reorganize our specific culture and those of everyone else has become a given. Unasked, in its own time, within a context acknowledged to be far from a healthy, a sign is given - a baby is born. Thankfully it was born in a manger which is far easier to track down than a baby born in a household - mangers are something shepherds know about.

Fast forward to the Shepherds actually checking out an unasked for sign. Who all do you envision being in the manger? Mary, yes. Joseph, yes. Anyone else? So when the Shepherds saw a swaddled baby in a manger and made known the stimulus for their coming to look, and Mary treasured their words - who all heard their testimony? We often fantasize about the Shepherds going door to door to tell  folks about what they had heard and seen, but probably not.

They talked with Mary and Joseph and returned to shepherding, filled with glory and praise. Again, we often fantasize about their composing songs of thanksgiving. What is your experience of being filled with glory and praise? Hopefully it will have something to do with proceeding to live the next stage of your life differently than you have done up to this time. I envision the Shepherds expressing their glory and praise by forming a Shepherd’s Union and beginning a Jubilee process from a labor base.

May your sign, your checking it out, your witnessing to it, your calling, all be engaged in transforming the present into the presence of G*D come on earth as it is in heaven.

May what ordinary signs you hear and see this day awaken you to new hope, new options, new commitment.

weeping continues

Christmas 1 - Year A

weeping continues

for children lost

oblivious selves

bloody atonement

surface unkindness

dismissed refugees

death by hunger

winning at any cost

short-lived honors

over-time jobs

compromised health

invisible babes

rote praise

surprise unacknowledged

dimness of imagination

weeping continues

in heaven

as it is on earth

unconsoled

self-selected out

exorcised out

angelic weeping

wracking sobs

diminished we-feeling

suffering raised

expectation lowered

for one and all

refugee wandering

away and back

and on and on

weeping continues

a sad-eyed dog

never petted enough

after excitement wanes

turning once and twice

three times and four

curls in manger hay

awaiting a next influx

of lives and life

each as holy

as holy can be

receiving a gift

of just enough

in a greedy world

and then its gone

weeping continues

in the face of green

garlands galore

in spite of hymns

high in glory

in preparation of hope

living within

in reaction to hope

dashed aborning

incomplete

tears dammed

break lose

flooding decision-makers

in sorrow

weeping continues

personal identity issues

arrive and arrive some more

having danced with race

and gender and ethnicity

sexual orientation and immigrants

we go around

variation upon variation

until outsides are exhausted

and so we weep

in prelude to inside segregation

loyalty oaths

creedal formulas

demanded

enforced

weeping continues

inhumanity to you

inhumanity from you

inhmanity around you

weeping continues

lies are told

bullshit grows

truth is avoided

weeping continues

experience begins

literalism chimes in

integration continues

weeping continues

weeping

continues

 

Hebrews 2:10-18

Christmas 1 - Year A

Hebrews 2:10-18

The weakest person you meet today is still your long-lost sister or brother.

As their sibling, be not ashamed to proclaim wonders that they might overhear and put their life in a larger context. You will be proclaiming mysterious things such as death doing away with death-dealers and thus freeing those enslaved by fear of death.

You’ve been tested and sometimes come through. This is the authority you have to proclaim new life to someone who has had a test they didn’t altogether pass. To proclaim past our experience is to get into the tricky area of saying more than we know, having our praise become mere words and formulas. So stick with reality.

It may help to remember some of the tests Jesus faced - birthed in a no-account place by ordinary folk; being a refugee from persecution and knowing that innocent others  were killed while he got away; growing up oblivious of the turmoil he caused by not traveling with the family; being in another no-account place for years of silent growth; hearing he is beloved and not letting it go to his head during some temptations; etc., etc. What tests have you faced? This is the grounding we need to be an evangelist.

Today, while rejoicing over yesterday’s defeat of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell and health benefits for 9/11 responders we can’t forget the children of immigrants, allied with those from Ramah, denied a reasonable path to citizenship.

G*D, Jesus, Spirit, Church, you, me - are to help our long-lost sisters and brother. To work together is a position of hope and power. Through your testing experiences you have learned to be a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of G*D. With this learning under our belt, we have only the small matter of implementation. Go ahead, be not ashamed of your long-lost sister or brother or whole clan, express G*D’s mercy.

 

Psalm 148

Christmas 1 - Year A

Psalm 148

From Walter Brueggemann’s, Israel’s Praise, we hear about a process moving from transformation to order:

     The Psalm is basically a set of imperatives mobilizing all of creation to affirm, praise, and legitimate. The reasons are compelling, but they are nearly smothered beneath the succession of imperatives.

     The loss of reason and the preoccupation with summons reflect a shift in theological sensitivity that begins to cut off the worshiping community from its own experience.

It is this cutting ourselves off from our experience by our doctrinal affirmations that begins to set us up for another round of repentance.

What is your experience of Christmas? This, as differentiated from what you think your experience of Christmas should be.

Brueggemann concludes his analysis of hymns of praise with this schema:

      I have identified three rather different ways in which the shift is made in the hymns of praise, from authenticating experience to legitimated world:

• A shift in the balance between the rhetoric or reason and summons. Israel loses its concrete memory and experience, and ends with no reasons for the praise that is compelled with an imperative. The summons to praise becomes absolute and unjustified. 

• A shift from specificity to generalization. Israel loses it specificity and recites generalizations which have a bite of neither affront nor energy. 

• A shift from the motif of liberation to the motif of creation. This shift softens the memory of displacing transformation which is both threat and gift, and evokes a happy, organic world of harmony and well-being.

     These three shifts, I submit, reflect Israel’s move away from a radical world of disciplined obedience and imaginative commitment to a new community of humane possibility, to a world of complacency, triumph, prosperity, and self-sufficiency. In this world obedience is not as urgent, human possibility is not as cherished, hope is not as defiant or dangerous.

     In addition to these three changes in rhetoric, I should mention a fourth dimension of such an adjustment which I shall not pursue. There is, I believe, a reduction of language so that the great narrative accounts of God’s activity are reduced to barren adjectives and finally to comforting nouns.

The account and experience of Ramah doesn’t just jump to the praise of this Psalm. Too much is lost if a call to transformation of violence to mercy simply becomes expected praise with no connection to our experience.

- - -

Bonus Christmas Story: Gifts of Life.

Isaiah 63:7-9

Christmas 1 - Year A

Isaiah 63:7-9

I’m intrigued with the language of:

according to G*D’s mercy

and

according to the abundance of G*D’s steadfast love.

At first blush we see the salvation of our distress when a certain level of abundance shows up. Mercy is not put off because of anything in particular on our part because G*D seems to prefer to see us as “not dealing falsely” with G*D’s mercy - we’ll appreciate it and respond to it. Mercy is delayed as a result of a lack of abundance of a desired steadfast-love. When steadfast-love is again abundant, merciful action based upon it will again be engaged.

If we were to extend the passage through the next chapter, we would see that these three little verses are only prelude to a much longer lamentation. From this optimistic beginning, the passage devolves into a complaint about G*D’s alternator not charging G*D’s level of steadfast love. Being a refugee is no easy matter, even if it is a time of learning and a provider of opportunity to show steadfast-love toward G*D before G*D can show it. We have experienced G*D coming through in the past and we want to remind G*D that intervention in unfairness can be done again.

Given that this passage, standing on its own, devoid of context, is such a happy one, how do you see it playing in Ramah, then or now?

Matthew 2:13-23

Christmas 1 - Year A

Matthew 2:13-23

Gift-givers come and gift-givers go. Gift yourself with a remembrance of those who have gifted you. Some are still with you and some are not. In either case their gift remains even should you find yourself alienated at home or abroad.

The prophecy, the classic quest, contains places dangerous and foreign to our experience. We all are called out of one “Egypt” or another. Heroes and heroines all face their own alienation and are eventually strengthened through that process to offer compassion to not only themselves, but others.

Living as a refugee turns out to be a much better gift than gold, frankincense, and myrrh. It shapes one’s identification with other “children of Ramah”. This is bottom-line creation material. Out of disaster, chaos, lamentation, disunion, and disjuncture comes a new word, “Let there be a new light on our commonality - weeping for one another.”

We weep for the generations of gay and lesbian patriots who were barred from service to their country. There is still weeping aplenty for gay and lesbian Christians barred from discipleship through their church. Repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” is helpful, but there are still miles to go before this becomes a non-issue.

We weep for the generations of immigrants barred from participation in their new country. A refused Dream Act has a certain irony in this season of being led by dreams. There are still miles to go before this becomes enacted, much less seemingly natural.

Gift-givers come and gift-givers go. Deliver the gift that is you and it will be enough.