St. Margaret's Sermon Archive

4/18/2010 - The Rev. Emily J. Guthrie - The Third Sunday of Easter

2010-04-18T14:36:00.000-04:00

One of my dear young friends has a familiar signature at the bottom of her emails: “God uses damaged people.” She sends a LOT of emails. Though I don’t often forward to the 10 people required so that I will be blessed 10fold in the next hour…I do end up reading this tagline at least once daily. God uses damaged people. And as ubiquitous as that phrase is, I now find I love being reminded of it again and again. It’s comforting…

This morning in Acts, we hear the symbol-laden story of Saul’s life altering experience on the road to Damascus. Saul was a young tent maker and Pharisee, a highly educated religious man who believed with many of the Jewish authorities that those who “belonged to the Way,” as the early Christians called themselves, needed to be controlled. But Saul was a zealot and unlike others of the Pharisees, Acts reports he breathed threats and murder and went from house to house to root out the men and women followers so that he could torture them or send them to prison.

But on his way to Damascus to bring back any Jews who had become followers of Jesus, his life changes. He hears the voice of Jesus calling him out on the truth of his life, and calling him to take all that had been given him and use it to build up the people of God. For Saul, his conversion – literally his turning around, his transformation – was sudden, unexpected and altogether life altering. Saul sees with new eyes. He sees his life and the lives of those around him through the lens of a God who loves and heals. In the past, he used power to instill fear, commit violence and create dissention. In his new life as Paul, he struggles and mostly succeeds to use his power and authority to inspire, instruct, lead and nurture the followers of Jesus in the first century of the Common Era, and for generations since.

Paul begins a life that would take this message of a living God to Jews and non-Jews alike, to cities and towns, to wealthy and poor, in ways that he would never have imagined. God it seems certainly used this one very damaged person…for glorious purposes.

Take also the disciples; they are so blessedly imperfect. Still fishing on the wrong side of the boat. Still not sure what they should do or if they should speak, even though knowing in their hearts that they are seeing and eating breakfast with the Jesus who they knew died and yet lives. In so many of the stories, they just don’t seem to get what Jesus is saying half the time. And yet they lived lives of recognizable difference, of noticeable love, of radical inclusion. Indeed this small group of Palestinian Jewish fishermen and working women, struggling to feed their families and make sense out of their lives, gave us a way to envision being disciples in our own day. In no way were they perfect, in no way could they be construed as the obvious choice for God’s revelation, and yet they were each willing to follow and carry on the message of God’s extraordinary love and radical vision for the People of God.

It is fascinating to me that each are called precisely for all their gifts and all their imperfections. It makes sense that Paul’s knowledge of language, of philosophy, of Jewish theology, culture, and tradition prepared him to speak and live as a follower of Jesus in cities across the Greco-Roman world and beyond. Yet the fact that Paul was a zealot, not only as a Pharisee, but also as a follower of Jesus, made him even more suited in many ways to his ministry! Who else would have had the zeal to work and teach for years in the face of persecution, hunger, conflict? This imperfection, this place where he was damaged and damaged others, is oddly the very thing that made him so effective in shaping a conversation that would last for generations about what it means to live a faithful life, to create communities of faith, to follow the Risen Christ.

Some years ago, a woman named Felita came to one of our programs at Capitol Hill Group Ministry. That is her name because she loved us to tell her story because she was proud of her transformation. When I first met her, she said straight out – “I’m damaged goods.” She had fled an abusive relationship and found herself homeless and incapacitated from the trauma. Yet over the course of the year and a half that I knew her – she became one of the most powerful teachers and leaders that I have known.

She hated us at first, cursed us up one side and down the other. Lord that woman could use some language. Then one day she decided that we were for real. We weren’t going anywhere. And almost just like that, she turned around. She started working harder than all of us staff combined. In short order, Felita got her 6 children back, earned a training degree that enabled her to then get a job, found a place to live, and began teaching our younger women to love themselves, and teaching all of us to recognize and use our broken places as places where the light of Christ can break into our lives.

I miss her so much… walking with Felita was walking with the risen Christ. You could feel the power of her love, compassion, and righteous anger for just action. God and Felita, they took broken lives and stretched them, not into perfection – but into something whole and holy.

Yes, God uses damaged people. And it just may be that our broken places are or will be where the sacred seeps into our lives – and seeps out into the world.

3/21/2010 - The Rev. Emily J. Guthrie - The Fifth Sunday of Lent

2010-03-21T09:41:00.000-04:00

Let us pray:
Oh God our great companion, send us anywhere you would have us go, only go there with us. Place upon us any burden you desire, only stand by us to sustain us. Break any tie that binds us, except the tie that binds us to you. Amen.
“I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. The wild animals will honor me, the jackals and the ostriches; for I give water in the wilderness, rivers in the desert, to give drink to my chosen people, the people whom I formed for myself so that they might declare my praise.” Isaiah 43: 19-21
This morning we hear from the prophet known as Second Isaiah who is reminding the people Israel that God is faithful, will provide a way, will do a new thing. It was written to the people Israel when they were in exile in Babylon, and so this was a message of the promise of freedom, of God’s constancy and continued covenant with God’s people. But getting to this freedom, this new life, necessitated letting go of the comfort of the status quo. Many had become part of the Babylonian infrastructure, and the last thing they wanted to do was leave for what was guaranteed to be a (literal) journey through the wilderness. God calls to the people Israel and God calls to us today to seek the way of freedom, the extraordinary promise of new life.
It makes sense given these circumstances that the Prophet conjures up images of the Exodus here: a path in the mighty waters, part of central memory of God’s magnificent act of freedom for the people Israel in order to entice them to embark on the journey home. But then - in what seems an odd move indeed - he immediately cautions “do not remember the former things or consider the things of old.” Right away, we see the creative tension: remember the powerful work of God who parted the sea for your ancestors, yet don’t remember the former things. In a poetic turn the prophet urges us to remember God’s presence in the past, but cautions us not to look behind us….stay focused on the future that is unfolding now…right before your eyes.

Once again, the ancient ones know what it is to be human. We won’t be able to see what God is up to now, in the present, if we are focused on the past. We have to try to honor the past and stay open to the new thing unfolding. A tricky dance indeed. Change when it springs forth, brings not only possibility and energy, but loss. Even if we are choosing the next step, the loss attends. There is a cost to moving into new life. We finish the 6th grade and leave a beloved teacher behind. We move to the excitement of a new life and grieve the daily life we have created. A Relationships ends and we are alone. A relationship begins and suddenly we have no time alone! In each case, it seems we have to let go of the familiar, to open our hearts and lives for the new thing, for life reemerging in a new form.
So the promise of change is new life, and the cost is giving up the ways of the past, the known, the comfortable. And we know the way of life will have change, loss, and suffering, not because we deserve to suffer, but because death, little deaths and ultimate death, is life’s dance partner.
And yet, and yet, God begs us to trust that there are new unimaginable things happening that will bring new life. I will make a way through the cross to resurrection life. I will make a way in the wilderness of your lives, and rivers in the deserts of your hearts. You will not be alone on this journey. Stay focused on the future unfolding right now before your eyes.
I mentioned changes we choose, but there are the changes we do not choose, we suddenly become ill, violence occurs, someone we love dies and our lives are changed forever. A new reality, a new life, unbidden. Will new life spring forth even there? And God through Jesus the Christ whispers – yes even there my beloved people. Do not be afraid of the journey. I am about to do a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?
Next week we begin Holy Week, when we are invited to participate in the journey of Jesus into Jerusalem, to the cross, and resurrection. St. Paul posits that in participating in Jesus’ suffering, our suffering is transformed. Indeed the way to the resurrection is through the cross. But because of the resurrection, we have the courage to walk into and through that wilderness.
Perhaps we can perceive the new thing that God is doing in and through our loss and pain. In the journey through Holy Week we are reminded that God in Jesus knows intimately the landscape of the totality of our lives, the gamut of human experience: Adoration, blessing, fear, bone deep love, betrayal, suffering, death, mourning, anxiety, confusion, wonder… a story told again and again not because of the suffering, but because of the redemption that transforms the suffering.
I leave you with a final image…a gift from John’s Gospel to hold in our hearts as we move into Holy Week: the image of Mary anointing Jesus’ feet. John describes a dinner party at the home of Mary, Martha and Lazarus for Jesus. Others are there, including Judas. But the powerful image is of Mary. She takes the costliest thing she owns, a pound of pistachio nut oil she likely bought for a burial, and pours it on Jesus’ feet. Then in an intensely intimate act, Mary wipes his feet with her hair. It is an act of loving abandon, done without concern for any other’s judgment, an outpouring of love and gratitude that literally fills the house with the fragrance of her love. She says nothing and yet in this act we know that she perceives God doing a new thing through Jesus. Her response is to bless God. It is an image of absolute bone deep love and devotion.
Let us perceive the new things God is doing, and with Mary bless the Lord.

3/14/2010 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Fourth Sunday of Lent

2010-03-14T09:39:00.000-04:00

“A priest seated himself at a coffee shop counter next to a man who immediately noticed his clerical apparel. ‘Where is your Church?’ the man asked. The priest pointed in the direction of the Church on the corner and the man said, ‘Why that’s the church I go to.’ ‘I’ve been there five years and I don’t believe I have ever seen you,’ said the priest. The man replied: ‘I never said I was a fanatic!’”
(Copied)

I would suggest this morning that the parable told by Jesus of the Prodigal is a call to fanatic and radical reconciliation. Let us look at the setting. Jesus was under heavy criticism from the Pharisees for eating with tax collectors and sinners, the most outcast at that time. He responded with three parables…the lost coin, the lost sheep and then the lost son. He was challenging the establishment to look beyond their rigidity and to recognize that God was and is a God of radical love and forgiveness.
Let us look briefly at the main characters in the story. First, the youngest son dared to ask for his share of his inheritance prior to the death of his father. Normally there would have been a division – 2/3 to the eldest who would care for his mother and unmarried sisters, and 1/3 to the youngest. Not only did the father give the youngest his share, but he also turned over the remainder of his wealth to the eldest. It could be surmised that the younger son didn’t trust his brother to divide things fairly.
The younger then went off to a distant land and squandered his fortune. By his behavior he sullied his father’s name and showed himself to be an immature wastrel. When he found himself feeding pigs to survive, still thinking only of himself, he came crawling home.
The father, seeing his son walking while still far away, ran to him and embraced him. This would have been highly unusual for an elderly, austere Jewish man to do in those days. Further, when he reached his son he embraced him and kissed him, a sign of forgiveness. Before the younger could even ask for forgiveness, the father called for a robe, a ring and sandals to replace his tatters. He then told the servants to kill the fatted calf for a feast.
The elder brother, on the other hand was not so generous. He had stayed at home, been very obedient, as only we eldest children can be, and was angry that his wastrel brother was being honored in a way that he, who had obeyed all the rules, had not been. It is pretty clear that he thought he had earned it! In many ways, he was like the Pharisees to whom Jesus was speaking. He, too, disappointed his father by not being willing to welcome his brother home.
The elder brother was much like the Pharisees, the establishment, who followed the rules and made judgments as to who followed them. He put greed and entitlement above relationship. We, too, often behave in this way. The younger brother was like us also…putting greed above relationship, wanting only his own way and selfishly seeking it.
The father, however, illustrated the radical reconciliation and forgiveness of God. We, in God’s eyes, have been forgiven before we even ask. All our trespasses have been forgiven as we are welcomed home to our God of pure and unadulterated love. The sacrifice of Jesus for all of us was the ultimate expression of that fanatic and radical forgiveness.
Lent calls us home to God, to renew our relationship and intimacy with the one who created us. In addition to prayer and worship, Barbara Brown Taylor has said that the only way to work out our relationship with God is to work out our relationship with one another. (Copied) The two sons thought that they could be in relationship with their father and not with one another. True healing in the parable would only come through the reconciliation of the two sons.
Desmond Tutu wrote an incredible op ed piece in the Washington Post on Friday calling for radical reconciliation on the continent of Africa regarding treatment of gay and lesbian persons. He chastised politicians and clerics of all faiths for daring to exclude anyone in God’s name.
Let us in this latter half of Lent come home to God through a radical reconciliation with the members of our families, our parish, our church, our denomination, our city, our nation and the international community. Help us to dare to be fanatics for God as we demonstrate outlandish love for one another. AMEN

2/21/2010 - The Rev. Alexander Webb - The First Sunday in Lent

2010-02-21T10:01:00.000-05:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

I have never been all that fond of Lent. Lent is long, the Great Litany is long, and my list of sins, vices, and temptations is long, long, long. I’m a busy person, and I move at a pretty fast pace. Why would I take time from my work to reflect on my shortcomings?

Yet, despite my objections, Lent keeps coming around, year after year. Actually, it feels like we’ve already had a few Lents this year. Several of the recent snowstorms have brought my life to an unexpected, unanticipated, undesired halt. On nights that were cold, dark, and still, I could not help but spend time reflecting on my life, my faith, and my future. I have come to see that time spent in holy reflection equips us to face the challenges of our lives. Lent prepares us to live the lives that God calls us to live.

In the third chapter of Luke, we learn of Jesus’ baptism. The Holy Spirit descends from heaven like a dove, and anoints Jesus as God’s Son, the descendent of Adam with whom God is well pleased. Immediately thereafter, in today’s gospel lesson, the Holy Spirit takes Jesus into the cold, dark stillness of the wilderness for forty days of reflection.

Luke does not tell us very much about those forty days, only that Jesus fasted, that he ate nothing at all, and that he was tempted by the devil. I can only imagine the powerful and intimate conversations that Jesus had with God as they wandered together in the wilderness: Conversations about life, faith, and God’s plan for salvation.

When Jesus emerged, he was famished, and we would have been famished too: physically, mentally, spiritually. But, Jesus’ challenges were not over. Jesus emerges from his forty-day fast only to find the devil waiting to tempt him once again.

The devil points to a rock and says, “Look there, if you are the Son of God, change that rock in to bread, and eat.” But, Jesus quietly quotes scripture and keeps to himself. The devil sweeps him up and shows him all the kingdoms of the world. “Look here, worship me, and in an instant all this authority, all this power, all this dominion can be yours.” But, Jesus quietly quotes scripture and keeps to himself. In one final attempt, the devil whisks Jesus up to the pinnacle of the temple, the highest height, the very apex of Jewish religious life. “Look here, if you are the Son of God throw yourself down and be worshiped by everyone as your angels charge to the rescue.” But, Jesus quietly quotes scripture and keeps to himself.

Hungry though he was, Jesus did not prove himself with magic tricks. Powerful though he was, Jesus’ did not prove himself with earthly domination. Holy though he was, Jesus’ did not prove himself by deploying his armies of angels.

Instead, Jesus exercised self-restraint. Jesus overcame temptation. Jesus kept in abeyance all the powers of the universe, and proved his might with the strength of his will. By his faithfulness, Jesus defeated the devil and revealed the power of God.

But, the devil was not down for the count. Luke tells us that the devil departed from Jesus until an opportune time. And, at the very end of Jesus’ life, the devil returns in the person of Satan, taking control of Judas Iscariot, and motivating the betrayal of Jesus.

The frightening part of this story is that Jesus’ temptations were not all that different from our own. We, too, must contend with the powers of darkness, and we too must wrestle with temptation. As St. Peter wrote, “[Our] adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour.”

Jesus had been fasting forty days. He was hungry, and the devil offered him something to eat. Jesus had only a dozen friends. He was lonely, and the devil offered him kingly power and earthly glory. Jesus had been rejected by the religious elders of his day. He was a heretic, and the devil offered him untold religious authority.

Consider what the devil said to Jesus: Do something that you can do easily, and fill your aching stomach. Reveal yourself to be the person that you know you are, and be heralded as a prophet forever. Accept the power that is yours by right, and never be lonely again.

If left to our own devices, which of us would not have taken the devil’s deal? In these uncertain times, we too feel the pangs of hunger. We too bear the despair of friendlessness. And, we too know the sting of rebuke as we witness to our faith in a world that has never been more secular.

In his temptations, Jesus seems so very human, but in his faithfulness, he seems so very divine.

Yet, Luke presents Jesus to us as a model for faithfulness amidst great temptation, for hope in the face of great despair. In his faithfulness, in his sacrifice, in his self-restraint, Jesus reveals the glory of God, and so can we.

As Olympic fever sweeps its way around the globe, it seems that the solution to every problem is training harder, growing stronger, or moving faster. But, sometimes, the solution to our problems is patient endurance.

When I was a teenager, my mother taught me a driving tip that has been on my mind during our recent snowstorms. The only way to get a car out of a snow bank is to use low gear, with slow but constant pressure on the gas. Low gear maximizes your power, and constant acceleration maximizes your momentum.

The physics are quite delicate. If you don’t use your lowest gear, or if you let up on the gas for even a moment, you will not get traction. If you accelerate too quickly, or apply the brake too soon, your wheels will spin and slide. Your car’s salvation depends on neither speed nor braking. The only solution is a mix of power and patience; there can be no rushing, no forcing. You must apply power slowly and consistently, and only the most assiduous efforts will suffice.

The life of faith is also about patient endurance. Jesus did not defeat temptation by setting superhuman goals for himself. Luke portrays Jesus being consistently quiet, consistently faithful. It was Jesus’ vigilance – his firm and consistent resistance – that enabled him to defeat the devil time and time again.

But, what happens when we fail? When our temptations get the better of us? When our efforts aren’t enough, we do the same thing we do when the car gets stuck in the rut. When temptations get the better of us, we do the only thing we can do: roll back a little bit, reexamine our situation, and try it one more time.

Lent is our time to fall back before our wheels start to spin. All year long, we strive to live lives that are worthy of our calling. Like Olympic Christians, we push and push and push. But, in the last days of winter, Jesus asks us to fall back with him, to regroup, recharge, and prepare for the work ahead.

In her Ash Wednesday sermon, our Rector invited us to think of Lent as a grace given by God, a time marked by fasting, temptation, examination, and prayer. Difficult though it may be to think of Lent as a grace, the hard spiritual work to which we are called in this Lenten season will equip us to grapple with temptation, sin, and Satan in the year to come.

Amen.

2/17/2010 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - Ash Wednesday

2010-02-17T16:06:00.000-05:00

ASH WEDNESDAY
February 17, 2010
The Rev. Susan N. Blue

Let us pray:

Jesus, you place on my forehead the sign of my sister Death: “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.”
How not hear her wise advice? One day my life on earth will end; he limits on my years are set, though I know not the day or hour. Shall I be ready to go meet you? Let this holy season be a time of grace for me and the entire world.

“Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain wisdom of heart.” O Jesus, you place on my forehead the sign of your saving Cross: “Turn from sin and be faithful to the gospel.”

How can I turn from sin unless I turn to you?
You speak, you raise your hand, you touch my mind and call my name. “Turn to the Lord your God again.”

These days of your favor leave a blessing as you pass on me and all your people. Turn to us, Lord God, and we shall turn to you. AMEN

(Ash Wednesday Prayer by Victor Hoagland, C.P.; Synthesis 2/17. 2010)

The ashes placed on our foreheads this day are a reminder of our mortality and, as the prayer said, they challenge us as individuals and as a community to stop for a bit, to remember whose we are and who we are called to be. We shall not live forever, so what will we do in the meantime to be ready to meet our all loving God? We are given the grace of the forty days of Lent, forty days during which we share with Jesus his time in the desert. That time was marked by fasting, temptation, examination and prayer.
Fasting does not necessarily involve food; for we can fast from unhealthy feelings, thoughts and practices. The Gospel is clear that Jesus was not terribly concerned about people following the letter of the law, though he had great respect for said law. No, he was deeply concerned about matters of the heart. These forty days of Lent are a gift to all Christians, a time to stop, to pray, in order to prepare for the joy of the Paschal Feast.
We use this time well when we begin with a rigorous self-evaluation followed by penitence and repentance. We are called to forgiveness of others and of ourselves. The resultant new beginnings then move us toward wholeness. This is a time of quiet, of prayer and worship, so that when Easter comes we, like the early Christians baptized on Easter Eve, are clothed in new garments, the garments of a forgiven people: refreshed, reborn and full of joy.
Dr. Barry Johnson gave a sermon in 1988 that talked about true spirituality. The first quality of spirituality is that we must simply believe God. First and foremost we believe that God is, that God loves us abundantly and will not leave us. It does not necessarily mean that we believe all that the church professes, but simply that God is …now and forever.
The second quality is that of humility. Accepting the love and abundance we are given knowing that it was unearned and has nothing to do with anything we have done. It is the nature of our loving God, not our striving and or our great works.
Third, we are called to a perpetual air of forgiveness; forgiving others on an on-going basis with the knowledge that we desperately need the on-going forgiveness of our God and of one another.
Finally, Johnson says, true spirituality is “remarkably liquid.” It is always adjusting, constantly growing and happy to wade about in a world of gray. It is having the ability to measure what we have been thought over and against that which is newly appearing in the on-going creation of the world. It is living without rigidity and judgment of others. We are to understand that there are no perfect or eternal answers other than our call to love God.
(Dr. Barry L. Johnson; First Community Church; 5/8/1988)

There is a story told by David Redding in his book The Golden String. It seems the author had a very loving, big, black, Scottish Shepherd dog by the name of Teddy. The two were inseparable. The hiked together, Teddy slept by his bed, and was a superb watchdog. Several months later David was drafted into the army. Trying to help his loving animal understand why he was leaving was impossible. k He returned home for the first time several months later. It was a long walk from the bus stop and he arrived very late at night. Suddenly he heard his watch dog, Teddy, barking. All it took was one whistle from David, and Teddy came bounding toward him with a yelp of recognition. The delighted animal leaped into his arms, whimpering with joy and covering David’s face with kisses. (Copied and abridged)

As Johnson says, “Love is like that, it reaches across the barriers of time and distance to embrace the soul and welcome the weary traveler home.” (Copied) If a dog can show such love, just imagine the abundant love God has for each one of us as we are welcomed home this Lenten season. Have a most blessed Lent. AMEN

12/20/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - Advent IV

2009-12-18T16:35:00.000-05:00

“…blessed is she who believed that the promise made her by the Lord would be fulfilled…” (Luke 1:45)

“A young girl listened attentively as her big sister told her a bedtime story:

Once upon a time there was a beautiful princess who had a golden ball. One day the ball fell into a well. However, an ugly frog came along and retrieved it for her. The beautiful princess was so grateful to the frog that she took it with her to her room in the palace. During the night the ugly frog turned into a handsome prince. At this point in the story, the little girl began to look very skeptical. ‘What’s wrong?’ her sister asked. ‘Don’t you believe the story?’ The little girl answered: ‘No! I don’t believe it, and I don’t think the Princess’s mother believed it either!’”
(Copied)

This little story points to the dilemma faced by Mary, a young woman who was probably no older than 13. To recap the prologue to our story this morning: Mary was visited by an angel of the Lord who told her that she would conceive a son by the Holy Spirit who to be named Jesus and would be the son of God. The angel went on to tell her that her relative, Elizabeth, an older woman who was said to be barren, was in her sixth month of pregnancy. Mary’s response was: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” As a young, unmarried, pregnant woman her future was in great doubt. Despite that, she accepted her circumstances and immediately went to visit Elizabeth. Elizabeth was probably no less a pariah in that society. For the Hebrews immortality was achieved through land and progeny. Without the latter the future was bleak. When one adds to this the fact that, at that time, women were simply pieces of property, her response was astonishing.
The angel’s promise was affirmed when Mary went to see Elizabeth, and, when Mary greeted her, the baby in Elizabeth’s womb leaped. Elizabeth then affirmed Mary’s blessedness. Mary’s response was the powerful “Magnificat.” When studied that lovely passage is not some soft, downy proclamation, but one of intensity that, in hindsight, reflects the reality of Jesus’ life.
The faith that Mary illustrated then and in the years to come, is an awesome model for each of us as we await the coming of the Christ, Emmanuel, God with us. Further, just as Mary bore the infant, we are in relationship to Jesus when we allow the power of God to enter into our hearts and souls. This is not easy for, as Sandy pointed out last week, we are fraught with anxieties and concerns. To allow God to enter in, to make ourselves vulnerable and wholly trusting is no easy task. There is, however, no other way to receive Him.
We are faced with a dilemma – our charge, like that of Mary, is to do God’s will. Jesus made it pretty clear as to what that means…to love God with our heart, soul and mind and to love one another as ourselves. That implies action, reaching out, showing in our lives what we profess in our worship and in our words. However, that activity has its inception in the silence and prayer of our own hearts. It is nearly impossible to have one without the other. For some of us, contemplation and prayer is natural – whereas for others activity is more the norm. As Christians, however, we are to have both…they flow from one another.
Like Mary, we are to seek out those who will support and understand us, just as we are called to do the same for others. Once again, our faith is not rooted in individualism, but is a collaborative effort of the entire body. Each of us has different gifts, gifts that are essential to our dual purpose of prayer and activity. We could not have fed 18,000 meals at Charlie’s Place, provided 80 turkey dinners or presents for 233 people without the prayers, activity and support of one another. Elizabeth’s presence gave Mary the wisdom and understanding that enabled her to return to her home and to face her betrothed, Joseph. One can imagine that, because God assured him in a dream that Mary was a virgin, that Joseph was the easy one! Can you imagine what the community thought? It must have been much like the little girl’s assessment of the response of princess’s mother.
As we wait, once again, for the coming of the Christ into our lives, let us pray and make ourselves vulnerable as a community and as individuals. Let us open our hearts to this wondrous miracle so that on Christmas we may experience the incredible joy of the presence of Christ within us and around us. AMEN

12/13/2009 - Alexander Webb - Advent III

2009-12-13T16:36:00.000-05:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

I have some worrying news to report: the days are getting shorter. There were thirty-five fewer seconds of daylight yesterday than there were on Friday, and today we will lose another thirty seconds. I am sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but if we continue to lose thirty or thirty-five seconds each day, we will not see the sun again after the end of 2012.

Are you worried?

More news: the seas are rising, and they’re rising fast. Sea level at Washington Navy Yard was 2.7 feet higher at 5:30 this morning than it was only six hours earlier. I am sorry to be the bearer of more bad news, but if the seas continue to rise this much every six hours, the U.S. Capitol Building will be completely submerged by the end of January.

Are you worried?

No, you’re not worried. You know that the seasons will change and that the tides will ebb, there’s no need to worry. Be at peace, Chicken Little, be at peace.

Paul’s message in today’s New Testament lesson is similar: Be at peace, Philippians, be at peace.

The church at Philippi is only a dozen years old at the time of Paul’s writing, and they’re already struggling. Internal conflicts are tearing the church apart from within, while critics and evildoers are simultaneously tearing it apart from without. Things probably seemed pretty grim in Philippi, yet Paul’s counsel gets right to the heart of the matter:

Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

That’s beautiful, but it must have seemed ridiculous. Do not worry about anything? What an outlandish request.

The Philippian church is teetering on the brink of disaster, and Paul doesn’t want them to worry about anything? You can imagine their reaction. Here at St. Margaret’s, we’re in a much better position than the Philippians were, but even we would find it hard to believe someone who told us not to worry about anything.

We haven’t met our fundraising goal for next year, the building preservation fund is down, and transitions in our clergy team leave doubt where once we seemed to enjoy certainty. There’s a war on, our economic rebound is quixotic at best, and partisan politics are at their worst. How could we not be worried?

In Advent, preachers are supposed to invite their congregations to spend four weeks in quiet contemplation on the beautiful complexity of the incarnation. But, I have never been very good at quiet or contemplation. My Advent is almost always characterized by pre-Christmas fervor, year-end business, and the holiday trifecta of cleaning, baking, and wrapping. I work harder, and faster, and longer, but more work generates more anxiety. My feeble attempt to remedy my fear makes me worry all the more.

Paul advocates an entirely different approach. To the Philippians, he says: God is the only remedy for your anxiety. Paul asks the Philippians to have faith, deep and abiding faith.

Some two millennia later, Paul’s message still rings true. In the midst of overwhelming anxiety, Paul asks us to turn to God. Offer your anxiety to God, says Paul, and trust that your fears will be replaced by a peace that can neither be described nor understood. Right here, right now, Paul asks us to learn faith when all we know is fear.

Impossible, you say? Consider again the seasons and the tides: We all believe that the seasons and the tides will change, but often we forget just how audacious that claim really is. Our planet is careening through space at an average annual speed of about thirty kilometers a second, and we have absolute faith that an invisible force will turn it back towards the sun, exactly eight days from today. The Atlantic Ocean is advancing with such speed that the naked eye can mark its progress, but we have absolute faith that an entirely different invisible force will draw the sea back before any damage is done.

Daylight is waning and the seas are rising, but we’re not worried. Our personal observations point to imminent disaster, yet somehow we have learned to supplant fear with faith. We have faith that invisible, interplanetary forces will keep us safe, and Paul asks us to have that same level of faith in the invisible, omnipotent God who set those forces in motion.

Faith and prayer are the only paths to peace, and peace is a remarkable thing. Once we have made peace with the changing of the seasons, we can begin to celebrate them rather than fear them. And, I believe, once we have made peace with the changes and cycles of this mortal life, we can begin to celebrate them for the adventure that they are.

We worry about our livelihoods: our work, our homes, our children. But, year after year, our jobs evolve, our locations change, and our children grow. We keep moving forward, and God keeps providing.

We worry about our church: its mission, its staff, its budget. But, year after year, challenges come and go, people come and people go, money comes and money goes. The church keeps moving forward, and God keeps providing.

To all these things, and so many more, Paul says: “Do not worry about anything…”

The house will get clean, the cookies will get baked, and the packages will get wrapped. And, even if one or two items do happen to fall from our checklist, Christ will still appear in the manger on Christmas morning.

When we come to realize that changing is part of living, and that peace comes from having faith in God amidst those changes, we begin to look at our lives differently, and our anxiety abates.

Later today, we will celebrate the ministry of my friend and senior colleague, Caron Gwynn. Caron has been a great gift to me in these last eighteen months, but today she takes her leave from us so that she can prepare to lead her own congregation in Maryland. This is quite a step for her and it’s quite a step for us. Anxiety looms on both sides, the days are short, and the tides are high, but God remains ever faithful.

Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Amen.

1 Raymond Brown. Introduction to the New Testament. New York: Doubleday, 1997. Pages 484 and 487-488.

11/26/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - Thanksgiving Day

2009-11-26T09:21:00.000-05:00

“…Do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what shall you put on…” (Mt. 6:25)

There is no question that this is precisely the Gospel that I both needed to hear and dreaded hearing this morning. My return visit to NYC to learn the fate of my foot has just been scheduled for next Wednesday. To say that I am both anxious and frightened is a colossal understatement. The dictionary definition of anxiety is:

“…distress or uneasiness of mind caused by apprehension of danger or misfortune; or, psychologically, the state of apprehension and psychic tension found in most forms of mental disorder.”

I am not sure which definition is more applicable to me this day! Clearly anxiety is unhealthy, yet we feel it regarding our children, our health, our safety, our money, our education, our future, and, ultimately, our death. The results of anxiety run the gamut and can be mental, emotional and physical.

This is Thanksgiving Day, the day when we are called to give thanks to God for the multitude of gifts we have been given. Thanksgiving can be considered the polar opposite of anxiety. Anxiety is fear-driven, whereas thanksgiving is characterized by acceptance. Anxiety is future oriented, whereas thanksgiving is focused in the past and the present. Anxiety produces tension and apprehension, whereas thanksgiving results in trust, calm and peace. Anxiety longs for what it doesn’t have and is filled with need, whereas thanksgiving accepts what it has and is filled with joy and celebration in the now.

Matthew locates this passage in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus has just challenged his listeners to give alms and to pray in secret, not seeking the approbation of others. Further, he cautions against storing up treasures on earth saying: “You cannot serve God and wealth.” Jesus is making it abundantly clear that our challenge is to trust God in all things.

We are called to thank God for all that we have and have had…the material things of food, clothing, shelter, education as well as for family, friends and co-workers. However, thanksgiving to God must be larger than this. None of the above can define our total existence. No people or things can fill us completely. People let us down, and material things can disappear. In the end we are challenged to confront ourselves, our aloneness, for we are born alone and we die alone. But…in that aloneness…there is God…loving us abundantly and banishing anxiety and fear. That love was with us before our birth and will abide with us after our death. That love was made flesh, visible and tangible, in the gift of Jesus Christ and guarantees God’s heavenly presence with us during our most difficult times.
If we focus on that love, if we feel it and let it fill us up and feed us, our anxieties will be driven away, and we can delight in the ability to offer genuine thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is at the heart of the Christian faith…a giving of thanks not only in words and silent prayer, but also in our generosity and love for others.
Shortly we shall celebrate the Holy Eucharist, named for “eucharista” that means “thanksgiving.” The heart of the Eucharist is the Great Thanksgiving when we lift up our hearts to God.
Let us offer our thanksgivings today to the God who created us, loves us and gives us to one another. Let us be newly bound in relationship in this most Holy Meal and find that we are newly energized to care for the people in the world around us. AMEN

11/15/2009 - Tom Head - St. Margaret's Day

2009-11-15T14:58:00.000-05:00

Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in your sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer. Amen.

There’s nothing like being asked to preach to give one a new appreciation for those of us like Caron and Sandy and Susan who do it often. This is the third time in the past ten years or so I’ve been asked to speak from this pulpit, and it doesn’t get easier or less intimidating.

I was heartened when I saw today’s gospel reading, the parable of the sheep and the goats, which seems almost to have been written for St. Margret’s and for St. Margaret’s Day. One of the things that we all love about St. Margaret’s is that our parish takes very seriously its obligation to care for those less fortunate than ourselves. Through Charlie’s Place alone, Tom Goss tells us in the Magpie this month, we have served 19, 673 meals this year to the hungry. We are organizing ourselves to provide Thanksgiving dinner for the families of 80 students at Marie Reed School. We are buying Christmas presents for 50 families at Mary’s Center. I think it’s safe to say that few parishes of our size can match us in the area of outreach.

This parable talks about a great separation of nations that will occur at the end of time. When that separation occurs, we like to think that our deeds of mercy and kindness will put us pretty firmly in the “sheep” category, on the right hand of the throne of the Son of Man. It seems pretty clear. Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, give clothes to those who need them, visit the sick and those in prison, and we will take our place in the kingdom prepared for us since the foundation of the world. Fail to do these things, and we are cursed, spending eternity in the fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

But I soon realized that this parable is really not that simple, Jesus’ parables often defy easy explanation, and this one is possibly more complex than most. The sermons and commentaries on this parable seem to fall into two categories. The first group starts by staying that in order to understand this parable, we need to understand more about the role of sheep and goats in first-century Palestine. My own acquaintance with sheep and goats has been largely at the dinner table in the form of roasts, so I’ll pass on the opportunity to comment on the pastoral economy of Jesus’ time.

The second category of commentary seems to be devoted to saying that Jesus didn’t really mean what he appears to say here. This is a scripture passage that is particularly troubling for our evangelical brothers and sisters. It seems to imply—well, it doesn’t seem to imply, it states pretty baldly—that in the final analysis, we will be judged and rewarded on the basis of our good works. It’s not our faith or our church attendance or our beliefs that count. The idea of justification by faith alone is central to the entire Protestant reformation, and this passage stands as a troubling contradiction to that doctrine.

So let’s look at the text of the passage a little more closely. Because the passage is known as the parable of the sheep and the goats, we often fail to notice that there are three, not just two groups of people involved. There are the sheep, there are the goats, and there are those referred to as “the least of these, my brothers.” We are accustomed to thinking of the “least of these” as representing all of suffering humanity, but it’s possible, at least, that Jesus had a more specific group in mind.

Earlier in Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus is told that his mother and brothers are outside, wanting to speak to him. Jesus replied: "Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?" Pointing to his disciples, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother." Matthew 12:46-50

It’s possible in this parable, then, that the King is judging the nations not on the basis of their care for all of suffering humanity, but that the brothers referred to are the disciples—that the King is judging the nations on the basis of how they have treated his followers, not how they have treated everyone who suffers.
It is interesting too that the group referred to as “these my brothers” does not seem to be part of either the sheep or the goats. They are a separate group that does not seem to be subject to judgment. This would seem to me to lend credence to the idea that Jesus had a smaller group in mind here than all of suffering humanity.
So this remains a question about the parable: Are the nations going to be judged according to how they treated the poor and the hungry, or are they going to be judged according to how they treated Jesus’ followers? It’s difficult to say with any certainty.

Another interesting detail in this parable is that both the sheep and the goats seem genuinely surprised at the outcome of the judgment. It’s a little bit more understandable that the goats would be puzzled. They have lived their lives without exercising mercy, either because they didn’t know they were supposed to or because they just neglected to do it—they have left undone those things that they ought to have done. But the righteous are equally surprised. The righteous say: 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?' They have done these good deeds without being aware that they will be judged by them. The good deeds done by the sheep seem not to have been done for the sake of doing good deeds. They seem to be a natural and indelible part of who the sheep are.
It’s hard, finally, to say what this parable means. Who are the nations? Who are the sheep? Who are the goats? Who are “the least of these my brothers”? What does it mean that the sheep and the goats do good deeds or fail to do good deeds without knowing it? Its meaning is certainly more complex than “Do good deeds and you’ll go to heaven.”

But, it seems to me, there are certain things we can say about this parable with fair amount of certainty. Like every other single story in the Bible, we must try, if we are to avoid proof-texting, to read it in the entire context of the gospel. It is certainly true that concern for the poor is one of the cornerstones of our faith. It’s a theme that runs consistently through the Bible. The passage from Isaiah that we heard this morning is a good example from the Hebrew Scriptures. I haven’t done this count myself, but I’ve read that one in sixteen verses in the Bible is about poverty. In the first three Gospels, the number is one of every nine verses. The question of sex, which parts of our church seem to be obsessed with, doesn’t get nearly as much attention. I think it’s safe to say that concern for the poor is a cornerstone of our faith.

I think another thing that it’s safe to say is that we can’t save up our good deeds with the intention of eventually buying our way into heaven. Our faith is not like a retirement account that we make contributions to with the expectation that we will eventually be able to live out our eternal lives in some celestial Sunshine Acres.
I saw an interesting review of a new book in last week’s New York Times Book Review. The book, by a political science professor at New York University named Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, is called The Predictioner’s Game, and the subtitle is Using the Logic of Brazen Self-Interest to See and Shape the Future. His theory is that it’s possible to predict the future by assuming that people will act in what they perceive to be their own self-interest. Mother Teresa went about doing good deeds. She did them because she expected an eternal reward in heaven. I’m quoting here: “It makes sense,” Bueno de Mesquita writes, “to pay the price of sacrifice for the short, finite time of a life span if the consequence is a reward that goes on for infinity in heaven. In fact, isn’t that exactly the explanation many of us give for the actions of suicide bombers, dying in their own prideful eyes as martyrs who will be rewarded for all eternity in heaven?” Mother Teresa—suicide bombers—morally equivalent because both are sacrificing themselves for the sake of spending eternity in heaven. It’s a ghastly perversion of our Christian faith.

One of the saints of our church is the late Verna Dozier, who spoke several times here at St. Margaret’s before her death in 2006. In her book The Dream of God, she quotes from T. S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral: The last temptation is the greatest treason:  To do the right deed for the wrong reason. Jesus did good deeds, Miss Dozier points out. He fed the hungry, gave drink to the thirsty, healed the sick, but his motivation was compassion, identification with their suffering.
Perhaps the complexities of this parable are a way of keeping us from absolutizing good deeds, as Jesus refuses to absolutize them.

The sheep and the goats are asked no questions about what they believe. The only thing that counts is what they have done.

“The important question to ask,” Verna Dozier tells us, “is not ‘What do you believe?’ but ‘What difference does it make that you believe?’ Does the world come nearer to the dream of God because of what you believe?” Belief must lead to action
We remember St. Margaret today because of her good deeds and acts of mercy, but it is important to remember that Turgot, her biographer, treated her charity and her prayerfulness in the same chapter. One was part and parcel of the other:
“To prayer and fasting, she joined the gifts of mercy. For what could be more compassionate than her heart? What more gentle to the needy? Not only would she give her goods to the poor, but if she could, she would have freely given herself.”
Margaret had a selfless devotion to the faith and an integration of faith and life that most of us can only aspire to. Her good deeds were acts of worship, spiritual acts growing from the compassion that was part of her faith.

I am very proud to be a part of this community and its commitment to social justice. I think that when we next read the parable of the sheep and the goats, we can be certain that we are not among the goats—we do feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the needy. But are we among the sheep? I think we’re getting there, but that the condition of sheep-dom something we must continue to aspire to. My prayer for St. Margaret’s is that we will continue to grow into our role as sheep, that we become a flock with faith so deep and so consuming that our outreach will be an act of worship, that will be no need for separate pages on our web site that describe our worship and our outreach. They will be the same thing, growing out of our commitment to following the Good Shepherd.

It’s a difficult commitment, but, as the prophet Isaiah assures us, God will smile on our efforts:
if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.

11 The LORD will guide you always; the Lord will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land  and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.

Amen.

11/1/2009 - Alexander "Sandy" Webb, Seminarian - All Saint's Day

2009-11-01T16:55:00.000-05:00

In the Name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

This weekend contains two important feasts of our church calendar; two important dates in our common life. Today is the Feast of All Saints, but yesterday was the parish Rummage Sale.

The Rummage Sale is a venerable tradition at St. Margaret’s, stretching back well over fifty years. Thousands of hours are invested in the sale every year, and thousands of people have participated over the years. Names like Bea Aitchison and Mabel Cook may have slipped from common memory, but in the sixties and seventies, they were the characters that defined the Sale. As today’s rummagers, we stand on their shoulders. We carry on their legacy. We build on their foundation.

You can get almost anything you could want at the Rummage Sale. Where else can five dollars buy you a stuffed snake, a floppy hat, and a pair of hockey mitts to complete your ensemble?

Indeed, you can get almost anything you could want at the Rummage Sale, and you can see almost anyone. We help single parents refresh their children’s wardrobe. We help Dupont Circle socialites assemble the perfect Halloween costume. And, we even help seminarians spice up their Sunday sermons.

Like our merchandise, our customers come in all sizes, shapes, and colors. They come with different interests, needs, and objectives. Yet, imagination unites them all.

Imagination is critical. Rummagers imagine that this traditional building is something of a Moroccan souq, a bustling marketplace filled to the brim with goods of every conceivable variety. Rummagers then imagine new possibilities for the vast array of pre-owned items on display.

In short, rummagers look at what is and imagine what will be.

Today’s lesson from the Book of Revelation is all about imagining what will be. In Revelation, God speaks to a man traditionally known as St. John the Divine, and tells him about the end of time. God says that before the end of time, there will be a period of great tribulation, involving battles in both heaven and earth. However, in the end, God and the saints will emerge victorious.

Our lesson for today is the climax of the Revelation story. After twenty chapters of warfare and violence, St. John the Divine sees a new heaven and a new earth emerging. His entire reality passes away, and the holy city, God’s own city, the New Jerusalem, descends from the sky. Everything is made new, and the voice of God rings out with some of the most comforting and poetic words in the whole corpus of Holy Scripture:

See, the home of God is among mortals.
He will dwell with them as their God;
they will be his peoples,
and God himself will be with them;
he will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more...

Jerusalem becomes God’s sermon illustration because Jerusalem has been besieged with inescapable violence since the days of King David. In Revelation, as the prophet Isaiah foretold, God cries unto Jerusalem: Your warfare has ended, and the glory of the Lord will be revealed. Everything is being made new. Everything will be peace.

Can you imagine? Can you imagine dwelling personally with God, alongside the saints in every generation, as citizens of a Jerusalem in which there is no heartache, no death, no pain? Can you imagine?

For many of us, this New Jerusalem of which God speaks is simply unimaginable. We can imagine that a sanctuary is a marketplace. We can imagine new uses for old stuff. But, we cannot conceive of the fellowship, unity, and faith of which God speaks.

Yet, I wonder why it is so easy for us to imagine what we will do with our rummage, and so hard to imagine what God will do with our world. Why is it entirely possible to believe that we can make a Halloween costume out of junk, but entirely impossible to believe that God can restore creation?

For me, the difference has everything to do with faith. When I imagine the possibilities for my rummage, I do so with full reliance on my strengths and abilities. When I imagine the possibilities for creation, I must rely on God’s strengths and abilities. When it comes to rummage, I limit myself to imagining that which I know I can make happen. When I imagine the New Jerusalem, I have to trust that God can make it happen.

Having faith in myself is a lot easier than having faith in God. Yet, when I start looking at the things I have done, I often begin to realize that I owe a debt of gratitude to many, many others. You see, in the Church, we never start from nothing. We are always carrying on the work of the saints who went before us. We start where our predecessors stopped and push forward one more step.

Today, we carry a torch once carried by Bea Aitchison and Mabel Cook. And, some day someone will carry it for us. Some day, our names will be added to the All Saints’ Day list, our work on earth will be complete, but the work of this parish, the work of the Church universal, will continue unabated.

The Rummage Sale, like the Church itself, belongs just as much to our predecessors and our successors as it does to us, and this is the spirit of All Saints’ Day. All Saints’ is our day to celebrate our goodly heritage and to imagine the day when all of God’s saints from every generation will be eternally reunited with God and with each other in that heavenly city; that New Jerusalem, in which there is no pain, no tears, no death.

When I have trouble imagining the New Jerusalem, I start looking for glimpses of it in the world around me. I almost always feel its presence at funerals, at weddings, and at baptisms. I see the New Jerusalem at the Rummage Sale, at Charlie’s Place, and in Sunday services. When the Church is gathered in faith and celebration, it becomes so much easier to imagine that day when all of God’s saints will be gathered together, when we will all sing God’s praises in perfect harmony, when we will love each other as God first loved us.

All Saints’ is our day to imagine. All Saints’ is our day to remember that God speaks with no doubt, no hesitation, no conditionality. The New Jerusalem is real, and we need only believe. We need only imagine.

Amen.

1 The preacher is grateful to Katharine Pagan and Maude Katzenbach for providing these names and memories.
2 For further information on Revelation, consult the following volume, which is widely considered to be accessible and authoritative: Craig R. Koester. Revelation and the End of All Things. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans Publishing, 2001.
3 Paraphrase: Isaiah 40:2, Isaiah 40:5

10/25/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Twenty-first Sunday After Pentecost

2009-10-25T14:21:00.000-04:00

This story from Mark is the last healing by Jesus prior to his entry into Jerusalem for the final time. It is distinct in that the name of the healed person is used – Bartimaeus or Son of Timaeus. Further, Bartimaeus recognizes, in some instinctive way, that Jesus is the awaited One, the son of David. As Jesus leaves Jericho he is surrounded by a crowd, one that perhaps is anticipating that a conflict with the Roman authorities is imminent. One suspects that their way was lined by beggars, hoping to profit by the large number of people. It is, therefore, remarkable that Bartimaeus dares to call out to Jesus by name asking for pity. Despite the shushing of the crowd, he calls out even louder. It is also amazing that Jesus can hear his cry.
Jesus then calls blind Bartimaeus to him, and, with that, the crowd parts and enables his passage. The blind man throws off his cloak, a treasured possession that not only kept him warm but also served to be a repository for the coins tossed his way. Jesus, with compassion, asks what he wants, Bartimaeus asks for his sight, and he is immediately cured. Bartimaeus then follows Jesus.
What a contrast to the rich young man who was so blinded by his possessions that he could not put them away to follow Jesus! It is also a profound contrast to the disciples, James and John, who asked for power and position rather than the faith and understanding that they needed.
It is no surprise that this healing is a metaphor for all who would follow Jesus Christ. Every person has ways in which they are blind or burdened. Most of us, at some point in our lives ask for Jesus to have pity on us. We ask when we are desperately ill, terribly frightened, extremely sad, or in any way very needy. Many of us have cried out from the edge of the crowd for pity and a healing of our burdens. For some, the darkness in our lives is well known to others, whereas some live in secret darkness. In either case, Jesus knows what we need, loves us, and will be there for us.
Jesus calls us to him with compassion, and we are called to empty ourselves, to cast off our cloaks of protection, and to move toward him empty-handed, asking only his healing. To empty one’s self is no easy task. We have to look internally, to let go of anger, fear, resentment and anxiety. We need to examine all that which blocks us from embracing the love of God. It means letting go of the need for power, possessions and self-righteousness. It means to set aside many of the values so highly regarded in the world.
We are often more like the disciples than the blind beggar. We are slow to “get it” and reluctant to embrace God with blind faith, trusting that putting ourselves in God’s hands will relieve that which burdens us.
The story continues with, after he is healed, Bartimaeus following Jesus. He has gained new life and recognizes that life source. Again, this is a metaphor for the disciples and for all Christians. If we are to follow Jesus we must see others through the lens of compassion, with the heart, not just the mind. There was so little time that day, for the beggar and for the disciples. It was Bartimaeus’ only chance for healing and a vivid example for the disciples of what they were to do were they to truly follow Christ.
Through this story we are called to a self-emptying and a harsh self-evaluation as we examine what we truly need. We are then to trust, to have faith, that we are loved, valued and will be cured…just as we are, in all of our nakedness. The time is short…we do not live forever…and our call is to act now before it is too late.
Bishop Fred Borsch has said that “…we act as though we are in charge. We look for God in liturgy, intellect, the institution of the Church, in the creeds and in Holy Scripture. However, our relationship with God doesn’t happen through our own efforts. We nee to let go, to wait, to be quiet, vulnerable and naked, despite the dark and the cold.” (Copied)
Many years ago John Newton fled his creditors and joined the Merchant Marines. He continued his pattern of gambling and drinking, however, and became more and more in debt. One night he fell overboard, too drunk to even grab the life preserver thrown to him. Finally, he was shot with a harpoon and dragged aboard the ship. As he recovered his eyes were opened, and he began to experience a religious conversion. In his own words, familiar to all of us, he penned:

“Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me
I once was lost, but now am found
Was blind but now I see.

T’was Grace that taught my heart to fear
And Grace my fear relieved
How precious did that Grace appear
The hour I first believed.”
(John Newton -- Copied)

AMEN

10/4/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Eighteenth Sunday After Pentecost / St. Francis Day

2009-10-05T11:19:00.001-04:00

When I looked at the Gospel for today and its contrast to St. Francis and the Blessing of Pets I wished that John Berry was still the Director of the National Zoo. However, underneath it all, there is one prevailing theme…that of stewardship and responsibility. In creation we believe that God gave humankind stewardship of the earth, of the creatures of the earth, of our children and, ultimately, of one another. I find it frightening that our earth, our creatures, our children and we are all endangered and threatened by generations of ignorance and unwillingness to address the incredible gift and responsibility we have been given.
Global warming is no longer a debatable issue; it simply is! Not only are our exotic creatures endangered, but one only needs to pick up the newspaper to see pictures of abused dogs, cats left to fend for themselves, a plan to perhaps kill all the deer in Rock Creek Park rather than using humane methods of sterilization, and general inhumane use of animals for commercial purposes. We were given the earth and the earth’s creatures to care for, and we haven’t done a very creditable job! We are to take our charge seriously and to challenge the powers that be whenever we see abuse, cruelty or neglect. We no longer have the luxury of turning away.
In Mark’s Gospel for today, Jesus spoke sternly to the disciples when they would have turned the children away from Jesus’ touch. His words were: “Let the little children come to me; do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the Kingdom of God belongs.” He then held and blessed them. What a contrast to the position of children in the first century! They were considered to be less valuable than slaves. They were the most marginal of all human beings then and, one wonders, if in some places they are not still today. The Roman Polanski crime is not singular; there are children who are sex slaves in all parts of the world. We read of children being physically and psychologically abused – even murdered – by the very persons charged to protect and care for them. Whenever we see abuse, cruelty or neglect of God’s children we are to challenge the powers that be. We are to see that they are protected, educated, fed, housed, clothed and given adequate health care. We no longer have the luxury of looking away. This is our role as Christians and as stewards of the Kingdom of God.
We are also given responsibility for one another as adults, and it is to one facet of this issue that Jesus is speaking when he talks about divorce. In the first century males were the only persons with power. Men were persons and women were objects. The entire Bible was written from that perspective – both the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament. Hence, it is no more productive to find twenty-first century answers in the Bible regarding the relationship between men and women, to proof-text if you will, than it is justify sleeping with one’s brother’s widow, Leverite Marriage, to murder one’s enemies, or to stone someone caught in adultery. There were two schools of thought in first century Judaism regarding divorce. Hillel contended that a man could put a wife aside for any reason; Shamai believed that could only happen for adultery. Further, only a man could institute divorce and, if he didn’t give the woman a bill of divorcement, she would never be able to remarry. If one adds in the factor that it was almost a thousand years later that polygamy was outlawed, we have a very complicated situation.
Jesus never had much patience with the technicality of the law. He challenged it around the dietary rules, the keeping of the Sabbath and the caring for the outcast. He had little patience for the legal intricacies of this debate and simply referred back to Deuteronomy and the Law of Moses. He contended that divorce occurred because of “hardness of heart.” In other words, Jesus reframed the argument from a legal one to a moral issue.
Jesus taught that God wants freedom and wholeness for everyone, not just the few. He also understood that we are all sinners; that we are all flawed and fail to do what we are called to do. Broken relationships are but one area where some of us err. How many of us always turn the other cheek, give not only our cloak but our coat to the needy, always reach out to the outcast, love the unlovable and forgive freely and constantly. All humankind is fallen; divorce is a metaphor for that failure. In divorce, the relationship is sundered and the charge to be one flesh is not followed. Sin is understood to be that which breaks or hinders our relationship with God, with others and with ourselves. All of us fall short.
However, there is good news! We do not have to wallow in our inadequacy. God is all-loving, all-forgiving and totally merciful. No matter how far we have fallen away, we are welcomed, as Jesus did the children, with open arms and blessing. Like the father of the Prodigal, God races to meet us with great joy when we return and ask forgiveness. God wants life for us, not death. Anyone who has been divorced or is a child of divorce understands that it, too, is a death.
Our charge, then, is to accept God’s forgiveness and to demonstrate in our lives new ways of being. God sees us as we are, not as we ought to be, and therein lies new life. Yes we were created for relationship with God, with one another, and with the earth and all of its creatures. Yes, we fail; but God does not! When we are lost, God seeks us out relentlessly and welcomes us home – freely, delightedly, and foolishly! God knows us through and through in all of our willful sinfulness, and loves us all the same. AMEN

9/27/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The 17th Sunday After Pentecost

2009-10-02T09:54:00.000-04:00

“Come to hear the Word, Come to do the Word, Come to experience Comfort. Come to experience Challenge. Come to find Cost. Come to find joy. Come to find Humility. Come to find Community. Come to find Church. Come to find God.” (Katharine Hawker, Synthesis 1997, 9/28/97)

In the one holy and undivided Trinity. Amen.

When I completed my undergraduate studies at Towson State University with a degree in community health education, I wanted something different from a ‘9-5’ job. VISTA (Volunteers In Service to America) was my answer. I became a volunteer in Columbus, Ohio at the Federal Summer Food Service program. I was a grass roots community organizer and an advocate for thousands of hungry people who lived in the city. My job was to expand the summer feeding programs to ensure that children participating in school meal programs would have access to the community summer programs. There were thousands of children in Columbus living in poverty.

At the Federal Food Service program, It was apparent that the office staff was unable to identify eligible community locations to serve as food distribution sites. The director welcomed me, even though I was an outsider. I took on the task of researching and locating the sites. The director of the program agreed to process the sites I was able to identify. We both wanted to help the children get their meals because we knew that for some of those children, that breakfast would be the only meal they would possibly have all day.

The point I want to make is that I did not have to be an employee of the organization to get the food to the children. Perhaps the director’s non-proactive approach to the distribution issue would have been fine if there had been marketing and advertisements informing the community about the food program. My approach was to use aggressive marketing strategies to inform and access the eligible community sites, which included personal contact.

That summer, the program served an additional 3,500 children through six new sites that had joined the program through the efforts of an outsider – a volunteer. The food program had also been in jeopardy of being cut and labeled ‘under utilized’ if the funds had gone unused. The director had accepted me - even though I was an outsider - to expand his outreach to the community. We had different approaches but we shared a common mission to eradicate hunger in the city. Incidentally, according to the Capitol Area Food Bank in DC, there are approximately 200,000 children at risk of going hungry and the children’s poverty rate is 48.2% compared with 36.4 % nationally.

Mark’s Gospel today proclaims that not only the insiders - the 12 disciples – but also the outsiders as well have helped to expand the boundaries of the new kingdom of God. This is the mission of Jesus for all people - not a select few. John out of jealousy informs Jesus that someone not in their group was successfully performing exorcisms in his name. John and some of the disciples had tried to stop him. They had been very upset about the matter and thought Jesus would be. How dare anyone attempt healing in the name of Jesus who was not, as John says, “one of us!”

Jesus, however, was not at all upset in hearing this news. I think he was glad. Jesus warns the disciples not to stop any of these individuals because “Whoever is not against us, is for us.” The outsider was doing the work of God. The outsider’s work made him equal to the disciples. The disciples thought of themselves as ‘the in crowd’ who had exclusive ties to Jesus. God’s reign is not exclusive. God’s reign is for the world. Moreover, we know others of different faiths who, nevertheless, believe in the one God of us all.

Jesus says that, "If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea.” You may recall that there were some stumbling block issues among the early church apostles in the Book of Acts. Case in point, Peter and Paul fall out over the issue of taking the Gospel to the Gentiles. Paul advocates for it and Peter is totally against the idea. Peter is not convinced until the Holy Spirit, in a dream, calls him to go to the home of Cornelius, a Gentile. Peter wakes up, finds the house, and shares the Gospel with all in that house. Before Peter leaves, amazingly Peter baptizes everyone in the Gentile’s house. God opens Peter’s eyes to evangelize among the Gentiles as he has been within his own Jewish community.

At some point in our lives, we all have experienced some form of exclusiveness. The Good News is that God is inclusive. The Gospel is inclusive. There are no boundaries of exclusion. Mark’s Gospel calls everyone to “taste and see” the transformative power and love of God. The Gospel calls us to see the wonder of Christ beyond ourselves in the world. The Gospel calls us to be filled with the salt of Christ as we work, pray, and share together in the mission of the Church. We are called to offer cups of water and bread to quench the hunger and thirst of our brothers and sisters in the world as we remember that the heaven of God is a rainbow of the human race.

Let us pray a prayer written by Mother Teresa:

Dear Jesus, help us to spread your fragrance everywhere we go. Flood our souls with your spirit and life. Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly that our lives may be a radiance of yours…Let us thus praise you in the way you love best by shinning on those around us. Let us preach you with out preaching, not by words but by our example, by the catching force, the sympathetic influence of what we do, the evident fullness of the love our hearts bear to you. (To Preach without Preaching,” Synthesis1994, p.2)
Amen.

9/20/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Sixteenth Sunday of Pentecost

2009-09-22T09:43:00.001-04:00

“Jesus said: Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all…”
(Mark 9:35)

When my son, Laird, was six he became very ill and was hospitalized. The child in the bed next to him had a badly infected leg. In the two weeks Laird was in that room that child never had a visitor. One day I arrived and found Laird’s fever raging, the air conditioning broken, and orders from the doctor for no aspirin (this was before Tylenol) as his hemorrhaging had increased. He was flushed and still; his eyes were glassy. I held him and asked how he felt. He replied: “I am fine, Mom, but Jimmy isn’t doing well – no one has come to see him and he is so sick and sad. Jimmy’s parents, for whatever reason, had denied the seriousness of his illness, and couldn’t bear to see him. This isn’t an unusual occurrence, just a heart-breaking one. While Laird was in surgery the next day I went to the chapel and bargained with God. I pointed out his concern for Jimmy (as if God didn’t know) and painted him as a paragon who would change the world. Needless to say, Laird lived, and, for awhile it looked like he would be the best educated waiter in New York City. He’s a good guy, but no paragon!
Neither the denial of Jimmy’s parents nor my outrageous bargaining with God is particularly unusual phenomena in the human condition. All of us have myriad defense and avoidance mechanisms whereby we deny that which we do not want to see, know or hear. These responses are often unconscious and a way to avoid the things that terrify us most.
All of us, too, have great concern with how we fit into this world, into the larger scheme of things. None of us wants to feel second-rate, we desire prestige, position and power in order to feel safe and valued. The greater our sense of insecurity the more we need these three things of the world. We find comfort in hierarchy – it gives order to our lives and let’s us know who is in charge and what our responsibilities are. It is out of this that prejudice emerges. We need to feel better than others in order to feel valued. As a result, discrimination exists between rich and poor, black and white, Anglo and Hispanic, male and female, adults and children, those of different gender identities and the intelligent and the slow. We tend to predicate our value not upon who we are in God’s eyes, but who we are in the eyes of the world.
The human condition was little different in the first century. Prestige and personal power were every bit as important as they are now. The disciples arguing about who would be first in the Kingdom would have not been an unusual debate. They were followers of a powerful man and assumed some of that power for themselves.
They were on the road to Jerusalem, and Jesus was using the remaining time to try to prepare them for the inevitable, his crucifixion. This idea was so horrifying that they were unable to understand and were so fearful that they could not even ask Jesus about it. They were clearly in denial. It is not that Jesus was not clear – he emphasized the cross, not the resurrection, and promised that it would happen. He was telling them that he would die a most degrading death; that he would give up everything for the world. What a contrast to the disciples’ response! They were in such denial that they could not share their fear, and did not even offer Jesus any consolation. Even more shocking, they bickered among themselves about who would be greatest in the Kingdom. What a contrast – Jesus told them of his upcoming act of total unselfishness, and they responded with total self-concern.
Surprisingly, Jesus did not rebuke them, but responded with patience and love as he continued to teach about the Kingdom. This response was particularly poignant given the very short time remaining before his death.
At that time children were perhaps the most marginalized people in the first century world. Over sixty percent of children died before they were sixteen! Jesus took the disciples aside and taught them by words and actions. The first were to be last, and they were to be servants of all. No power and prestige for them! He then took a child in his arms and held him, an action that indicated love and caring for the least among them. He then said: “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes not me but the one who sent me.” (Mark 9:37) In other words, they were to live, teach and preach according to God’s standards not those of the world.
Jesus says exactly the same thing to each one of us. We are to reach out to the marginalized in our society – to care for all alike, and to be particularly responsive to those in greatest need. We are to share Jesus’ special concern for the poor and outcast. We are called as Christians to work to bring about the Kingdom of God here on earth. We are called to live according to God’s standards, not those of the world. That is our charge and our great delight. AMEN

9/6/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Fourteenth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-09-08T09:20:00.000-04:00

“…And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly…they were astounded beyond measure saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak…’”

In first century Judaism a physical affliction was evidence of the presence of evil. It is in this context that we hear the stories of Jesus’ healing ministry. Jesus healed both out of compassion and as a way of showing who he was and what we are called to do. Both are critical to his central message – to bring about the Kingdom of God. Consequently, Jesus did not set up a healing ministry or clinic in the cities – acting as a spiritual doctor to all and sundry. Each act of healing was significant far beyond the wellness of the individual.
For salvation to occur evil had to be exorcised and impediments to wholeness needed to be removed. Therefore, Jesus’ healing was both a statement of liberation and an icon for his followers in terms of action. Healing, therefore, lay at the heart of Jesus’ ministry and found its source in the heart of God.
There is a splendid irony for me that this is the gospel for this Sunday. On Monday I went into the city to see yet another foot specialist. His approach was interesting and gave me hope for the first time in many months. However, he does not take my insurance and surgery could be well beyond my ability to pay. Seems he also treated Patty Browning, wife of the former Presiding Bishop, just prior to their retirement to Oregon. He noted that he was raised as an Irish Catholic but now attends the Episcopal and Congregational churches. He commented: “I am hedging my bets.” As a result, he will take whatever my insurance gives him. Needless to say, my relief was palpable, and I only await a couple of tests to determine what comes next.
This is all happening in the context of the health care reform debate in this country. The extent to which it has gotten out of control is astonishing. As I rode home on the train I thought of the many people who do not have insurance or adequate health care and would not even have been able to walk into that doctor’s office. If healing and wholeness are at the heart of Jesus’ ministry how can we not find a way to provide adequate care for each and every person? Going further, how can we not assure that all of God’s children are fed, clothed and housed?
The politicizing of basic human needs shows us to be a country with little concern for anyone except ourselves. It would be wrong, however, to over simplify what is a very complex problem. Still we are charged by our faith, to work together to find viable solutions.
The Episcopal Church has joined with the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, Sojourners, The National Council of Churches in Christ, and Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good in attempts to mobilize supporters of health care reform and to correct the rampant misinformation that exists around it.
I learned in New York City that, privileged as I am, I still could have to forego top quality care because of my financial situation. Very few people are fully immune. Our efforts here at St. Margaret’s to feed and care for the homeless as well as our participation in other outreach and justice initiatives lie at the heart of our faith and at the heart of the Gospel.
In Mark’s Gospel this morning, Jesus exorcises the demon from the daughter of a Gentile woman and opens the ears of a deaf man. The latter was brought to Jesus by the man’s friends, again affirming that the event, though done in private, was communal and important for the entire community. Jesus says: “Ephphatha, be opened.” He says it to the deaf man, to the disciples and to us. We heard in the Gospel for last Sunday that we are defiled by what comes out of us, not what we take in. Here we are challenged to examine what blocks us internally. What inside each of us and inside our community needs to be opened so that we can hear and act more effectively? Think of those things that keep us from hearing – those things that we think, feel, dream and fantasize about. We are to identify them and take them to Jesus for forgiveness. Jesus wants health and wholeness for all of God’s people, not perfection!
Removing blocks to hearing is not an unmitigated blessing. It allows us to hear the voice of God, but it also lets us hear the cries of those in need. When our filters are removed, we can truly hear. We are then no longer able to stand mutely by – we must act.
Jesus says to each of us as he touches our ears and our mouths: “Ephphatha, be opened.” What do we need to be opened in ourselves, here at St. Margaret’s and in our community? AMEN

8/30/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-09-03T09:47:00.001-04:00

One would have to live in a bubble to have missed the ongoing news of Senator Kennedy’s death, funeral and the endless rehashing of his life. He was a complicated man and, because of his family, his life was lived out on center stage. It has been said that the turning point in his life came when he realized that he would, in all probability, never be the President of the United States. It was then that he turned to perfecting his skills in the Senate and became one of the most adept and one of the longest serving Senators in the history of that body. He was quoted as saying that “there is a difference between the perfect and the good.” One could argue that that was the mark of his vocation and his ability to reach across the aisle, to compromise, and to push for that which would do the most for those in need. Ultimately he let go of the rampant self-righteousness found in so many of us and put himself aside. It would be refreshing if our representatives of both parties would learn to do the same.
Israel had the well-developed ethical system of the ancient world. As we hear in Deuteronomy, Israel was directed, upon entering the Promised Land, to live according to the law of God, the commandments that had been given them in the Pentateuch. However, a tradition had arisen as the teachers, the Rabbis, began to interpret these commandments and adapt them to everyday life. As a result, the law, through the tradition, had become so detailed with minutiae that only the very wealthy, learned, leisure class could follow it completely. Even then, there was great argument about the details.
The Pharisees in Mark’s Gospel for this morning were criticizing Jesus’ followers for eating without washing their hands, an important tradition. Jesus’ reply to them was: “Listen to me, all of you, there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come…”
Arnold Toynbee, in his work An Historian’s Approach to Religion, said that “All religions start with a promise of universality, but they deteriorate into a concern for particularity.” We know that the Hebrews were not unique in this error. Throughout the history of the Christian Church a legalistic approach has resulted in wars, murder and prejudice. Other religions have acted similarly. Our own Episcopal Church has fought about liturgy, slavery, Biblical interpretation and who is in and who is out. These behaviors come from the human heart, a heart that is not filled with the love that originally grounded most religions.
At the heart of this is a profound hypocrisy…a self-righteousness … that will not hear of compromise and will not listen to the other. Most of us would love to have an immutable list of what we need to do to have our heart’s desire. If we could only follow steps one through ten, we would be happy, healthy, wealthy and wise. This could be rooted in the early years of our childhood when we were deeply rule oriented. One only needs to listen to children arguing on the playground to stir our memory. Small children are most specific as to what is good and bad, right and wrong….and it is mostly according to their individual standards. I realized my grandson, Ryan, was entering this stage when he announced last Monday to his babysitter that “there is nothing good about kindergarten.” Who knows what triggered that, but one hopes his outlook improves!
Jesus ate with and forgave tax collectors and sinners not because they were more fun (though I suspect they were) but because he recognized that they were treated as “other” and that no one, absolutely no one, is beyond the redemptive love of God. Needless to say, this flew in the face of “tradition” and was not appreciated by the Pharisees and powers that be.
The particularity of religious law can isolate and marginalize whole groups of people. In the Middle Ages when the altars went against the wall, the priest’s back was to the people and the language of the Eucharist went from the vernacular to Latin, the peasants felt cut off from Christ, as represented by the priest. They were no longer able to receive the cup of wine and were allowed bread only twice a year. As a consequence, they began to pray to Mary, hoping that Jesus would not turn his mother down. This response created an early Mariology that was twisted at that time by the church to further marginalize women.
According to the Gospel, a real concern for the human heart is central to Jesus’ preaching. We, as followers of Christ, are called to a rigorous self-examination of our hearts and to root out that which defiles us. Let us make no mistake; all of us have sins of the heart – parts of us that need cleansing, repentance and reformation. The letter of James, our Epistle for this morning, links a pure and undefiled heart to reaching out to those in need and keeping ourselves ‘unstained’ by the values of the world.
We now enter autumn…the time of school opening, new pencils and crayons and notebooks. It is a time of new beginnings and a renewed commitment to learning and to growth. Let us focus our energies on what comes out of us in love and ‘let be’ our judgment of other’s behavior. Our world is in desperate need of lovers, we have too many judges. It has been said – we need peace makers not just peace lovers. Let us, with my little Ryan, look for the good in the kindergarten of our lives. Let us listen, compromise and seek the good for all people – the need is great. AMEN

8/23/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Twelth Sunday of Pentecost

2009-08-24T09:26:00.001-04:00

PROPER 16, YEAR B
August 23, 2009
The Rev. Susan N. Blue

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of God’s power. Put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:10-12)

The letter to the Ephesians has Paul writing in chains from prison. Our epistle this morning challenges the Christians in Ephesus to continue to battle against that which is not of God; to use the armor of truth, righteousness, peace, faith and salvation. His final request is for prayer, that which undergirds and establishes a relationship with God, by individuals and by the community. Though the weaponry used as metaphor would have been understood as that of a Roman soldier by first century Christians, it is no less relevant for us today.
Those of you born after 1975 may never have heard of Episcopal seminarian, Jonathan Daniels. He graduated as valedictorian of his class at VMI and entered Harvard in 1961 to study English literature. A year later he felt called to the Episcopal priesthood and entered what is now the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass. This Sunday has been designated Jonathan Daniels Remembrance Day in the state of Wyoming and the preacher at St. Mary’s church in Cheyenne will be the Rev. Judith Upham. She accompanied Jonathan to to Alabama to join with The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the Civil Rights movement. They intended to stay only for the weekend, joining the march from Selma to Montgomery. They missed their bus, however, and stayed on. While there they integrated the local Episcopal Church, tutored children and registered black voters.
“Daniels was among a group of 29 protestors who were arrested while picketing a whites-only store in the small town of Fort Deposit, Alabama on August 13, 1965. They were released from jail a few days later. Daniels and three others walked down the street to get a cold soft drink at a grocery store, where they were met by a local resident, Tom L. Coleman, who threatened them with a shotgun. When Coleman fired at 17-year-old Ruby Sales, a black woman, Daniels pushed her out of the way and was killed instantly. Coleman was later acquitted. Upham said that: ‘Daniels death helped galvanize support for the civil rights movement within the Episcopal Church. We became serious about civil rights. The school, ETS, also became involved in the anti-war movement,’ she recalled. ‘There was a new sense of laying down your life for others. That’s what we are called to do.’” (www.episcopalchurch.org)
It is easy to forget the incredible progress this nation has made on many fronts as we confront the rampant greed and warmongering extant today. Paul writing in chains, in prison, to the Christians of Ephesus, could be a prototype for the chains that bound our black citizens in the 1960’s. Though slow to mobilize, the Christians of all denominations with other determined citizens made a huge difference during that time. It inspired an entire generation of young people who became aware that they could make a difference and influence the decisions of our nation.
From earliest time it has been incumbent upon the people of God to stand for that which we know to be true and righteous. It was true in the time of Solomon who challenged his people to give up foreign gods and to worship God, our Creator, only. It was true during the time of Jesus…who gave up everything, his entire self, that we might understand who we are called to be. As he conquered death and the powers of darkness, so shall we if we follow in his footsteps.
The Gospel from John links participation in the Eucharist with intimate relationship with Christ and with God. It goes beyond just eating the bread and drinking the wine. His life, death and resurrection are detailed in the Holy Communion, and give us a pattern for our lives as Christians.
We are to be people of prayer, for that is fundamental to our relationship with God and to our ability to take on the weapons of Paul as we deal with the enemies within ourselves and without. Our goal is peace, truth and love for all people, not just those like ourselves. Like Jonathan Daniels, we are to be mobilized until all people have the basics of life and access to the freedom and the opportunity that we enjoy. We are to live in hope, with courage, and not succumb to the numbing fear that produces inaction.
It is important that we not lose the cosmic aspect of evil and allow evil to rest in certain individuals whom we dislike or do not respect. We know from the Gospel that no one, absolutely no one, is beyond the reach of God’s redeeming love. Human beings at times do evil things, but our deepest concern must be the systemic evil around us that rewards some and denies those gifts to others. (Curtis Preston, copied.) The civil rights movement came about as a result of an evil system, one of marginalization and prejudice. That system still exists today in many different ways. We are called, as people of God, to speak the truth in love to the principalities and powers; to do so in solidarity with others and certainty that we are deeply loved and empowered by our God of limitless love. Helen Keller said: “Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature, nor do children as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.” (Copied)
Let us embark on the daring adventure of life armed with peace, love, courage and, above all, prayer. AMEN

8/16/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - Pentecost 11

2009-08-17T09:53:00.001-04:00

“…those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them…” John 6:54-56

The first week of my vacation this summer was spent in Granville, Ohio where I grew up. I visited with my ninety plus Father and Stepmother, and attended my high school reunion. Once there the stories flowed…they were both funny and sad. At the time we had no idea the nature of the home lives of some of our friends. It is only as adults that we can understand one another as whole persons, shaped by our community and families.
Granville was a small town of 2500 when the university was in session. Our class included the children of shop keepers, Denison professors, farmers and business people from Newark and Columbus. The class of ’59 is still talked about, as it was highly unusual. There were sixty of us and the average intelligence was extraordinarily high. Our town was not even remotely wealthy or fancy, and our class was a fluke. The boys in our class were particularly bright, bored and young. They were highly creative in their behavior which did not fit the rigid mold of many of our teachers. As it would happen, a Mr. Jones (not his real name) was the principal at that time. Mr. Jones would fit any definition of paranoid. He was a one man undercover operation designed to foil the antics of our guys. He peeked into lockers and hid around corners as though he were dealing with a drug bust.
One day two of our most arch criminals were in the coaches’ office, at the milk machine. Milk, at that time, was three cents a container and either of them could have afforded it. However, it was much more interesting to use their safecracking tools of a penny, gum and string. As Tommy was laboring (he now has a doctorate in physics) He remarked to Bobby: “Would it be funny if Jonesy were in that closet?” At that point, Bobby opened the closet and quickly slammed it. Tommy turned around, Bobby opened the closet again and, you guessed it, Mr. Jones was in that closet.
They were not bad boys, they were simply hungry. They were hungry for challenge, intellectual stimulation, and relief from boredom. They were hungry with all the hunger of adolescent boys with both raging hormones and rampant insecurities. I think that was true of all of us…no one in their mid teens feels all that good about himself or herself…we were never attractive enough, bright enough, popular enough or interesting enough. It is a time of great hunger and longing.
It is true for us as adults, though one hopes we have a slightly different focus. Once the essentials of life have been met – food, clothing and shelter (physical needs that are primary) – most of us have a longing for something more.
The sixth chapter of the Gospel of John is all about hunger and feeding. We read the story of the feeding of the 5000 and the amazement of those fed. It was reminiscent of the Israelites being fed manna in the wilderness, and, in each case, Jesus is clear that it was God who had done the feeding. In urging his followers to eat the bread and wine, Jesus’ body and blood, Jesus promises them that they will live forever. In that feeding, the spiritual and the physical are indelibly linked together.
Our relationships are not static…we know that even our most intimate ones are always changing. Sometimes they are wonderful, and sometimes not. Our relationship with God can be much like that. We long for intimacy with God, for meaning in our lives, for our spiritual hunger to be fed. That is why we are here in this sanctuary today. Our relationship with God is not static…when we feel close we are sated with intimacy and meaning. There are times, however, when God feels distant…we long for relationship, but feel separated and disconnected. The ancient mystics called this being in the “desert.” It is not a comfortable place and, mostly, we feel unable to change it. We learn over time that we must simply live through that absence and pray our way through it.
Jesus says in today’s Gospel: “…those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life…they abide in me and I in them.” What an incredible promise of intimacy…a promise not heard before or since. In the end, whether we are feeling close to God or in the desert we always have a place to come – the altar of God. Even if we feel estranged, we can rejoice in our closeness with one another as we approach the Eucharist together. In it we are reassured that we are not alone and that our time in the desert will end. As we shall sing during our worship this morning:

“Eat this bread, drink this cup, come to me and never be hungry. Eat this bread, drink this cup, trust in me and you will not thirst.”

Christ’s promise to each of us is that our deepest hunger will be satisfied. We shall be given all that we need for our bodies, for our relationships and, most important, for intimacy with God, the only source of true life. We shall rejoice in that promise as we celebrate the Holy Eucharist this morning. What a great gift we have been given! AMEN

8/9/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Tenth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-08-09T16:54:00.000-04:00

I am the bread of life. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh." (John 6:48-51)

In the name of the one holy and undivided Trinity. Amen.

The Jewish crowd surrounding Jesus and the disciples in Capernaum continued to speak highly of Moses for providing the manna in the wilderness for their ancestors. Jesus, however, politely corrected the crowd on their facts. He informed them that it was God who provided the manna for their ancestors during their Exodus from Egypt and not Moses.

We know that God sustained these wandering people each morning with manna from heaven in the wilderness. Manna has been described as a bread-like substance that is small, round, and resembles a fine frost on the ground. It looked like small coriander seeds and tasted like wafers made with honey (Exodus 16:14, 31). Additionally, we know that bread has a traditional place in the worship practices of Israel. Two loaves of leavened bread were sacrificed as an offering during Pentecost celebrations (Lev.23:17) and the Levite priests offered twelve unleavened loaves of bread on behalf of the people to God each week to represent God’s presence with the twelve tribes of Israel (Exodus 25: 30). Although he gave them bread for their bodies, Jesus had something even better for them and for us to consider.

God provided for their physical needs then. God provides our needs today. The point that Jesus wanted to press upon them and upon us is that God offers us much more than nourishment for our bodies. God offers us spiritual nourishment as well. The Israelites source for spiritual nourishment was standing right before them in the person of Jesus. Jesus is the source of our spiritual nourishment as Christians and Disciples of Christ today.

We often hear and see bread used as a metaphor in the Gospel of John. Bread is very much a part of the Jewish culture. However, Jesus, stirred up the crowd causing murmuring among them with an incomprehensible and extraordinary statement that he is true bread from heaven (John 6:32, 41) and that he is the bread of life (John 6:48-51). This notion for the Jewish crowd of Jesus being the bread from heaven was quite a stretch. Remember that they knew Jesus as the son of their neighbor, the carpenter. Therefore, Jesus was not surprised that they did not understand or realize that the ‘the bread of life’ actually stood before them.

Nevertheless, Jesus extends the offer of eternal life to them and to us today through the acceptance of this bread of life from God. Jesus is a gift of spiritual nourishment to the world. We know that Jesus is the sacrificial gift for us on the cross.

There are Eucharistic overtones in John’s Gospel and as Christians, we are
are offered a feast on the bread of life for our souls so that we may never hunger or thirst. Our Eucharist gathering binding us together as brothers and sisters in the Body of Christ is a weekly celebration of the gift of Christ - the bread from heaven, the living manna, and the eternal sustainer of life.
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I read a story that I would like to share with you. “A seminarian, doing his diaconal ministry in a hospital in the Bronx, was visiting an elderly Italian gentleman on a Saturday evening. He entered the man’s hospital room to ask him if he would like to receive Holy Communion on the Lord’s Day. The man’s wife was seated in a chair next to her husband’s bed. She was holding her husband’s hand. The seminarian asked, “Would you like to receive Holy Communion tomorrow, sir?” The man could not hear well as he lay in his hospital bed. So the old man looked up at his wife somewhat quizzically and said, “Eh, Mama?” His wife nodded knowingly with assurance and said to her husband, “It’s okay. It’s only God wanting to feed you.” (copied and adapted from Richard Fairchild, “Homily for 19th Sunday of the Year,” (August 13, 2000 Published on the internet, Proclaiming the Revised Common Lectionary.) We are called to be open and allow ourselves to be fed by the supernatural food from God that faithfully and eternally sustains us through the life and death of Jesus on the cross.

The Apostle Paul in today’s epistle reminds us that we are called to live and be filled with love for others as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. (Ephesians 5:2). We are called to offer ourselves in service to Christ who is the bread of life for the world. (http://www.predigten.uni-goettingen.de/archiv-8/060806-5-e.html). We are called to be the potter’s clay reshaped by Christ as faithful witnesses of a loving God in the world.

The daily news reports reminds us that all over the world people are broken and hungry. Jesus is the perfect offering for us. We are called to look beyond ourselves to find the meaning and purpose of what God is calling us to do in the world.
(http://www.predigten.uni-goettingen.de/archiv-8/060806-5-e.html) Daily we are filled with the yearning hunger for peace where there is war, for justice where there is in equality, for love where is hatred, and for reconciliation where is division. We are called to gather at our Eucharist table to be strengthened. When we leave the table, we are fed and refreshed in fellowship through the love of Christ. (adapted from http://www.predigten.uni-goettingen.de/archiv-8/060806-5-e.html)

In closing, I would like to read to you a poem by Brain Wren and at the conclusion please repeat after me “Thanks be to God.” (Brian Wren, “At the Eucharist Invitation to the Table printed in Let All the World, ed. Wendy Robins (London: USPG, 1990).
Amen.

8/2/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Ninth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-08-02T16:49:00.000-04:00

Text: John 6:24-34

“For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” (John 6: 33)

In the name of the one holy and undivided Trinity. Amen.

Most of us have enjoyed festive meals with family and friends. I know I certainly have and most likely, these festive meals were a part of holidays, birthdays, baptisms, commencements, family reunions, or some other special occasion.

After such meals, we are full and completely satisfied. Some of us like to refer to these meals as ‘soul food:’ Meat, vegetables, dressings, gravy, bread, condiments, fruit, desserts - food stretching from one end of the table to the other!

In our Gospel today, Jesus continues a dialogue with the crowd that benefited from his miraculous feeding produced for them out of five loves of barley and two fish near the Passover celebration. We hear that the remaining people who were fed get into their own boats to look for Jesus and the disciples in Capernaum. Jesus tells this remaining crowd that he knows they are only interested in him due to the feeding and not because of signs, they could see beyond their physical need. Jesus senses they were looking for a repeat performance. They wanted another meal.

Consider this story:

A guest in a posh hotel restaurant called the headwaiter over during breakfast one morning and placed his order. He said, “I’d like one egg undercooked so it’s runny and one egg over cooked so it’s tough and hard to eat. And I’d also like grilled bacon that’s a bit on the cold side, brunt toast, butter straight from the freezer so it’s impossible to spread and a pot of very weak, lukewarm coffee.”

“That’s a complicated order, sir,” said the bewildered waiter, “It might be quite difficult to complete your order.” The guest replied sarcastically, “It can’t be that difficult---that’s exactly what you brought me yesterday!” (Homiletics, Aug.2009, p.45)

I think it was clever of Jesus in the role of a radical host to make sure everyone was fed. We readily offer our guests refreshments. Following our service, all are welcome to light refreshments in the parish hall. This is a weekly practice at St. Margaret’s and we feed the homeless four days out of every week. Jesus’ act of hospitality helped to set the stage for the crowd to see beyond a physical situation - being satisfied and full - Jesus wanted them to stretch more than their stomachs – he wanted them to be full spiritually as well.

The focus of today’s gospel is that Jesus is offering food–bread- that stays with you for more than couple of hours. This bread is the soul food that does not perish. We know the people misunderstand the meaning behind that miraculous feeding. “Our ancestors ate the bread in the wilderness…” they respond (John 6:32). However, after hearing Jesus inform them that he can give them, bread from God that gives life to the world. This bread offering is unlike the manna their ancestors ate in the wilderness. Then they ask Jesus for the bread for always.

Jesus reveals to the gathering that he is the living bread. The bread Jesus is offering is the bread we pray for in the Lord’s Prayer to God: Give us this day our daily bread. We pray with trust and faith for substance and sustenance – we feed on the nourishment of God’s presence with us daily. God’s presence does not leave us, although sometimes we may not be aware of it. This supreme presence will not leave us empty or unsatisfied. This presence is eternal.

You may recall that when Jesus was famished and tempted by Satan to turn the stones into loaves of bread. Jesus responds, “it is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” (Matthew 4:4).

The Good News is that in John’s Gospel, Jesus is the Word that lives among us daily (John 1:14). Jesus is the true sign indicating the gift of God’s presence among us. God seeks us out for a relationship that grows with love, faith, and trust. This is the work we are called to do to sustain an everlasting relationship with our creator. Jesus is the healthy food source from God that nourishes the soul when our heart is an open vessel.

We are called to be a community of faith fed by the bread of life given by God for the world. We become filled with humility, patience, forbearance, love, forgiveness, and peace. (Ephesians 4: 2-3) These are the super foods that feed the soul. Additionally, these are the ingredients in the Bread of life that strengthen our minds, bodies, and souls (copied and adapted AHA, Aug.3. 2003). It is with this strength that we carry out the work that God calls us to do. Know that we are called to believe and have faith in our Creator - the source of our daily bread. There is NO expiration date!

Let us mediate on these words from one of my mother’s favorite hymns, Bread of the World:

Bread of the world, in mercy broken,
Wine of the soul, in mercy shed,
By whom the words of life were spoken,
And in whose death our sins are dead.

Look on the heart by sorrow broken,
Look on the tears by sinners shed,
And be thy feast to us the token,
That by thy grace our souls are fed.
(Bread for the World from Reginald Herber’s Hymns,written and adapted to the Weekly Service of the Church Year (London: J. Murray,1827), # 34.

Let us leave this sacred space with a renewed relationship with God having been spiritually fed, nourished, and strengthened by the bread of life for eternity.

Amen.

7/26/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Eighth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-07-26T16:53:00.000-04:00

God split the rocks open in the wilderness, and gave them drink abundantly as from the deep. Yet the Lord commanded the skies above, and opened the doors of heaven; God rained down on them manna to eat, and gave them the grain from heaven. Mortals ate of the bread of angels; the Lord sent them food in abundance. And they ate and were filled, for the Lord gave them what they craved. They did not keep in mind God’s power, or the day when God redeemed them from the foe; when God displayed signs in Egypt, and his miracles in the fields of Zo’an. (Psalm 78:15, 23-25, 29, 42-43)

In the name of the one true God and holy Trinity. Amen.

The source of our Gospel lessons for the next several weeks will be the Gospel of John. Today in John’s Gospel, the feeding of the 5000 and Jesus walking on water are two familiar miracle stories to us. The Gospel of John is known as the Book of Signs because the purpose of the Apostle John’s Gospel is to reveal the identity of Jesus as the Messiah who is in our midst and the author of our salvation.

Additionally, this Gospel was written to reveal the nature and power of God through Jesus Christ as witnessed by the disciples and others during his public ministry. Apostle John says, “Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name” (John 20: 30-31).

Quite often, the signs Jesus revealed and displayed were misinterpreted, misunderstood, or missed all together. This created confusion about who Jesus was and what he could and should do for the crowds that followed him everywhere he went and even among his own disciples. The people were in awe of the miracles he could perform but they continued to miss the true meaning of his teachings and the signs he tried to show them. The feeding of the 5000 and Jesus walking on water are indicators of the miraculous actions that reflected the presence of God among the Israelites in the Old Testament scriptures.

At one point, Jesus has to slip away to a mountain to pray alone. He sends the disciples ahead of him in a boat to Capernaum. The Israelites wanted to select and crown their own king. A group of them was convinced that they had found their king after witnessing Jesus heal the sick and feed the crowd of 5000 people with five barley loaves and two pieces of dried fish. The fact of the matter was that Jesus fled because his identity and mission was not linked to becoming the next political king. Jesus’ mission is God’s mission among the people and he carried that mission out through his actions and teaching. The sign for us is to remember that Jesus was not a new prophet like Moses. Jesus was God incarnate. The power of the God of Moses, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the Samaritan woman at the well - all reflected the power of Jesus the Messiah.

In our society, we find signs that identify the people sitting behind their desks in the office or in the classroom. Our bodies give us signs that something physical is happening. However, when we are not careful, we may miss the physical warning signs that may require immediate attention. We depend on economic indicators, traffic signs, news reports, and other signs and signals that give us critical information and direction everyday.

In l981, I traveled to Guatemala City to test out the experience of traveling outside of the States while I was contemplating volunteering for the Peace Corps. One day, I needed to cash some travelers checks at the local bank. I knew a little Spanish and I was eager to practice it. I stopped a man and asked him for directions. I was standing alongside a wooded area and according to the man, it appeared that all I needed to do was to walk around to the other side of the wooded area and I would see a yellow building.

I happily walked around the wooded area towards the building. The yellow building had a sign, El Banco de Sangre. I did not pay much attention to the rest of the words after seeing ‘El Banco.’ But to my surprise, the door was locked. I waited patiently for a staff person to arrive and noticed a woman walking hurriedly towards me. I pointed to my watch to ask what time the building would open for business. The woman smiled and turned my arm over and pointed to the inside of my wrist. She let me in and while she answered the phone, I noticed a couple of huge silver refrigerators and a centrifuge on the laboratory table. Have you already guessed where I was standing? I was in a blood bank! The woman and I laughed and laughed. When we composed ourselves, she led me around the corner to a small unimposing building and there I saw a large sign which read -The Bank of Guatemala City – in English! I had not read the first sign completely and had an entirely different expectation of what a bank should look like!

I suspect that one sign that is often overlooked in the feeding of the 5000 gathered for the approaching Passover celebration, is that Jesus - yes, Jesus meets the physical needs of the people. However, John’s Gospel more importantly, reminds us that we are called to be is the host of radical hospitality wherever we are just as Jesus was for the crowd who gathered as his guests. Jesus displays radical hospitality to all the people around him - both his supporters and his foes alike. It is written, that this radical hospitality is not a response to expectation, need, or demand but rather a response of grace and generosity as Jesus modeled the nature of God. (Synthesis, July 26, 2009). We are called to witness to others and remember the signs and miracles in our own lives as a response of God’s love and mercy. AMEN.

7/19/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Seventh Sunday After Pentecost

2009-07-19T16:49:00.000-04:00

The apostles gathered around Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught. He said to them, "Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while." (Mark 6:31, NRSV)

A writer describes this cartoon, a pastor stood on the platform of the train station. Vacationers waved and happily shouted at him as they filled the cars. The caption said, “Sure, it cost Pastor Smith a great deal to send the entire congregation on a vacation, but it was worth it!” (copied and adapted from, Lectionary, July 23, 2000, p. 33) We are in the middle of the summer season. This is the usual time we escape from our busy lifestyles to refresh and replenish ourselves physically, mentally, and emotionally. I myself am returning from a week-long vacation at the beach. I had wonderful days of enjoying the beauty of the deep blue sea, warm sand beneath my feet, and quiet time. We all need to take a break.

In today’s Gospel, the disciples are addressed for the first time as apostles. The word apostle literally means, “sent ones.” The apostles have just returned from a mission that Jesus used to test their hands at public ministry. The apostles were given both instruction and authority to anoint and heal the sick, cast out demons, and teach all who would listen. On the horizon was the decimation of an unusual type of leadership and discipleship for a new kingdom that differed from the customs of the people. This new kingdom had brought skepticism for some and hope for others starving for renewal in their lives.

The apostles returned and excitedly reported to Jesus everything they had experienced. They obviously had been successful because crowds of people had continued to follow them. The apostles were all talking at the same time while Jesus listened to their accounts. They, undoubtedly, had an adrenaline high following the debut of their public ministry. Jesus intuitively sensed their need for retreat and respite in the midst of their enthusiasm and exuberance.

Jesus does not say, ‘Wonderful! Now get back out there.’ No, he instead invites them to "Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while." (Mark 6:31) Jesus was aware that many people were coming and going as the crowds swelled in numbers and the apostles had little time to catch their breath or to eat. Jesus certainly knew what that was like. Perhaps some of you probably also know what racing around and neglecting some of your own needs feels like as well. You know that kind

of exhaustion. According to Luke, soon thereafter, Jesus and the apostles proceed to a boat and head towards a deserted place in Bethsaida for rest and recuperation.

Jesus knew the importance of recuperation and solitude for prayer. These are also important disciplines for us to mirror today. We know that Jesus also went to deserted places such as the wilderness, mountaintops, gardens, retreats, and walks by himself to rest, think, and pray.

Our call and challenge today is to search for those quiet places that provide peace and silence in the presence of the Lord so that we will be at our best to help others and be productive in our daily tasks. We are challenged in our fast paced society to recognize our limitations and know just how much we can cram into one day before we deplete our energies. Our youth are called to learn how valued they are by just being themselves in the eyes of God when they use a Sabbath day for rest and relaxation. This break from the grind of school and other activities afford our youth to time to dedicate to ministry or service to the community.

Our scripture today reminds us that vacations are wonderful gifts for us to take. However, we are called to consider that such refreshment can be interwoven with the daily threads of our lives and carefully stitched with an intentional balance of work, ministry, school, leisure, family, friends, and the solitude of prayer. (copied and adapted) Of course, this may not be an easy balance to accomplish.

Our faith community reminds us that when we are on vacation and when we return, we are very much a part of a Christian faith that holds our lives together in the body of Christ when we are resting and also when we return restored and energized for St. Margaret’s program mission as disciples of the risen Christ. We are called to remember that we are bonded together in one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism.

We are the hands, the eyes, and the heart in the community modeling Christian teaching, healing, and reconciliation in our world. The strength and guidance for our ministries requires resting in solitude wherever we can find our quiet place. We are called to keep in mind that our Lord is the God of peace that teaches us that in returning and rest we shall be saved, and in quietness and in confidence shall be our strength…(adapted and copied from prayer #59, Quiet Confidence, Book of Common Prayer, p. 832)

Let us pray:

Help us to feel you calling us away into the quiet, sacred, holy, and lonely spaces. There are needs all around us, pressing us for answers, pushing us for help and pulling us for time. Yet we cannot fully engage these needs without the perspective that only you can bring from our time in the quiet. Grant us grace Lord to know when to retreat and when to engage. Give us ears to hear you in the quiet and eyes to see you through the haze of our urgencies and business in our lives. (copied and adapted from Homiletics, July 2009, p.25). Amen.

7/12/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Sixth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-07-12T11:21:00.000-04:00

“God chose us before the world began, to be holy and blameless…to be full of love.” Ephesians 1:3

When I first looked at the lessons for today I was horrified. I am not real enamored of David right now and John the Baptist’s head on a platter is pretty grim. After some much needed research, however, I realized that, in many ways, the Gospel, at least, is quite appropriate.
Looking to what preceded this passage, we learn that Jesus discovered that he is not recognized as a prophet in his own country. He then sent out the disciples, two by two, to preach. He gave them authority to cast out demons and to heal. Their mission, by all accounts, was very successful. It was so very effective that Herod was hearing about Jesus and was terrified that he was John the Baptist raised from the dead. Since Herod was in Tiberius and Jesus had never been to that city, Jesus’ reputation was spreading widely. It is then and only then, that we read a flashback of the circumstances of John’s death. That became a precursor of Jesus’ death and the death that his followers both then and now might experience.
What was this very dangerous teaching that could get John, Jesus and many of the disciples killed? The answer can be found in the letter to Ephesians in which it is said that all people are called to God, not just the chosen. This, according to Paul, was God’s plan from the beginning. All who bless God are called to be children of God by adoption…and, as God’s children, recipients of redemption and forgiveness of sins through the blood of Jesus Christ. Through Christ all walls of exclusivity were broken down and all who believed in him were welcome.
This did not sit well with human beings then or now. Human beings want to feel special, to be more important or more loved than others. This was certainly true of the Jews in Jesus’ time and true of all of us today. We curry prejudices that foster the thinking that some people are in and some are out. Often we develop litmus tests that are frequently based upon single issues and misconceptions. We paint all of one group with the same brush and attach common characteristics to its members without seeing them as individuals. If the Kingdom of God is for all people we are no longer special….and human beings did not like that one bit in the first century, and we do not like that now. If we look at the variety of religions, if we look at the number of Christian denominations, if we even look at our own communion and province, we find that there is a certainty about “our way” that makes it more ‘right’ than that of the other. Jesus preached love for all people, especially for those who were shunned or outcast. He listened, he healed, and he dined with and cared for each and every person.
Our General Convention is meeting in Anaheim right now. There are two issues that are receiving the most attention. First, BO33, a resolution passed at the last minute of the General Convention three years ago, is being revisited. BO33 was pressed upon newly elected Presiding Bishop, Katherine Jefferts Schori, by the Archbishop of Canterbury and retiring Presiding Bishop, Frank Griswold, with the argument that refraining from consecrating openly partnered gay and lesbian persons to the Episcopate was the only way for our province to stay in the Anglican Communion. It was an ill conceived resolution and has cause much anxiety and regret for the past three years. The House of Bishops has had a number of opportunities to discuss this, but the House of Deputies is meeting for the first time since the 2006 Convention. As a result, the House has taken an unprecedented special order that allows for informal discussion of the entire House. That discussion started yesterday and continues today.
Other resolutions before the Prayer Book, Music and Liturgy Committee ask for marriage equality and rites for same-gender blessings. Though the hearing was very long, the majority of those speaking testified that the wall of sexual orientation be dropped in each and every rite of the church.
It is clear that our church is beginning to move beyond the exclusivity issue and to recognize that God loves all people, not just the few. We would be profoundly naïve if we believed that these resolutions, if passed, will be well received by the rest of the Anglican Communion and the various Christian communities. Things will get worse before they get better, but justice and Christ’s love demand that we embrace these issues. This process was true when the Episcopal Church addressed the exclusion of people of color and, again, when it dealt with the full inclusion of women.
We are called, as God’s beloved, to reach out to all people, including those with whom we disagree. We need to listen with love, not anger, and to embrace the sadness that Jesus experienced, when two-way communication breaks down. For our mission to be successful we are to, like the disciples, proclaim Christ’s word in deed as well as in word. We are to seek justice, to heal the broken, to serve the needy and to show compassion in our interactions with all people. When faced with injustice we are called to name the issue, to have the courage to speak up, doing so with as much love and compassion as we can muster. In doing so, we make ourselves vulnerable, another state that human beings find to be very uncomfortable. In the end, we leave judgment to God and God alone. This requires prayer, worship and community. We cannot do it alone. Just as the disciples went out two by two, so do we move forward together. It is our challenge at St. Margaret’s to pray for the deputies and bishops at the General Convention. By doing so they will know that they are not alone but are being supported by a multitude of Episcopalians.
Let us together commit to following Jesus, knowing that it will require vulnerability and suffering as we claim and show the love that we have been given. There is great danger and great risk. There will also be great reward and great joy.

AMEN

7/5/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Fifth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-07-05T16:52:00.000-04:00

On the Sabbath, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astounded. They said, "Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?" And they took offense at him. (Mark 1-3, NRSV)

May the mediation of our hearts and the words of our mouths be found acceptable in your sight O Lord our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

My sister performed in a locally acclaimed play called “Inner City” in DC when she was a high school student. My family was very excited about this and we all went to see her on opening night at the L Street Theater. Thirty minutes into the play, my father asked "Where’s your sister?" I do not see her on the stage with everyone else.” My sister had been on the stage since the play began. However, my father did not recognize her as his daughter because he was looking for her in the way that he knew her.

My father did not recognize his daughter in the make up and costume because she appeared to be older than her actual age. We did not dare tell him her role in the play but I pointed her out to him. He felt comfortable now and became engrossed in the play. He did not take his eyes off my sister after that. He was a very proud dad watching his daughter perform in the play. He returned many times along with the neighbors we would take to see the performance.

Actually, I could not believe that I watching my sister on the stage singing and dancing. I kept saying to myself, ‘that’s my sister on the stage. Awesome! I could not believe the talent I was seeing on the stage. I felt like this even after she began to perform in plays or shows in New York. She was an actor on the stage. However, I know her as ‘my sister.’

Jesus was known as just one of the local folks in his hometown. He began his public ministry by teaching in all of the synagogues in Galilee. It was only natural for him to return to his hometown of Nazareth at some point. Most likely, perceptions of him were already formed in the minds of the Nazarenes. News of his miraculous powers were constantly circulating throughout the area. He arrived in Nazareth after having healed several people. You may remember the man possessed with demons and the hemorrhaging woman who could not stop bleeding. They both were healed. Jesus also resuscitated Jairus 12-year old daughter. Crowds of strangers followed him with curiosity. Many people left their homes to be by his side as disciples including the specially selected twelve men. However, the reception from his old neighbors and family his hometown was cold and unwelcoming.

Jesus was a little surprised by their blatant rejection of him especially after the teaching he gave for them in the synagogue. Yet, at the same time, he anticipated this would happen.

Mark does not provide us with specific details about what happened in the synagogue that caused such a negative response from the listeners. However, Luke provides us with some information that sheds light on the situation. It was customary for a visitor to the synagogue to be offered the opportunity to teach by the head ruler of the synagogue. The thing that Jesus loved most was to teach and here, was an opportunity he could not pass up by with taking advantage of the moment.

Jesus was given the scroll of the prophet Isaiah to read. Jesus read. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because God (he) has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. God (He) has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing." (Luke 18-19, 21 NRSV)

They marveled at his insight and wisdom though they questioned the source. Who was this person with such an authoritative manner indicating the prophet Isaiah was referring to him who was now standing in their presence? This was scandalous! The people were offended by the words of Jesus.

As far as they were concerned, he was Mary’s son; the carpenter who grew up there as a little boy. Their neighbors were his siblings. He and his father used to build their furniture. Their perceptions were that Jesus was an ordinary person. Now, through his actions and words, he was not human like them but Jesus claimed to have a divine nature like God! Jesus did not fit their conceptions of the Messiah. This man was familiar to them and he was one of their own. They could not think of him in any other light.

However, we know that God does work in ordinary people to serve as a witness to the marvelous works of peace, justice, love, and healing in the world. F.W. de Klerk was a regular church member. On his inauguration day, Pastor Bingle told him in a sermon that God was calling him to do God’s will for the country. His election was not to serve a select few but God was relying on him to be the President of all the people in South Africa. De Klerk was deeply moved and could be seen crying.

He asked his family to pray for him to do the will of God because God had revealed to him what to do as the President. He knew that following God’s will would mean rejection by his own people. He knew, however, what was in stake: by following God’s will. It would mean rejection by his own people. Later, de Klerk initiated negotiating with the African National Congress to disable the apartheid system in South Africa and he released Nelson Mandela after 27 years of incarceration. (from Bill Carter, Water Won’t Quench the Fire, p.94 in Lectionary, July 16, 2000).

I am sure there were many people in South Africa that did not expect de Klerk to do what he did. Many people were astonished and flatly dismissed him following his decision. His His own people had a different perception of their newly elected President. However, God had a different plan and de Klerk allowed God to use him.

The rebuffs of his own people did not stop Jesus from continuing to teach the good news of the Gospel, healing the sick, and liberating the world. Jesus died on the cross out of his love for us. God used the synagogues as a place of witness to reveal the purpose of Jesus’ ministry in his hometown and everywhere else he taught.

On this 4th of July weekend, I am reminded of what Kathleen Townsend Kennedy wrote. She said that it was time we stopped distorting faith to serve politics or silencing the better angels of our nature. It is time we started allowing faith to breathe freely and speak honesty, seeing the holy in our fellow human beings and our duty to one another on God’s earth. (Synthesis 2003)

We are called to remember that we are ordinary people like the disciples whom Jesus sent out one by one and two by two to do the ministry of the church. We are called to listen through prayer and do the will of God as a witness of God’s love as Christians in the world. During these times of discord in the Church we are called to overcome different perceptions by other people of who we are and the denunciations of others.

Remembering our collect let us pray…
O God, you have taught us to keep all your commandments by loving you and our neighbor: Grant us the grace of your Holy Spirit, that we may be devoted to you with our whole heart, and united to one another with pure affection; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Amen.

6/28/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Fourth Sunday After Pentecost

2009-06-28T16:51:00.000-04:00

While he was still speaking, some people came from the leader's house to say, "Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?" But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe." He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. (Mark 5:35-37,NRSV)

This week our local news was filled with reports of suffering, fear, and tragedy. The tragic Metro subway accident that claimed nine lives and injured more than seventy others produced feelings of turmoil, loss, bewilderment, and shock. Yet, God’s presence was there in the midst of the horrific aftermath for those clinging to life and for those facing the end of life.

I imagine that the Metro driver, seeing the danger ahead of her, frantically pushed the mushroom button to apply the brakes as she braced herself for the collision. She was trying to protect her passengers as best she could. God’s presence was there with her. God’s presence was also there when the emergency crews swung into immediate action to rescue and provide medical services to the injured passengers. Medical professionals who were also passengers in the derailed train cars also assisted some of the injured. God’s presence was there.

This accident troubled me deeply as I thought about all of the times I rode the Metro trains without a single thought of concern for my safety. I had a narrow escape on the Metro subway during the 1982 snow blizzard in Washington, D.C. I rode the blue line two stops and then decided to get off for fear of being stuck underground. I jumped on the bus and rode home. While on the bus, a report came across the radio that a blue line train had jumped the track in the tunnel and many were injured.

I was very thankful that I had gotten off of that train but I later learned that one of my high school classmates had been on the train. She sustained severe back injuries that plagued her for years. She and her family successfully sued Metro and won a settlement for her medical fees. But, unfortunately, she never fully recovered from her injuries and subsequently passed away. My sister and I were saying the other day that in light of last week’s derailment, few will want to ride in the front or back cars of the train. Everyone will be jammed into the middle cars to feel safe.

Tragic accidents like this on the Metro produce feelings of fear and bewilderment. People wonder, ‘can we really trust in the public transportation system?’ However, we should realize that we do not ride the trains alone – God’s presence is with us. God is riding with us.

I recall a story of a young man riding in a car with his father. His father was going pretty fast and this was terribly frightening to the young man. He says, “Pop, Pop slow down!” His father says, “Don’t worry son, the Lord is with us.” The father’s drives on but goes even faster. The young man is getting really anxious and says, “Pop, Pop please slow down!” and the father once again says, “Don’t worry son, the Lord is with us.” By this time the car is going faster and faster,

The young man is frantic and practically screams to at his father, “Pop, Pop please, please slow down!!” and once again the father with full confidence and for the third time responds to his frightened son, “Don’t you worry son, the Lord is with us.” The young man looks out the window at the blur of scenery racing by and says to his father, “The Lord may be with you but me and Jesus are getting OUT!

Sometimes it is not so evident to us when God’s presence is among us - especially during a chronic illness, a natural disaster, the loss of a loved one, or through a trouble marriage. Think about a time in your life when you were desperate and there seemed to be no way out and you were at a loss as to what to do or where to go. You had exhausted all of your means and resources. We do not always have the fullness of faith and trust that enables us to recognize that Christ’s presence is just within our reach during these dark and difficult times.

The people mourning at Jairus’ home had no idea about the power of the man who entered the house with Jairus. They jeered and laughed at Jesus when he said, “the child is not dead but sleeping.” Rob Lowe, who appeared on the Emmy award winning television show, The West Wing, depicting the inner workings of the White House, shared this story about his son on a visit to the real White House.

Lowe recalled that during the momentous occasion of standing in the Oval Office introducing his son Matthew to the President, his son is only paying attention to one thing. Matthew is gleefully jumping up and down, shouting, and pointing, “Dad, Dad, squirrels!” Matthew did not fully grasp the magnitude of the moment. (“Pop Quiz with Rob Lowe” People Magazine, April 29, 2002).

However, in Mark’s gospel, Jairus did grasp the magnitude of the moment and sought Jesus out in desperation to save his twelve-year old daughter. Those of you who are parents can relate to the desperation of Jairus and the depth of his love for his daughter who was close to death. In fact, she was reported to have died before Jesus could get to the home. Jairus was a leader and member of the Council of Elders in a synagogue. He was a wealthy man of influence and stature in the community. Jairus’ first concern was to get the best help he knew for his daughter. This synagogue leader did not take the time to investigate Jesus’ background. He just knew that he needed the power of God that Jesus possessed to save his little girl.
Karl Barth once said that people come to church with one primary question: Is it true? – Is it true that Jesus is Lord over life and death? Is it true that Jesus never met a corpse he did not raise? Is it true that Jesus can bring “a new creation” out of the depths of death, darkness, and despair? Is it true? That is what Jairus wanted to know and he found out.

We can imagine the tremendous relief and joy Jairus felt – the tears streaming down his face as he fed his daughter after the ordeal was over. Jairus came to know the mystery of faith. He encountered the authority of the Abba-experience in Jesus Christ, which is what all of us deep inside seek to encounter. (copied and adapted, HKO, Synthesis, June 3, 2003)

Jesus would not let Jarius lose hope. And Jesus does not let us lose* hope in our own human conditions. Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, "Do not fear, only believe.” After ordering the mourners gathered in the little girl’s room to leave, Jesus approaches her, takes her hand as says, “ Talitha cum” meaning “ Little girl get up!”. The child is immediately resuscitated, gets up, and begins to walk. The cloud of death is removed from the girl and Jairus’ despair is vanquished.

The story of this miracle connects us to our faith and hope. It is a story that reminds us that in our own brokenness and weakness, we are called to seek wholeness from the power of God. We are challenged to allow our faith to draws us closer to God in all of the challenging situations we encounter. I know that you have had your own personal situations where you have found this to be true.

The lesson today helps us to remember that God gives us the gift of faith. We are called to seek it out and initiate its action from within ourselves in order for the gift of faith to grow and become active in our lives. Faith cannot be comprehended by human reasoning or seen with human senses. It is a spiritual power that God gives us because we cannot obtain it by our own abilities. Jairus had a desire for faith. We are called to use our own will to initiate desire for faith.

We are called to seek faith by praying to God for this gift to unfold within us. Each time we participate in Holy Communion, we have the opportunity to receive the grace of God to build our faith. In essence, we are called to tap into the faith that is present and deep within us. We are called to tap into the very faith that has been with each of us from birth and we can activate this faith for our spiritual journey through life. (copied and adapted from Synthesis, June 28, 2009)

We are called to allow Jesus Christ to touch and raise us up with expectant hope and trust. The Good news for us today is that God, whether or not there is healing or a life resuscitated, God is present. God suffers and rejoices with us. We worship a living God in life and a God who has power over death for eternity. It IS true and a promise that God keeps and has for us. Amen

6/21/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Third Sunday of Pentecost

2009-06-21T13:27:00.000-04:00

Let us pray:

“O God of peace, who has taught us that in returning and rest we shall be saved, in quietness and in confidence shall be our strength: By the might of your Spirit lift us, we pray, to your presence, where we may be still and know that you are God. Through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Amen
(Prayer #60, 1979 BCP)

Our Gospel lesson for today could not be more opportune. Not only are we experiencing far more thunderstorms than is usual in June, but we are in the midst of an economic storm in which many people feel they are sinking. Ever since 9/11, much in our world feels as though it has been turned upside down. Such was true that day for the disciples in the boat. The Sea of Galilee is both beautiful and dangerous. It is shallow and surrounded by high hills or mountains. When a storm arises it can cause a terrifying sea.

Let us look at it closely. Jesus asks them to take him to the other side of the sea and they did so, taking him just as he was. The storm arose and the boat was in danger. Meanwhile, Jesus was asleep in the back of the boat on a cushion, seemingly untroubled by the waves and wind. The disciples woke him up and challenged him, asking if he cared at all that they were in danger of dying. Jesus woke, calmly rebuked the sea, and all was quiet. He challenged their faith and fear, and the disciples were in awe that he could control even the violence of nature.

The disciples were seasoned fishermen, so it was odd that they panicked and did not do the normal bailing, lowering of sail, and rowing that they were accustomed to do. Instead of asking God to save them, a normal response to fear, they accused Jesus of not caring. His response was to use words of exorcism to calm the storm: “Peace! Be Still!” The disciples were anxious at that point for Jesus had demonstrated that he had power over demons and chaos, a power reserved for God alone! They had not yet understood that Jesus was the human face of God…the loving, saving, tender, ever-present God who created us for God’s delight.

We, too, experience fear during the storms of our lives. People are plagued by illness, depression, economic insecurity, painful relationships…the list of life experiences that produce anxiety and panic is long. We often, like the disciples, call out to God for help without having nurtured our relationship with the Holy One ahead of time. We are sure we are in control of our lives until something radical happens. At that point we try to pull God out for help, without the calming preparation of trusting faith. We treat God like an occasional genie in a box when we cannot control what is happening to us, rather than the one who is the source of all life. Frank Wade has said that:

“When we assert our authority over life we come against God’s greater authority. People, even people of great faith and piety, are not very good at recognizing the line between individual responsibility and God’s authority.”
(Whose Life is it? Francis Wade)

True faith is trust in God in the midst of the storm, not as an afterthought. Yes, we are to believe in ourselves. There is much data to affirm that self-confidence and optimism are essential qualities when trouble comes. God wants us to be responsible and brave and believes that we can be. However, as Frank Wade has said, we need to remember that, ultimately, God is in charge.

I have learned over the years that fear, anxiety, hurt, jealousy, anger and most strong emotions begin with the same feeling in our stomachs. Often we have not learned to trace those back, to find what has triggered them. As a consequence we respond inappropriately, often with anger, when our real issue is fear or hurt. One way to deal with these feelings, after we find their source, is to pull them out and look at them, to name them and expose them to air, by sharing them with one another and with God. In doing so they assume an appropriate proportion and we find that we can trust God and ourselves in the midst of the anxiety and pain.

In the Gospels, Jesus, as the human face of God, illustrates God’s power over demons, death, chaos, nature and disease. There is no question that God’s power overarches and grounds all that is, was and will be. At times God is accused of “sleeping” when our prayers are not answered as we wish. There is a story of a long time church organist whose daughter became ill. She asserted that if her child did not live she would never play the organ again. Her daughter died and she never again played an organ in church. (Copied)

I cannot believe in a God who chooses that this child will die and that child will live. That is a quixotic, puppeteer God that, for me, has little relationship to the God of love whom I worship. I believe in an ‘in-suffering’ God, one who suffers with us and never leaves us. God suffered with Jesus on the cross yet did no lift him off and end his pain. The promise has always been that God will be with us always, even unto the end of our lives and beyond. We were not promised freedom from pain, anxiety or suffering, only the constant love and companionship our Creator.

Let us, during these slower days of summer spend some time reconnecting with God through private prayer, worship and the love we experience with one another. Let us expose our demons to the Holy One and allow them to be exorcised and released. Let us, like those first disciples, finally, through the cross and Resurrection, come to a faith that sustains us every day of our lives. Those early Christians sustained many forms of persecution and death, yet it did not prevent them from spreading the Gospel to the ends of the known earth. Let us seek that same trust and relationship that will enable us, with God, to help to bring about the Kingdom. AMEN

6/14/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Second Sunday After Pentecost

2009-06-14T16:50:00.000-04:00

Text: Mark 26-29

In the name of the one holy and undivided Trinity. Amen.

Some of you are gardeners and you may appreciate hearing about my first gardening experience. I have been a city girl all of my life. Before going to West Africa in 1982, I had never planted or grown anything. All of the produce I consumed, was happily obtained from the grocery store.

In Africa, vegetable production is sparse and my Peace Corp trainers encouraged all of the volunteers to try and grow vegetables. They provided us with several packages of seeds and sent us on our way. The part of the country that I lived in was known for its low water table. This means that the water supply from the wells was limited and only available at certain times of the day.

I went to the village chief to ask for a small plot of land to use for my garden. He granted me some land behind the village health clinic where I worked. This was the ideal spot for me to plant. I could use the vegetables from the garden as show and tell for my nutrition classes and the well baby clinic talks for new mothers.

In the hot broiling sun, I trekked to my plot of land and began to prepare the land for my garden. I broke up the earth to make the nursery beds, planted the seeds, and watered the ground. The ground was very dry and difficult to break. I gained a new appreciation for farmers and the tillers of the land as I labored to create my garden.

I began to see the connection between nature and myself. I began to think of my dependence on the seeds I planted and their dependence on me to help them grow. I thought that if I did all that was required, everything would work out, and all of the seeds I planted would grow. All I had to do was be patient and wait for the rains to come. Finally, it did rain late one night.

I was asleep when I heard the first rain of the season arrive. I jumped up out of bed, ran outside, and danced in the rain. The whole time I was thinking about the water that my little garden was finally receiving. For several days and weeks, I watched over my garden and looked for signs of growth.

Only two out of the six different vegetable seeds I planted began to grow much to my surprise and my disappointment. I was expecting more for all of the energy and work I had put into the preparation of the garden. I really expected all of the seeds I had planted to grow! But, in spite of all of the energy, hard work, and attention I gave that garden – I learned that I was not in control of what was supposed to grow.

What was there for me to reap or harvest was not in my own hands or control but in God’s. My tomatoes and eggplants were plentiful and I enjoyed them immensely. They added to my limited supply of nutritious food. However, why the other seeds failed to grow was a mystery.

Jesus compares the Kingdom of God to that a farmer who sows seeds and then relaxes day and night. Later magnificent results occur and the farmer reaps the harvest. A mysterious process takes place and causes the seed to germinate, sprout and grow- although this process is hidden from the human eye. (Synthesis 6/16/91) God’s ways are not a human’s ways. We cannot see everything that God does or is doing. We can do a little and God will still do a lot.

What is the reign or dominion of God like? Jesus explains Mark’s gospel, that the Kingdom of God is not the result of human earnings, human creativity, or human striving. What is revealed to us is that the reality of God’s kingdom is a mystery that involves the creative nature of God.

This divine action is not brought about by human intervention or accomplishment. There is no need for me or anyone else to take credit for what causes one seed to grow or another not to grow. God’s boundless ways lie beyond the limited capacities of our human scope or comprehension.

The harvest in the Kingdom of God is linked to our growth. We are called and invited to reap the harvest given to us by the grace of God that feeds our spiritual growth and deepens our faith out of love. (Synthesis, June 16, 91). We are called to allow ourselves to ‘be grown’ by the Holy Spirit. We are called to be present and open for God so that we will be able to reap the harvest and blessings that God has ‘stored up’ and waiting for us.

God provides us with a hope and optimism for the present and the future. Consider this, a notice that appeared in the window of a coat store in Nottingham, England resonates with an enduring and optimistic spirit about what lies ahead.

We have been established over 100 years and have been pleasing and displeasing customers ever since. We have made money and lost money. We have had good payers and bad payers. We have been cussed and discussed, messed with, lied to, held up, robbed, and swindled. The only reason we survive in business is to see what happens next. It keeps us hoping. We’re optimistic! (sermon pulpit)

It has been said, that an optimist is one who has been captured by the Christian faith. An optimist is one who believes in Jesus’ promise of ultimate fulfillment in the present and advent of God’s kingdom. We are hopeful and optimistic at St.Margaret’s. Yesterday many of us participated in the DC Gay Pride Parade to support the inclusiveness and equality of God’s kingdom. Everyone is welcome in God’s Kingdom.

The harvest is growing and ripening at St. Margaret’s as we witness our Sunday School rolls increase with more and more children. Our seeds are rapidly spreading and yielding fruit as we support and sponsor nine persons for confirmation. reaffirmation, reception into the Episcopal Church at the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and St. Paul on next Saturday, June 20th.

We do not have to ask, ‘How is it that our harvest is bountiful? We know that this is the work of God’s divine action and that of the Holy Spirit in this church, in the Kingdom of Heaven. Amen.

6/7/09 - The Rev. Dr. Margaret Guenther - Trinity Sunday

2009-06-07T14:42:00.000-04:00

There is irony, even humor, in the conversation between Jesus and Nicodemus. Picture it: these two men, in an intensely patriarchal society, solemnly discussing the mechanics of birth. Both of them, of course, have been born as all of us have. But neither had given birth and, given the customs of the times and what we know of their two lives, it is highly unlikely that either had witnessed a birth or even listened in on "women's talk" of obstetrical adventures.

It was Jesus who brings up the subject. He puzzles Nicodemus, because he gives an answer before the question can be asked: "Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

This is probably more than Nicodemus wants to know. The imagery is unexpected feminine and earthed. Jesus does not say "observe the law" or "study Torah" or "give alms" but rather he forces Nicodemus to think in terms of intimacy, human bodies, fertility, and transforming experience.

And Nicodemus is literal minded; according to current jargon, a real left brain type. So he visualizes the scene the absurd scene of a grown person returning to his mother's body to be born anew and he ponders the difficult logistics: how can a person be born again when he is old?

There is humor in this scene two learned men, teachers, rabbis, trained in the intricacies of the law and presumably worshiper of an abstract, invisible, indeed unknowable God. And here they are, talking about birth that mysterious, joyous, painful, dark and bloody process by which new life enters the world.

Think for a minute about what it means to be born.

It means emergence into light and air, after a long time in confined darkness. To be born is to be thrust from this sheltering darkness into light, to feel the pressure of the atmosphere, to be exposed to heat and cold, to feel gentle breezes and harsh winds. To be born is to become open and vulnerable.

To be born is to experience human touch for the first time, to know intimacy and relationship. So with birth comes identity, the identity of a name bestowed, the identity of being son or daughter, part of a family.

And to be born is not easy. Research and imagination, and perhaps our own vestigial memory tell us that it is a difficult passage. In many ways, it is the first trauma, the first involuntary step on the long journey.

To be born is a transformation, as dramatic as the coming forth of Lazarus from the tomb. To be born is to become fully human. To be born is to begin to live.

It ought to be enough to have to do it once!

As I thought about this Gospel over the past few days, I found myself thinking about the time when I worked as a hospital chap¬lain. I loved it when my rounds took me anywhere near the newborn nursery. Then I would detour and stand for a few moments looking at the lovely new life, carefully aligned behind the big window. I would stand and marvel at the newness, the perfection, the beauty of it all. And sometimes new parents would be standing there and it was at first amusing, then touching, and then compelling to watch them in the presence of the newly born.

They expected nothing of these tiny, useless creatures. Sleeping, yawning, even red and screaming the newly born were objects of delight and wonder.

There was something holy in the moments of celebration of new life. Yet I always felt a twinge of sadness as I watched the delight of those earthly mothers and fathers because I knew (as an earthly mother myself!) that it was too good to last. I knew about fatigue and impatience and the sheer wear and tear of families living together to say nothing of our own sinfulness, that sinfulness which even the most cherubic baby grows up to experience and embrace all these forces that dim and tarnish the delight, the holy wonder. If only it would last! I would think.

It can and does, you know. Our response to the wonder of human birth, our delight in its wholeness and promise, may grow dim. But God's delight in our birth as his children never dims.

It is hard for most of us to accept the fact of God's delight in us. In other people yes. In all the rest of creation yes! But not us! We do our best, but in our imperfection we are scarcely objects of delight.

Yet that is what this Gospel is telling us, linking the metaphor of birth with a reminder of how God feels about us, for tucked in this story of Nicodemus and rebirth is the familiar verse one many of us learned as children in Sunday School: Yes, God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life.

That's the good news. In our earthly birth and in our new birth in Christ, God loves us so much. The old Latin translation says it even better: God so delighted in the world that he gave us his son.

So with Nicodemus we reflect on the wonder of birth, our new birth in Christ. And like Nicodemus we may say: how can this be? We are grownup dignified people in dignified clothes and with dignified jobs and dignified identities. Some of us even have gray hair and wrinkles, and all of us are getting a little shopworn.

It is ironic and there is humor in the picture.

Jesus our teacher is encouraging us to think of ourselves as newborn infants, born anew, reborn mysteriously still ourselves, yet new and whole as objects of God's delight.

We delight him just as surely as those newborn babies in the hospital nursery delight those who love them. (And we have done just about as much as they have to merit that delight.)

Yes, we are called to walk in his way. To work, to pray, to study. To come together as his people in the sacraments. To repent–which after all means redirecting our steps-- to forgive, to love.

But that's not the real news. The real news is God’s love for us, his love for us as earthly children born to earthly parents and his love for us as children born anew in the mystery of baptism.

For God so delighted in the world, that he gave us his only Son so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life. My dear friends, from our new Christians-- especially these very young ones baptized today –to the oldest among us: please have a lovely day reflecting and celebrating on how delightful you are!

5/31/09 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Day of Pentecost

2009-05-31T14:49:00.000-04:00

“In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy…Then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.’” Joel

The Feast of Pentecost that we celebrate today has often been called the birthday of the church. It begins with story…the believers are gathered together in a locked room…the disciples, the women, Jesus’ mother and brothers…all are frightened, lost and grieving. They have given up everything to follow Jesus and now he has gone.
This story is told in two different ways. In the book of the Acts of the Apostles, written by Luke, this occurs after Christ’s Ascension. In the Gospel of John, that we just heard, Jesus comes among them through the locked door and declares that he will send the Holy Spirit, the spirit of truth. In either case, Jesus must leave in order for the Spirit to come to enable their ministry.
In Acts, the Spirit is represented by tongues of fire and by a rushing wind. Both are uncontrollable earth forces and, when they appear with power, those persons and things that are touched are changed forever. We are reminded of the wind (ruach) that rushed over the earth at creation. We cannot see the wind; we only know it by its results.
Further, they spoke in many languages, not just Hebrew, a symbol that the Spirit was for all people not just the Jews. It was a unifying symbol, the opposite of the divisive Tower of Babel. Further, it comes to the entire community, not just the few.
So, in this story, whether Jesus had ascended and the Spirit came in wind and tongues of fire or Jesus, himself, came among them declaring the coming of the Holy Spirit, those who heard and believed were changed forever. Fear was transformed into courage, doubt into faith and grief into hope.
They could only be changed if they were open to the Spirit, if they were vulnerable and broken. A rigid heart and mind could not hear and respond. The results of this encounter are the facts of history. This small band of believers spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ throughout the known Western world. The heart of the story is the universality of the message: Jesus came for all people, not just the few.
We are like those early believers. We have much to fear in the twenty-first century. We are assailed by pandemic illness, grinding poverty, a faltering world-wide economy, the depletion of the world’s resources, terrorism, war and radical fringe groups. The list goes on and on.
To be transformed by the Holy Spirit, like or forebears, we must be open, vulnerable, listening and trusting. One word of caution, we must be clear that what we believe we are hearing is truly of God. If it divides it is not of God. If it subjugates or isolates others it is not of God. If it breeds self-righteousness and arrogance, it is not of God. We shall know if we have judged rightly by what we do and say as a result of the encounter.
We are called today to be changed, to embrace all people as Jesus did. We are called to know no outcasts, to listen to those who differ from us, and to proclaim love to a hate-filled world. We shall be known by the fruits of our work. As a community we can be changed. We can find courage to speak truth to power, to challenge the values of the world, and to bring hope to a hurting world. We shall remember that: “… everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” AMEN

5/17/09 - Easter VI - Alexander Webb

2009-05-17T09:55:00.000-04:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

What does the “average Episcopalian” look like? For a lot of years, the “average Episcopalian” was thought to be white, straight, and male. He was thought to be fairly well off, well educated, and well connected. But, the face of our Church has changed dramatically in the last half-century. God has moved in new ways, and God is moving still.

Let me tell you a story, and as I do, see if you can figure out what story I’m telling:

The Church is divided on a major theological question. There is a certain group of people who see themselves as Christians, but the Church is not sure whether God can really bless people like them. The Church begins to divide into two camps over whether or not those people can be considered Christians. Charismatic leaders emerge on each side of the issue. Conferences are held, and a heated debate ensues.

The leader who favors inclusion shares his experiences, and tells how God is at work in the lives of those people. They live in families, and they raise children in the context of holy relationships. Yet, the other leader will hear none of it. He has been in the Church for a long time, and has never worshipped next to those people. His arguments are scriptural. God chose people like him, and he sees no way that God
could ever bless someone like them.

Have you figured out who they are? Can you name the group that longs for inclusion?

It is tempting to think that the story I just told was about the movement for GLBT equality in the Episcopal Church, but my story is older than that.

Not all that many years ago, you might have thought I was talking about the women’s movement within the Episcopal Church. You see, the big question for our Church in the 1970s was whether or not women could be ordained or serve in positions of church-wide leadership.

But, my story is not about women or about gay and lesbian Christians. My story is far older.

Some might think that the story I just told was about equality for African Americans. Well into the nineteenth century, African Americans were required to sit in the balconies of Episcopal Churches throughout both the north and the south. There were no African American priests in our Church until the ordination of Absalom Jones in 1802.

But, my story is not about African Americans, or about women, or about gay and lesbian Christians. My story is far older.

My story comes from the Acts of the Apostles, and the two charismatic leaders are St. Peter and St. Paul. The church-dividing issue in the first century was whether or not Gentiles could be considered Christians. Paul thought that everyone who accepted Christ was a member of the Church. Peter disagreed. For Peter, God’s chosen people were the only ones who could become Christians. In other words, Peter believed that Christians had to first be Jews.

With whom do we identify in this story? Perhaps we see ourselves as the excluded Gentiles, or as the heroic St. Paul, arguing for total inclusion. However, we miss the point of this story if we fail to consider the ways in which we might be behaving like St. Peter. You see, Peter didn’t set out to be exclusive. He just never accepted the possibility that God could be at work in the lives of those Gentiles.

We deceive ourselves if we think that the movement for GLBT equality will make the Church completely inclusive. Our history shows that there will always be one more group of outsiders, and that the Church often fails to realize that it is being exclusive. I wonder which will be the next group of people that needs to fight for full inclusion in the Church. Might it be illegal immigrants? Might it be homeless people? Might it be our own young adults, who are affirmed as adults in this church once they turn sixteen,1 but tend not to serve on vestries, as Eucharistic Ministers, or on major committees that are not focused on youth?

In our reading from Acts this morning, God resolves the question of inclusion. Peter is telling a room full of Gentiles why it is impossible for them to become Christians. Suddenly, God interrupts him, and the Holy Spirit descends on everyone in the room, both Jew and Gentile.

Peter’s followers are astounded.2 You can imagine that every eye in the room was fixed on the leader of the established Church. What was Peter going to say? What would he do?

The first words out of Peter’s mouth were a humble reversal of everything he had ever taught: “Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?” Then, “he ordered them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.”3

You can almost hear Peter’s voice. With fear: “Let them be baptized.” With hesitation: “Let them be baptized.” With faith that God was doing a new thing in his midst: “Let them be baptized.”

This story is about Jews and Gentiles. But, it’s also about gay and lesbian Christians, and it’s also about women, and it’s also about African Americans. It might even be about young adults. This story is about every group of people that the Church has ever made to feel unwelcome, unwanted, or unworthy. This story is about every person who does not look like the “average Episcopalian.”

What Peter learned on that astounding day is what we must learn every day: God loves everyone. God has no rejects, no outcasts, no unlovables. Everyone has a place of honor in God’s Church.

Amen.

1 Canon I.17.1(b), although Article II of the Constitution of the Diocese of Washington requires that Diocesan Convention
delegates be at least eighteen years of age.
2 “Astounded” is used in Acts 10:45 (NRSV). “Astonished” is used in Acts 10:45 (KJV, NIV, and NKJV)
3 Acts 10:47-48

5/10/09 - Easter V - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn

2009-05-10T16:43:00.000-04:00

Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from e you can do nothing. (John 15: 4-5, NRSV)

On Wednesday, October 11, 1994, NASA’s Magellan space explorer was put out of commission. It had surveyed the planet Venus more than 15,000 times since 1990. On this particular day, NASA scientists deliberately guided the crash of the satellite into the planet causing it to burn up in the atmosphere. This $900,000,000(nine hundred million) satellite disappeared just like that-in a split second. The scientists made this decision because the Magellan ran out of power following an experiment that drained the batteries. The satellite could no longer transmit data back to NASA. [Craig Brian Larson and Leadership Journal, 750 Engaging Illustrations for preachers, teachers, & writers (Michigan: Baker Books, 2004) p. 539] This demonstrates that even high technology is worthless without power. This experience serves as reminder to us that without the power of God even committed Christians cannot bear fruit.

Today, John’s gospel reminds us of the importance of staying connected to Jesus, God, and each other as Disciples of Christ. Otherwise, without the living stem of the vine that enables us to bear fruit, we will have no power to be productive as disciples and we could end up shriveled like a grape that has become disconnected from the vine. Allegorically, God is the vinedresser, Jesus is the vine, and we are the branches. All three parts are connected and related together. God, the vinedresser, provides the surging power with love through Jesus for us as the branches to grow and produce fruit for the ministry of the church.

This gospel assures us during the Easter season that the death of Jesus upon the cross is not the end of the living God we serve, but rather an open door for the new Christian ministry of those who believe and follow Jesus as his disciples. The apostles and those in the early church where charged with bearing fruit by remaining connected to the teaching of Jesus and doing the ministry of Jesus. These ministries included: lovingly caring for one another, acts of compassion, supporting each other during troubled times, caring for the widows and orphans, and sustaining the faith of the community. These ministries bonded and connected both Jews and Gentiles in the Christian communities.

The strength of the church lays in the strength of the ministries of the people- the branches. Our various ministries at St. Margaret’s have an open door for anyone who wants to walk through and connect with our faith community that is powered by the love of God. We are all very busy and have responsibilities that claim our time and energy each day. I recall a time when I felt that I was giving all that I had to give to the church. There was just was not another thing I could do because I was running out of energy and steam to do anything else.

John’s Gospel says that God prunes the branches to produce more fruit. God prunes us individually for new growth. We are called to let God do the pruning so that God’s power to bear more fruit through us takes place as promised by Jesus. I imagine that I am not the only one who has had some pruning done! I have found this to be sometimes uncomfortable. However, pruning can be a transformational experience that allows God to use us for God’s purposes.

I recall a parishioner sharing that the experience of serving as a Lay Eucharistic Visitor became an unexpected transforming and humbling experience. Our God gave all of us a variety of gifts, which we are called to share with one another for the collective good of the whole. Some of our ministries that rely on your service includes: providing transportation for our elderly, visiting our sick and shut- ins, helping at Charlie’s Place, and working with our youth. In short -stewardship of our gifts and talents. We are called to be bonded together with love and care for others within our midst and within our communities. We are called to spread like branches throughout the ministries of St. Margaret’s to serve God’s purpose and the mission of this church.

Yes, sometimes we are going to want to do our own thing and in the process, we may loose our way and become detached. There was a man who dropped out of church. He figured that he could just as well worship God on his own. A few weeks went by and the minister went to visit him. They sat in the living room by the fireplace and made small talk. Then the minister took the tongs, picked up a glowing ember, and placed it on the side of the fireplace. The two men watched without saying a word. In no time, the ember began to cool. A few minutes later, the minister picked up the dead ember with his fingers and pitched it back into the fire. Immediately, it came back to life. Without a word, the minister put on his coat and started to leave. The man walked him to the door and said, “That was one of your best sermons. I’ll see you in church this Sunday.” (copied and adapted from a sermon entitled, The Vines and The Branches by Dr. Philip W. McLarty, http://lectionary.org/Sermons/McLarty/John/John%2015.01-8,%20VineBranches.htm)

Our strength and power lie in the connection of our relationships to and with each other as a community of faith and as a connecting link in the body of Christ in the world. It is in this way that we are called to live our lives faithfully as disciples of Christ.

Jesus speaks to us (on this Mother’s Day) to remind us that we are called to stay attached to Christ by abiding in him. Abiding means to remain or stay in relationship with Jesus for the fruitfulness of our love in the kingdom. “Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.”
(John 15: 4-5, NRSV)

The vine biblical image conveys to us a strong sense of the connectedness in our lives. We are called to remember that there is only one supreme power source. I am not referring to the internet VIOS, but to the blessed One, who always lovingly guides, protects, and prunes us - thereby enabling us to lead faithful and productive lives in this world.

In closing, we are reminded that we are connected to Jesus in a similar fashion as to that of our mothers or to the women who have nurtured us throughout our lives and to that end - I wish all women in this role a Happy Mother’s Day!

Let us pray: Oh God send us forth to abide in your love. For it is in this love that we are known and it is this love that we help to transform and renew the earth. Oh, God send us forth abiding with you with love. For it is this love that hope is known and it is in this love that we help to renew and transform all life. May we blossom in Christ’s love and live firmly in Christ’s resurrection promise. [copied and adapted from a blessing found in Homiletics, May 2006, p. 25) AMEN.

5/10/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Fifth Sunday of Easter

2009-05-10T14:38:00.000-04:00

4/26/09 - Easter III - Alexander Webb

2009-04-26T16:45:00.000-04:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

The writer of First John was a religious fanatic. He wrote for a small group of second century Christians who were being persecuted and oppressed. He called for their faithfulness, and labeled dissenters as the “antichrist” and children of the devil.

Yet, there is not a lot of fanaticism in today’s lesson:

“Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous, just as [God] is righteous.”

These words do not appear radical because the lesson that was appointed for this morning stops in the middle of a paragraph. The rest of First John’s words were deemed too harsh for this joyous Easter season. Yet, there’s more to learn. First John has more to say:

“Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous, just as [God] is righteous. Everyone who commits sin is a child of the devil; for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The Son of God was revealed for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. Those who have been born of God do not sin,because God’s seed abides in them; they cannot sin, because they have been born of God. The children of God and the children of the devil are revealed in this way: all who do not do what is right are not from God, nor are those
who do not love their brothers and sisters.”1

While these words are hard for our twenty-first century ears to hear, they would have been hope-filled for a band of marginalized Christians trying to endure oppression.

These words are hard to hear because we know that we are children of God, but we also know that we often fail the test. Do we always do what is right? Do we always love our brothers and sisters? No, at least I don’t. Yet, First John says that these very standards reveal us as children of God or children of the devil.

For a moment, picture yourself as one of the thousands of homeless people who live on the streets of Washington, D.C. You rest on a bench or grate, but the city’s rumble makes sleep impossible. You know hunger all too well, because the food you are offered is never quite enough. Your blanket is barely adequate, your clothes in tatters. You shiver in the shadows of the most powerful government the world has ever known, yet that government does little to help, it can’t even figure out just how many of you there are.

How does First John sound now?

“The children of God and the children of the devil are revealed in this way: all who do not do what is right are not from God, nor are those who do not love their brothers and sisters.”

When I worked in New York, my commute was 43 minutes long. I left my apartment at a
precise moment, caught a certain train, and navigated the Manhattan maze in the same way. Herald Square to 34th Street, Madison to 37th, left on Park Avenue, through Grand Central, and there I was. 43 minutes.

The sights and sounds of the city were as predictable as my route. My 43-minute odyssey included some of New York’s most famous attractions, but it also included some of New York’s less picturesque realities. In particular, I remember a homeless family that slept in an alcove on one of the side streets. They had a routine as well: one man and one woman, always together,always in the same place, always with their dog next to them on the sidewalk. For the better part of two years, I saw them every day. Then, they vanished. I never saw them again.

In a strange way, I came to miss them. They had become part of my commute, just like the train conductor and the newspaper peddler. Yet, the rigidity of my 43-minute routine caused me to look right past these two human beings. I saw them, I could describe them to you in detail, but I never stopped to say hello or learn anything about them. They had become part of the scenery.

On 27 January of this year, a homeless man named Jose Sanchez was assaulted in Columbia Heights, barely a mile and a half from this pulpit. He lay on the street for twenty minutes before anyone called an ambulance, and he died four days later.2 People saw Jose Sanchez on the street, but no one acted. Jose Sanchez had become part of the scenery.

There is something inherently sinful about allowing human beings to become part of the scenery. Jose Sanchez, the family in New York, and the thousands of homeless people who come into this church for warmth and food would probably hear First John quite differently than we do.

“The children of God and the children of the devil are revealed in this way: all who do not do what is right are not from God, nor are those who do not love their brothers and sisters.”

As individuals and as a parish, we are frequently revealed as children of God. Charlie’s Place is an incredible ministry, supported in large part by parishioners’ donations of time and money. We support the Transitional Housing Corporation, which offers an escape from the downward spiral that is homelessness, unemployment, and addiction.

Many of us remember the Fannie Mae Walk for the Homeless last November. On that frigid morning, we stood in solidarity with our brothers and sisters and raised millions of dollars to help meet their needs. We were revealed as children of God on the National Mall that morning.

Each of these acts of mercy is important, righteous, and godly. We should seek to do more. Yet, charity can only address the effects of homelessness on individuals. The sinister root of this problem is the reality that our society is willing to let some people’s basic needs go unmet. Charity puts buckets around the living room, but it doesn’t patch the leaky roof. As a society, we hold the unacceptable expectation that some people will be homeless. In this way, we fail both of First John’s tests.

“All who do not do what is right are not from God, nor are those who do not love their brothers and sisters.”

People are people, and we sin if we allow ourselves to look past them or their needs.
I was not revealed as a child of God when I ignored my brother and sister on the street for fear that my commute would grow to 48 or even 49 minutes. No children of God were revealed in the twenty minutes that Jose Sanchez lay unhelped on the street.
We should be disquieted by the words of First John, and our homeless brothers and sisters should be encouraged by them. From across the centuries, First John speaks to them and First John speaks to us.

“All who do not do what is right are not from God, nor are those who do not love their brothers and sisters.”

Our status as children of God is assured in our baptism. Our place in heaven is guaranteed through Christ’s death and resurrection. However, in this world, we must choose whether we will be revealed as the children of God that we are, or as the children of the devil that we are not.

If we want to be revealed as children of God, we must do something to end homelessness in our city, and in our time. One leading advocacy group says that it would only take a decade to end homelessness, and that our role as individuals would not be all that complex: Part I is advocating for better data collection and human services. Part II is helping people make healthy transitions when they leave hospitals, prisons, and the military. Part III is volunteering with and donating to
agencies that provide housing options, mentorship, skills training, and direct services to people who are homeless.3 The choice is ours. We can continue closing our eyes to the suffering in our midst, or we can do something about it.

In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed. By our silence and inaction, we consent to the presence of homelessness in our capital city. It is time to withdraw that consent.

We withdraw our consent from the marginalization of thousands. We withdraw our consent from the belief that some Americans are not entitled to warmth or food. We withdraw our consent from the myth that the most powerful government in the history of the world is unable find a bed or a meal for all of its citizens.

In this season of resurrection and new life, it is time for us to be revealed as children of God. It is time for us to end our silence on matters of oppression. It is time for us to withdraw our consent.

Amen.

1 I John 3:7-10 (NRSV)
2 David Betancourt. “Attack Victim, Ignored By Passersby, Has Died.” The Washington Post. 1 February 2009, Pg. C04
3 More information is available from the National Alliance to End Homelessness (www.endhomelessness.org). The role
of individuals described above is based largely on the NAEH’s Explainer of September 2007, “What is a Ten-Year Plan
to End Homelessness?” This document is available electronically on their website.

4/12/09 - Easter Sunday - The Rev. Susan N. Blue

2009-04-12T16:57:00.000-04:00

“Then Peter began to speak to them: ‘I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right God finds acceptable. You know the message the Lord sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ – he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea,, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil for God was with him…’”
(Acts 10:34-38)

“Alleluia, Christ is risen; The Lord is risen indeed, alleluia!” Once again we have made the long journey through Lent and Holy Week. We have walked with Christ to Jerusalem as increasingly ominous signs have appeared along the way. The darkness of evil fell in full at the crucifixion, for it appeared that evil had won the never ending battle. After Jesus was laid in the tomb, the darkness was exacerbated for those early followers. Christ was gone, the night was long, they hid themselves away in the dark…filled with despair, doubt and weeping. They had given up everything, and that sacrifice appeared to have been in vain.
God had the last laugh, however, for, on that Sunday morning Jesus was raised by God from the dead…resurrected in a new a most profound way. This must have been terrifying for his followers. There are other stories of resuscitation in Biblical and other literature, the raising of Lazarus for one, but there are none of someone coming back after being dead for three days. Jesus was different in appearance, but still had fully human characteristics as well as those not possessed by humankind. This Jesus could walk through walls, but still bore the wounds of the nails. He could appear suddenly, but still ate fish at the side of the lake. This resurrection was unnatural…a shocking event, and his followers found it almost incomprehensible just as many people do today.
Over the years there have been many scholars who have tried to prove or disprove the historicity of the physical resurrection. Several factors point to the truth of the historical resurrection. First, the tomb was empty, empty in all four gospels. It is logical to believe that, had his body been stolen, his enemies would have produced the bones in order to refute the beliefs of the growing number of Christians. Further, in all four gospels, women were the first witnesses to the empty tomb. At that time, it was unheard of for a woman to be a credible witness, yet the writers attested to just that. As Newsweek pointed out (March 28, 2005), these facts “point to the historicity, not theology, of the resurrection.” However, this would be a slim basis for what transpired.
The most compelling argument blends the two. “The number of Christians rose from roughly 1000 believers in AD 40 to nearly 34 million in AD 350. (Rodney Stark, “The Rise of Christianity,” Copied.) Something profound happened that gave this nascent movement an energy that had not been seen before and has not been seen since. The followers gathered strength from this light…the appearances of Jesus Christ…and moved from fear to love, night to day, despair to hope, doubt to faith and weeping to joy. By not requiring believers to follow Jewish law, all people were welcome and the movement exploded. Further, they cared for one another and others in need…showing a unique love and compassion that was compelling. As St. Paul’s words in our Acts passage for today attests: all persons are loved and cared for because all are one in Jesus Christ. Christians cared for the sick during the plague, Romans, Jews and believers alike, and valued women in a new way. There were no barriers to being included.
This speaks volumes to us today. The Early Church preached peace, love and inclusivity causing it to receive widespread acceptance. I would suggest that we, too, are to follow in Christ’s footsteps and those of the believers in the Early Church. We are living, as did they, in a time of great uncertainty, conflict and fear. Like Mary we weep, if only inwardly, as we see so much of what we had counted upon being dismantled. Yet, we are called to follow her example by being faithful, by staying the course, trusting and hoping that there will be light in the darkness. We are blessed to know how that story ends, and our faith points to a similar story for ourselves today. Through our anxiety and sadness there will come a voice, the same voice that came to Mary, a voice that calls each of us individually and collectively by name. It is a voice that assures us that we are loved beyond measure, a voice that compels us to share what we know, have and believe with all the people we meet. We share that by our actions as well as our words.
At our Tuesday morning Eucharist this Holy Week, we could hear the sounds of our volunteers and clients of Charlie’s Place in the background as we worshiped. It was very moving to know that we were doing Christ’s work in the Parish Hall even as we offered ourselves in thanksgiving and penitence in the Chapel.
The world in which we live is much larger and more complicated than that of the early Christians. The Gospel demands an examination of the many errors our church and our nation have made through the years. It calls us to honor all religions, not just our own. It calls us to accept all people, especially those whom we have traditionally shunned. It calls us to speak out with one voice against war, violence, poverty, prejudice and abuse. It calls us to understand our interconnectedness with all people, and our need to solve problems with love, listening and understanding, not with guns and torture. We are to remember that ours are the hands God in the world and to work to bring about that Kingdom of love.

The Most Rev. Edmund Browning, former Presiding Bishop said:

“Jesus calls each of us by name – the name we received by our baptism into his death and resurrection. He calls each of us as we stand at the tomb. He calls each of us as our eyes are filled with hot tears. He calls us individually and corporately. When we hear that familiar voice call our name it makes all the difference in how we perceive ourselves and our society. When we hear that voice we can say, ‘I have seen the Lord.’”

(The Most Rev. Edmond Browning, Easter Message 1988, “The Living Church,” Easter, p. 10)

We are called to the same radical new reality to which the Early Church was called. It is one of prayer, inclusivity, and peace-seeking, care taking and sharing. The outrageousness of God’s gift of love in the Resurrection of Jesus Christ demands no less of us! We are called to have courage, trust and faith that God never, ever leaves us and loves us to distraction! “Christ is risen, the Lord is risen indeed!” Have a most blessed Easter. AMEN

4/11/09 - The Great Vigil of Easter - Alexander Webb

2009-04-11T16:56:00.000-04:00

Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia! Amen.

Today, Christ has burst the prison of death. Today, our Lord lives again. Today, the gates of hell are slammed shut. We have nothing more to fear. Alleluia!

Picture yourself as one of the two women who arrive at the tomb on that first Easter morning:
You go to the garden at first light. The sky is painted a beautiful shade of red by the sun that is just peeking above the horizon. Little blades of grass poke up between your toes, and the dew dampens the bottoms of your feet. Butterflies dance on daisies, and squirrels skitter around playfully as they welcome the new day. This garden might as well be Eden.

Just then, the earth begins to rumble, and an angel descends from heaven in radiant brightness. The tomb guards are petrified, but the angel looks into your eyes and says, “Do not be afraid,” for Jesus has been raised from the dead. A little while later, the resurrected Jesus appears to you personally and says the same thing: tenderly, lovingly, “Do not be afraid.”

Yet, even amidst our Easter celebrations, fear is close at hand. The world is a scarier place now than it was a year ago. There has been new violence in Mumbai, Zimbabwe, and Gaza. There were natural disasters in Italy, China, and Burma. The war in the Persian Gulf has continued, global warming has advanced, and the economy has tanked. Our homes, our jobs, and our retirements are all at risk. It’s a scary time, yet into this melee comes the resurrected Jesus: “Do not be afraid.”

There’s a lovely hymn that I can almost hear Jesus singing to Mary Magdalene and also to us:

Be not afraid.
I go before you always.
Come follow me,
and I will give you rest.

We began tonight with a reading from Genesis. Step-by-step, day-by-day, God methodically knit the world together, and each day’s work was good. First light and sky, then the land and sun, then all the living creatures, and it was all good. Then, God stepped back. God looked at creation as a whole, and all together “it was very good.”

Fear was nowhere to be found in those first moments of creation; everything was good and perfect, just as God is good and perfect. But, the pure goodness of creation didn’t last for long. When human beings started trusting in themselves instead of God, they came to know the sting of fear. Those who trust that God will provide for them have nothing to fear. Those who rely on themselves have everything to fear.

The problems facing the world today are bigger than human beings are able to handle, but they are not too big for God. The only way to escape fear is to put our trust back where it belongs. Fear is the consequence of doubting God.

Our Old Testament lessons for this evening show us that our ancestors were unable to put their trust back in God. During the Exodus, God led the Israelites with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. Yet, they refused to trust that God would provide for their needs. They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness?” But Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid…” The prophet Zephaniah said the same thing to the Israelites hundreds of years after they had arrived in the Promised Land: “…The LORD, is in your midst; you shall fear disaster no more. On that day it shall be said to Jerusalem: Do not fear, O Zion...”

Jesus’ words, “do not be afraid,” ring through eternity. God wants the resurrection garden to be a new Eden. Everything is being made new and there is no room for fear. In the presence of Mary Magdalene and the other Mary, the scriptures are being fulfilled, sins are being forgiven, and for the first time since the sin of Adam, the world is being made beautiful and righteous in God’s eyes.

Nothing is left unchanged. The whole history of creation – past, present, and yet to come – looks to this one moment, in which God reenters creation and restores its goodness. Easter marks the feast of Christ’s resurrection, and the revival of the whole world.

In the agony of betrayal and broken hearts, Jesus says: “Do not be afraid.” In the midst of hardship and war, Jesus says: “Do not be afraid.” In the face of cancer and disease, Jesus says: “Do not be afraid.”

While the things that define our earthly lives may indeed pass away, the faithfulness and love that define our God will remain ever true.

Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!

Amen.

3/29/2009 - The Fifth Sunday of Lent - Alexander Webb

2009-03-29T09:45:00.002-04:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

Five weeks ago Wednesday, we embarked on a spiritual journey. We began the Lenten season of self-examination with a Litany of Penitence in which we confessed our failure to love God, our failure to serve others, and our sins of infidelity, self-indulgence, anger, envy, worldliness, dishonesty, greed, and negligence in prayer.1 It was quite a list, and the lessons appointed for the last four Sundays have drawn us further and further into our exploration of sin.

Today is no exception. In today’s reading from the Gospel of John, Jesus lays out an understanding of discipleship that emphasizes sacrifice and obedience. Jesus wants us to choose godliness, but the world’s temptations are strong. Too often, we make decisions that separate us from the love of God. That’s what sin is, you know, a conscious or unconscious action or inaction that draws us away from God. But, our salvation lies in our power to do otherwise. The choice is ours.

Jesus says:

Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Those who love their life lose it, and those who hate their life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves
me must follow me, for where I am, there will my servant be also. Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.

Jesus’ words are famous, poetic, and filled with double-talk. Jesus addresses the nature of discipleship and knits it together with the nature of his own sacrifice. By dying, he bore much fruit. By hating his earthly life, Jesus procured eternal life for us all. By going where God led, Jesus honored God and God honored him.

Jesus’ entire ministry was characterized by obedience to God, yet he made no friends among the religious establishment of the day. Jesus turned water into wine, healed the sick, and fed the multitude. Jesus appeared to have more power than the people in power, and he proved it when he raised Lazarus from the dead. From that point on, Jesus’ days were numbered.

At the Passover, Jesus was faced with a choice: he could go into hiding or he could join all of the other observant Jews on their pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Jesus chose to go to Jerusalem, a path that meant certain death. He literally walked into the courts of the officials who wanted him dead.

In John, this is the precise moment at which Jesus decides to lay down his life in God’s service. He never looks back, and never reconsiders his choice.2 His first teaching once he arrives in Jerusalem: Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.

The death that Jesus calls us to die is not death to life, but death to sin. Jesus wants us to shun the temptations of the world, the individualism of our society, and the greed that pushes us to advance ourselves at any cost. In other words, Jesus wants us to give up those things that define what it means to live in the modern world. Jesus wants us to lay down our selfish, sinful lives so that we might be able to seek God’s glory instead of our own. As Saint Paul wrote in Second Corinthians,
“[Christ] died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.”3 Sin is living for ourselves; righteousness is living for God.

When you begin to think about the number of ways we live for ourselves and not for God, the weight of sin becomes overwhelming. Barbara Brown Taylor writes, “When I say ‘sin,’ there is no telling what you see: the stolen candy bar, the rumpled sheets of a bed you shared with someone else’s lover, a large pipe spilling orange sludge into a once-blue river, a clutch of homeless people sitting around a fire built from trash in a vacant lot between two corporate skyscrapers.”4 The list
goes on and on.

Pleasure, affluence, and success are the idols of the twenty-first century, but idolatry has no place in the Christian life. God created everything in the world to be in right relationship with everything else. It is human sin alone that moves the world away from that perfection. Sin corrupted God’s perfection and sin corrupts it still.

It’s hard to talk about sin. Most of the people who talk about sin on television do so with an air of superiority that makes me tune them right out. Yet, speaking about sin with integrity is downright embarrassing, because we must acknowledge our shame and shortcomings. We don’t even want to name the sins that we see around us for fear of being associated with the prudes that branded Hester Prynne, and the judgmental fools that looked down on Johnny Tremain.

One of the best-kept secrets in most families is that the struggles our young people face in school are not all that different from the struggles that adults face at work. Social pressure and substance abuse, cheating and dishonesty, bullying and harassment are hardly limited to our teenage years. Not only do we remember the pain of adolescence, we still experience much of it every day.

Yet, there is a code of silence that surrounds human weakness. There is a code of silence that allows sin to spiral out of control. God has placed us within churches and families so that we can share our struggles and encourage each other in faith. We were never intended to walk this road alone, yet we are made prisoners by our own shame and embarrassment.

A bit of shame is not a bad thing when we talk about sin. To feel shame is to know that we have come up short, and to acknowledge our dependence on God alone. We cannot overcome sin without God’s grace, but shame prevents us from accepting the grace that God has offered.

When we get all caught up in the shame and embarrassment of our imperfections, we miss the opportunity to rejoice in our redemption. When Christians tell the story of their sin, they should do so with joy and thanksgiving, not shame and grief. God created us for joy, not sadness.

What would the world be like if we were willing to admit our struggles, and encourage each other in faith? I suspect that there would be a lot less sinning.
Barbara Brown Taylor concludes, “To measure the full distance between where we are and where God created us to be — to suffer that distance, to name it, to decide not to live quietly with it any longer — that is the moment we know we are dead and begin to decide who we will be tomorrow.”5

Tomorrow is always a new day. In the waning hours of Lent, I invite you to measure that distance between where you are and where God wants you to be. I invite you to talk with your partners, your friends, and — yes — even your children about the pressures and temptations of the world. When we name the role that sin plays in our lives, we rob sin of its power. Nail your shame to Jesus’ cross next Friday and leave it there. Easter will be our resurrection too.

Amen.

1 Abridged and Paraphrased: Ash Wednesday Litany of Penitence, The Book of Common Prayer (1979), 267-268.
2 Compare Jesus’ attitude towards “the cup” in John 18:11 with Jesus’ attitude towards “the cup” in Matthew 26:39,
Mark 14:36, and Luke 22:42.
3 II Corinthians 5:15 (NRSV)
4 Barbara Brown Taylor. Speaking of Sin: The Lost Language of Salvation. Cambridge, MA: Cowley, 2000. 62.
5 Barbara Brown Taylor, 62.

3/22/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Fourth Sunday of Lent

2009-03-22T14:39:00.000-04:00

The Lenten season invites us to walk with Jesus toward Jerusalem and the cross on Good Friday. For some who take this journey, one piece of luggage they pack is the guilt bag. The practice of Lent is not designed to walk toward Jerusalem with Christ consumed with thoughts about our limitations, failures, short comings and otherwise wanting to beat ourselves up. On the contrary, in our lessons for today we have the opportunity to unload some of our guilt, pain, and mourning. We can leave these items at the side of the road as we journey towards the cross and approach Holy Week free to focus on the reality of God’s love for us and on our faith in God.

Our Lenten colors for the past three weeks have been purple signifying passion. But with our new perspective, our Lenten colors are rose signaling the time of rejoicing. Many of you may already be aware of this fact. Thus, today, Lent four is known as Laetare Jerusalem, a Latin term meaning rejoice O Jerusalem, rejoice Sunday! We can rejoice today because we are more than half way through our penitential season and the individual disciplines of the Lenten season. We are journeying closer and closer towards that awaiting explosion of joy that will engulf us on Easter Day. You may remember that our children hid our Alleluia until Easter. Can you feel the excitement building as we get ready to proclaim our praise with mounting exuberance again? I am beginning to feel it…can you! Can you feel it?!!

Our Old Testament lesson helps us to remember that we are called to keep in mind the pact we have entered into with God. We can rejoice as partners of the same covenant God made with Abraham. That covenant is that God’s presence is always with us. We heard that the Israelites were whining and complaining about their condition. They did not have any food and the things they did have were far from satisfactory in their eyes. They were disgruntled about everything. After all it was tough going wandering in the wilderness. Their unhappiness swept over them after their victory in defeating the Canaanites. However, they later recanted their sorrow to Moses. They sought and received forgiveness from God who continued to help and heal them. God never abandoned them. God does not abandon us because God responds with listening, caring, giving, and unconditional love.

When we are going through a transition and experiencing new things, challenges will come and these challenges can often put us on the edge. The Israelites were on the edge. They were impatient and wanted to rush through the wilderness experience and be done with the hard part of transitioning. God was calling them to endure and grow in order to start the fresh and new way of living that was part of God’s covenant. The Israelites were missing the fact that God’s grace and love was all around them throughout their ordeal in the wilderness.

It took them a long time but they later realized that God’s grace had provided a snake image made by Moses for anyone bitten by a snake in order to be healed. It may take us a while to recognize God’s grace. The season of Lent serves to remind us of the gifts of God’s grace and God’s unconditional love.

This love will ease our challenges and help us to cope with the difficulties of the transitions we undergo throughout life. Each day may present us with challenges and while we may become impatient with the daily grind of business, school, healing from injuries, caring for others, economic and housing issues - all of these issues will propel us in all sorts of directions and we can become drained and tired and we in the role of the Israelites may forget that God's grace is all around us.

Our need to do things always correctly and perfectly drains the soul. We are called to remember that God is the source of our survival in this world. The good news is – and I think the apostle Paul says it best in Ephesians - that we can rejoice in knowing that as repentant sinners, God is our power line – and we are directly linked to the richness of God’s grace and love for us. We are called to remember that God is not far but near. God reaches out to help us rebuild our lives through all the circumstances we may encounter. We are called to remember that God acts on our behalf and empowers us with love and grace every day. For it is by grace through faith - which is not our own doing - but a gift from God that we are saved for all of eternity by God’s immeasurable, unconditional love for us.

Let us pray:

In all our undertakings,
Grant us prosperity and good success.
In all our friendships,
Grant us to find our friends faithful and true.
In all our bodily things,
Make us fit and healthy,
Able and for the professional and school work of the day.
In all things of the mind,
Make us clam and serene,
Free from anxiety and worry.
In all material things,
Save us from poverty and from want.
In spiritual things,
Save us from doubt and from distrust.
Grant us that all trials may only bring us closer to you and to one another; and grant that nothing may shake our certainly that you work all things together for good through Jesus Christ our Lord. AMEN. [from Prayers for the Christian Year by William Barclay]

3/8/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Second Sunday of Lent

2009-03-08T14:40:00.000-04:00

He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it.

In the name of the one holy and undivided trinity. Amen.

In Mark’s Gospel, we previously heard Peter proudly reveal the identity of Jesus as the Messiah. Jesus, seeing the disciple’s bonafide faith in knowing his identity, finds that it is time to raise the learning curve.

I believe that as our faith grows everything begins to change -sometimes before we even know what is happening. We all know that the life of the disciples was never the same for them and they could never go back to their villages as anglers. They were empowered to become anglers of humankind for generations to come. However, there were some challenges that came with the job. Jesus says, in order to follow me deny your self, take up your cross, and walk behind me. Jesus was very clear about his expectations for disciples. The disciple should be prepared to suffer along with Jesus and trade self-concerns and wants for servant hood.

Jesus expected a bone fide disciple to follow him and adopt new ways of life that required sacrifice and self-denial. The early disciples gave up their homes, occupations, and families to follow Jesus. What more were they to do in terms of self-denial?

Today, Jesus requires no less of those who want to be disciples and follow the path he taught. Today, as disciples, what are we to think about in terms of self-denial? Right now, we are in Lent, which is usually the time Christians pay a little more attention to the practices of self-denial until Easter. After Easter, we can return to those enjoyable things we have forgone during the season of Lent.

However, I think Jesus had something else in mind for the early disciples as well as for us today as disciples of Christ. Jesus was saying that we, as disciples, are called to say “no” to self. Parents, I am sure there are times when you have to say no to your children. Do you recall how many times you have said no to your little ones? I am sure there were so many times you cannot count all of them. Nevertheless, you said no for a particular reason. For instance, you told little Mark not to touch anything on the stove when it was in use or not play with matches. Jesus may tell adults something similar: do not eat that, do not smoke in bed – or better yet - do not smoke.

These ‘no’s were not temporary but life-long practices. Jesus had in mind a different kind of self-denial, which was to become permanent. For us, self-denial may not mean abandoning your family or giving up ice cream. Self-denial means saying “no” to self. The self has to die like apostle Paul says, “We die to self” and become new creatures in Christ.

We do not like to give up the things and activities we enjoy. However, we are called as disciples to give up control in our lives and say no to our own desires and our own will. We are called, as disciples, to leave our agendas at the door before entering a business meeting for the benefit of the group. You are called, as young people, to say no to self because your values as followers of Christ may be different than those of your peers at school.

The thing for us to remember as disciples is that self-denial is a permanent calling because we are marked and set apart as God’s dwelling place for Lent and beyond. In Readings for Meditation, C.S. Lewis offers this reflection for us to consider:

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what God [He] is doing God [He] is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on: you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised.

But presently God [He] starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is God [He] up to? The explanation is that God [He] is building a different house from the one you thought of—throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made in to a decent little cottage: but God [he] is building a palace. God [He] intends to come and live in it. God intends to come and dwell in you.” (from fC.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity quoted in C.S. Lewis: Readings for Meditation and Reflection, edited by Walter Hooper. Found in Synthesis, March 12, 2006)

The heart of the Gospel of Mark includes the invitation for all disciples to pick up your cross and follow Jesus. The early disciples were mesmerized by witnessing Jesus heal the sick and the lame. However, they were not thrilled about the prospects of suffering and carrying the cross as Jesus had instructed. Who would want to do that? During the time this Gospel was written, carrying a cross meant death and it meant being strung up by the Roman army and crucified like a criminal. Needless to say, it was an horrific ordeal. But we know that the early disciples did, indeed, pick up their crosses for the Gospel as followers of Christ. They all died cruel deaths with the exception of apostle John who died of natural causes. Jesus died on the cross.

Jesus asks us today to pick up our cross – but what does that mean for us? It is not likely that in this country disciples will meet their deaths because they are Christians. However, in other countries such as China, Burma, South America it does happen. Contemporary disciples who are serious about their faith and values may encounter some conflicts with those who think differently in our schools, worksites, and sometimes - yes even in our churches and even in our families where steadfast faith may cause suffering and pain among certain family members.

We usually think to pick up our cross means carrying some type of problem, illness, or concern that is weighing heavy on us. But that is not it carrying our cross does not mean allowing abuse to be inflicted upon us by anyone either. I agree with C. Edward Bowen who sums up nicely what it means to pick your cross and follow Jesus. He says, “When we come to the point in our lives where God’s love fills our heart we will do whatever God wants us to do even to the point of giving our lives. This is what Jesus did. Jesus followed in the way God wanted him to follow even to the point of giving his life there on the cross. Jesus also invites us to do what God wants us to do, no matter how difficult or challenging it may be. This may mean doing those things that there is not enough money to pay us to do but that’s what God wants us to so we do.”

Taking up your cross daily in self-denial is hard to hear and hard to do as disciples of Jesus. Consider this story: A man went into a store complaining that his cross was too heavy. He wanted to trade it in for another one. So he walks around the store and tries out several of the crosses to see how they feel. He is just about ready to give up and decides to leave. On the way out, he notices one in the corner and inquirers to the storeowner, what about that one over there? The owner looks up and says— what, that little one? It’s the one you brought in with you!

We are called to follow God. Jesus knows the weight of the cross he is asking us to carry. The good news is we do not have to carry it by ourselves. Jesus is carrying the cross with us.

In conclusion, we are called to be followers - as hard as it is for some of us not to be the leaders. There is only one master and one leader who wants to dwell with us daily and be the center of our lives. This Lent, and always, we have an invitation to receive a gift that will last for eternity as only God can give us when we are serious and ready to deny ourselves. Pick up your cross and follow Jesus. Amen.

2/25/2009 - Ash Wednesday - The Rev. Susan N. Blue

2009-02-25T15:20:00.000-05:00

“Yet even now, says the Lord, “return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping and with mourning; rend your hearts and not your garments.” (Joel2:12-13)

Today we begin the most holy season of the Church year, the great forty days of Lent that culminate in Holy Week and Easter Sunday. It is a time of intense self-evaluation for us as individuals and as a community. During Lent we are charged to pray, fast and give alms as we make ourselves vulnerable to God and to one another. It is a time to allow ourselves to be broken open, to examine what we find, and to return to God and that which is ultimately important.
In 1998, my first Ash Wednesday here, I shared a story that illustrates how many of us come to this time. I hope those of you who were here that day will not mind having it repeated. John Stanford, the son of an Episcopal priest, talked of growing up in a New Hampshire farmhouse. It had no electricity or indoor plumbing. Water was drawn from an old well outside the front door. Even in the heat of the summer it was never dry, but always pure and sparkling.
The day came when renovations were necessary. An artesian well was dug and the old well sealed as a reserve. Several years later John decided to check the well. When he opened it, he discovered that it was dry. He had this to say:

“It took many inquiries on my part to understand what had happened. A well of this kind is fed by hundreds of tiny underground rivulets along which seeps a constant supply of water. As water is drawn from the well, more water moves into it along the rivulets, keeping these tiny apertures clear and open. When such a well is not used, however, and the water is not regularly drawn, the tiny rivulets close up. Our well, which had run without failing for so many years, was dry, not because there was no water but because it had not been used.” (John Sanford, The Kingdom Within, p. 8; via The Rev. Barry Johnson, 5/8/88.)

My suspicion is that this is what happens when we become distracted from God and overly focused on the secular. It has been said we give alms to show that we are not defined by our possessions. In doing so, we admit our own poverty and deadness. We fast to get in touch with our own hunger, a hunger that most of us cover with busyness and addictions. In doing so we are reminded that God is the only source that can feed our hunger. Finally, we return to prayer – prayer that forces us to look at our distance from God. We need all of these for our journey to the cross. (Copied: Martin Smith)
In a way, as we are distanced from God we are cut off from our true home. Lent gives us an opportunity to return, to come home to ourselves and to our Creator as we walk with Jesus on the tragic journey to the cross. When the psalmist says “create in me a clean heart” he is being called to remember his true home, his home with God.
This is a time to be reconciled to God and also to one another. It is painful to forgive, and we often cannot forget. Not forgiving, however, means we carry a deep and unnecessary burden. We become even more vulnerable when we ask for forgiveness, when we admit our fault and our sorrow.
I invite you to come home with me to God – to go to that place where we are loved abundantly and charged to be transformed into the goodness for which we were created. Let us as a community find this a time of renewal and new birth so that, when Easter Sunday arrives, we can celebrate with the joyful sounds of the forgiven. AMEN

2/22/2009 - The Last Sunday After the Epiphany - Alexander Webb, Seminarian

2009-02-22T09:48:00.002-05:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

Every year, around this time, a certain question begins to bubble up. Your answer to this question defines how you will live for the next six weeks, and also affects your perceived level of piety. I hear it over and over again, on the street, at lunch tables, and even at our coffee hour last week. The question is simple and familiar: “Are you giving anything up for Lent?”

I have nothing against Lenten disciplines, but this question misses the mark. The purpose of Lent is to draw closer to God. Disciplines are valuable when they deepen our faith, and they are worthless when they don’t.

Lent is a time for people whose faith, like the Christmas Grinch’s heart, is two sizes too small. Lent is our chance to find God in the wilderness of our lives. Biblical characters that brave the wilderness almost always find God before they leave. It was true for Hagar and Jacob, it was true for Moses, and it was true for Jesus. When we allow ourselves to journey in the wilderness, God shows up.

We can see this theme played out in today’s lesson from Second Kings:

Elijah, one of Israel’s most significant prophets, is on a journey with Elisha, his long-time apprentice. As they travel from Gilgal, Elijah announces that God has called him to go to Bethel. He tells Elisha to stay behind, but Elisha refuses, “As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” His words are as loyal as they are loving. He does not speak as a mere associate, but as if he were Elijah’s own son. His words echo the love of Ruth for Naomi: “Wherever you go, I will go. Wherever you lodge, I will lodge.”

Once Elijah and Elisha arrive in Bethel, the story repeats itself. Elijah is called to Jericho, and Elisha refuses to stay behind. In Jericho, it happens again, and the two set out for the Jordan. If this were an American movie, Willie Nelson would now come out to sing a bit of traveling music:

On the road again,
Goin' places that I've never been,
Seein' things that I may never see again,
And I can't wait to get on the road again.

Our movie’s plot thickens after Elijah and Elisha leave Jericho. There will be no more course corrections, no more attempts to leave Elisha behind. The prophets are about to meet God.

By crossing the Jordan – on dry ground, I might add! – Elijah and Elisha leave the Promised Land. They enter the wilderness. The Israelites walked forty years in this wilderness. God established the law in this wilderness. Moses lived most of his life in this wilderness, and died within sight of the place at which the two prophets now stand.

To the Israelites, this place had all the charm of Mount Crumpit, the Christmas Grinch’s cave, high above Whoville. Like Mount Crumpit, the Israelite’s wilderness was scary, dark, and desolate. The wilderness was far away from the warmth and security of civilization. The wilderness typified what it meant to be radically “other.”

Yet, God waits for the prophets in this barren wasteland. When they arrive, a fiery chariot whisks Elijah into heaven, and Elisha is anointed as the new prophet in Israel’s Northern Kingdom. When the prophets go to the wilderness, God shows up.

So what does this mean for us? If we go to the wilderness, will we meet God?

In short, I believe that we will meet God if we go into the wilderness. But, our wilderness might not look like the prophets’. Elijah and Elisha followed God to the most vulnerable place imaginable. For us, that might not be a physical place.

A spiritual journey is a lot more than taking a walk in the woods. You must be willing to search the depths of your heart. You must be willing to face your sins, name your inadequacies, and stare down your addictions. You must be willing to let God have control of both your path and your destination. Taking a true spiritual journey is a lot harder than giving up chocolate, but its rewards are far greater.

Bethel is not on the way from Gilgal to Jericho. For no apparent reason, God chose to send the prophets on a long, circuitous journey before meeting them in the wilderness. The prophets never knew where they would be sent next, but they never complained. God called, they followed.

Elisha will never return to this wilderness. Yet, it was important for him to go there, just as it is important for us to journey in our own wildernesses. Are we willing to go on the road with Jesus? Are we willing to go places that we’ve never been, and see things that we may never see again? This Lent, will we explore our inmost selves, and acknowledge those things of which we are most ashamed?

On the road again,
Goin' places that I've never been,
Seein' things that I may never see again,
And I can't wait to get on the road again.

Our journeys will get harder as they draw on and as Easter draws nearer, but God is waiting for us at the end. When Elijah and Elisha make it to the wilderness, God takes away the old and anoints the new. God will do the same in our hearts, but not if we don’t follow Jesus to the deepest, most vulnerable parts of our realities.

So, what are you going to give up for Lent? My prayer is that you will give up the security of Whoville for the vulnerability of Mount Crumpit. Jesus has invited you to go on a Lenten journey with him in the wilderness, and God is waiting for you at the end. Your only choice is whether or not you are willing to make the journey. I pray that you are.

Amen.

1 Ruth 1:16 (New King James Version, repunctuated)
2 “On the Road Again,” lyrics by Willie Nelson, Honeysuckle Rose, 1980.

2/15/2009 - The Sixth Sunday After the Epiphany - The Rev. Susan N. Blue

2009-02-15T09:40:00.000-05:00

A few years ago a group appeared on the internet called “The Clergy Letter Project.” It was dedicated to teaching about evolution and taking the opposite view of the rapidly growing number of literal Biblical translation believers. Until this year, their views were mostly written from a Christian perspective, but now have been redesigned to incorporate Jewish Rabbis and other faith groups. Appropriately, this year, “Evolution Sunday,” falls on the weekend of Darwin’s 200th birthday. It is hard to miss that celebration as articles about Darwin and Lincoln are running neck and neck on the cover of magazines and newspapers. What, you might ask, does this have to do with Jesus’ healing of the leper in Mark’s Gospel for this morning?
First, the literalists have justified their stance on gay marriage, abortion, women clergy and other women’s rights on selected passages taken out of context in the Old Testament and the Pauline letters. I hear the Gospels quoted only rarely and then with little regard for their context. Further, while embracing arguments from before the first century BC to support their claims, they also ignore the more unpalatable sections of that document that include stoning, Leverite marriage, extreme dietary laws and war.
Our Gospel for today, as did last week’s, presents us with a compassionate Christ. In the dialogue a leper falls at the feet of Jesus begging to be healed saying: “If you choose you can make me clean.” Moved with pity Jesus touched the man and said: “I do choose. Be made clean!” Jesus followed the footsteps of Elisha who healed Naaman, a leper. In doing so both were illustrating the unlimited power and compassion of God. Jesus demonstrated that the love of God was for all people, not just the chosen few. As a result, through touch, moved by pity, he was able to cleanse the man and make him whole.
Jesus showed no partiality except for the poor and the outcast. His compassion extended to all people: the sick, the poor, the outcast, children, women, tax collectors and other people on the margin of society. He illustrated that the Kingdom of God that was breaking through was for everyone. In the Kingdom all people would be healed and made whole. He then charged his followers to go and do the same even after his death.
This understanding reflects the two mythical creation stories in Genesis. As myth they are not to be understood as being literally true but pointing to a truth. They are not, as Darwin and we understand, a factual account of the creation of the world, the waters, the heavens, plant life, animals and human beings. The great truth, however, is that we are all profoundly interconnected. Humankind was given the charge to care for the created world, including one anther. Hence our deep concern for preservation of all animal and plant species, our waters, and our air. Stewardship of this world was given to us in creation. It is not simply a soapbox political issue but a matter of survival for everything and everyone. The abuse of any part of God’s world abuses the entire world.
We are called to care for all of God’s created world. The environmental and animal issues are pretty straight forward, but how are we to care for one another? We are to be like Jesus reaching out to the suffering through touch. We can never underestimate the power of touch. When I was first ordained I went to the hospital to see a young man who had to tell his parents in one day that he was gay, that he had AIDS, and, as a result, lymphoma. He was terrified. Further, those were early days in that crisis, and even the people cleaning his room came in dressed like bee keepers. At that point we didn’t understand how the disease could or could not be spread. I was frightened also. Something in me knew, however, that I had to touch him, to hold his hand and give him a motherly embrace. I’m no saint and it wasn’t easy, but somehow God helped me to do what was needed. In speaking with doctors and nurses at Sloan Kettering several months later I learned that all of them had had the same experience. The young man and I bonded that day and, as a result, he had someone he could trust with his tragic story, and I was given an incredible opportunity to listen and to learn.
Touching is not only physical, but can be emotional and intellectual as well. It is not easy. We risk when we touch. We risk being broken open and known in a new way. We risk learning and being healed ourselves in ways that we could never have imagined. We are a part of all that we have met. We share a common ancestry with living things and are charged to care for them with a radical stewardship.
God created this universe, this world and all that is in it. When finished, God declared that all was good, and God loved that which had been made. I believe that we are charged to be partners with the Holy One in the ongoing creation of our world and the bringing in of the Kingdom in all of its fullness.
It seems to me that this is a beautiful and important truth for meditation as we approach the Great Forty Days of Lent. I invite you to join with me in praying and meditating during these days on the radical interconnectedness we have with one another and the world. We might ask what this means for us as individuals, for this parish, this community, this denomination and the worldwide faith communities.
Dorothy Day has written:

“If I did not believe, if I did not make what is called an act of faith (and each at of faith increases our capacity for faith), if I did not have faith that the works of mercy do lighten the sum total of suffering in the world, so that those who are suffering in this ghastly struggle somehow mysteriously find their pain lifted and some balm of consolation poured on their wounds – if I did not believe these things, the problem of evil would indeed be overwhelming.” (Copied)

AMEN

2/8/2009 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - The Fifth Sunday of Epiphany

2009-02-08T14:39:00.000-05:00

God heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. The Lord lifts up the lowly,but casts the wicked to the ground. (Psalm 147:3,6, NRSV) Jesus came and took her and lifted her up. Then the fever left her, and she began to serve them. And Jesus cured many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons;…(Mark 1:31,34)

Lord let the words of our mouths and the mediation of our hearts be pleasing unto you. Amen.

Mark’s Gospel does not begin with any genealogical background outlining Jesus’family lineage and it does not give a birth narrative of Christ. This gospel of Mark, written prior to the synoptic gospels, begins unfolding the events that comprised the public ministry of Jesus. In the gospel last week, we heard the powerful, authoritative teaching and exorcism in the Capernaum synagogue. The teaching and actions of Jesus reaching out in need demonstrates how close God truly is and Mark tells us that, “the kingdom of God has come near.” (1:15)

We are called to remember the powerful nature of God’s presence in our lives. God is present and close not just during the happy times but also during our struggles as well. Many of us are feeling the strain of a declining economy. Some are wrestling with the chronic health conditions of loved ones and friends, or uncertain employment. Our youths also battle with a number of unprecedented social and community issues.

As frustrating as it all seems - as angry as we may be – as consumed with doubt as we may be - it is in these very times that we are called to hold onto the faithfulness and assurances of the healing power of Christ. The healing power of Christ can free us (or however you want to say that) from depression, illness, fear, guilt, and more. And when we heal, we can help others to heal.

Jesus exhibited love and compassion each time he reached out to heal someone. We see this in our narrative today. Simon most likely informs Jesus of his mother in law’s illness after witnessing Jesus performing an exorcism in the Capernaum synagogue. Simon’s initiative on faith opened the window of opportunity for the healing of his mother-in-law. Simon faithfully placed her in the hands of God through Jesus. Jesus clearly goes against the culture by touching a woman. Touching a woman was unorthodox but Christ gently “took her by the hand and lifted her up.” Her fever vanished and she was restored to health - signaling that the presence of God was with her.

One of my former professors shared a story with the class from his travels to India to work with Mother Teresa. One day at the clinic, Mother Teresa gave him some bandages and ointment. He was surprised and puzzled and he asked Mother Teresa what he was supposed to do with them. Mother Teresa turned him around and told him to go and dress the open sores of the people who were waiting to be treated. The thought of touching these sick people scared him. However, he regained his composure and proceeded to do as he was instructed. He was, nevertheless, very uncomfortable at the onset. However, by the time he finished, he had become a witness to the healing power of touch. He felt the presence of God while bandaging the wounds of the injured patients. strangers.

Significantly, we are reminded that Jesus came into this world, “not to be served but to serve” [Mark 10:45]. Simon’s mother-in-law following her healing* began to serve the* guests and relatives in her home.

Our own healing and restoration can lead us on a mission to love and serve others by offering prayers and a healing touch. As a faith community, we are interconnected through the body of Christ as individuals and corporately bound by our mutual love of Christ. Frederick Boehner says that:

“Your life and my life flow into each other as wave flows in to wave, and unless there is peace and joy and freedom for you, there can be no real peace or joy or freedom for us. To see reality—not as we expect it to be but as it is---is to see that unless we live for each other and in and through each other, we do not really live very satisfactorily; that there can really be life only when there really is, in just this sense, love.” (Synethesis, 2000)

We are called to reach out with compassion to touch those in need in our homes, schools, and worksites. We are called to remember the loving kindness of Christ who heals us, pardons our sins, and renews our lives by lifting us up by the grace of God. We are called to be the healing hands in the world for Christ. Amen.

2/1/2009 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - The Fourth Sunday After Epiphany

2009-02-01T12:26:00.000-05:00

“…They were all amazed and they kept asking one another, ‘What is this? A new teaching…with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him!’”

Last week we heard of John’s imprisonment and the calling of the sons of Zebedee. Now, Jesus begins his ministry. When teaching in the synagogue on the Sabbath, there was a man with an unclean spirit. The unclean spirit called out: “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the holy one of God.” The unclean spirit recognized the person of God, and was fearful. Further Jesus proceeded to speak authoritatively and command the demon to come out from the man, and it did.
First, Jesus did not speak as the other teachers in the synagogue – the rabbis, the scribes and the lawyers. All three, as in our time, referred to past decisions to support their premises. Jesus did not bother with that, but simply commanded the spirit to come out, and, with convulsing and difficulty, it did! Now, it is important to recognize that Jesus was not necessarily dealing with a unique, mentally disturbed man. Certainly, in the first century when this was written, the understanding of demonic possession as well as of any illness was quite different from our understanding today. The setting, however, could be right now, right here, today.
Clearly there were three, perhaps four, main actors. There was Jesus, the possessed man, the demon and the onlookers. The latter were the most passive and in the safest position. However, Jesus’ way of speaking directly with authority, was highly disconcerting to the gathered crowd. Clearly, a higher power was at work, one that challenged each person present as well as the man possessed and the demon.
I would suggest that we might put ourselves in the place of the onlookers and experience the shock of the exorcism. That would be the safest place to be. But what if we recognize that a demon is anything that gets in the way of our ability to love God, ourselves or our neighbors? A demon prevents full and loving relationship. If that is the case, we might begin to look at our own personal lives as well as our lives in community and seek out the demons that might be plaguing us.
Evil has been described in many ways…one person has noted that the reverse spelling of ‘evil’ is ‘live,’ and, by extension, that which is evil in our lives prevents living a full life. Scott Peck has said that the primary characteristic of the presence of evil is the frequency of lying. When Jesus spoke with authority, he was speaking with the power of God, much like the prophets before him. That power flowed through him and created a new reality, one in which the Kingdom of God, the presence of Grace, could be ushered in.
The cry of the possessed is the language of terror, one that is threatened by the purity of the love of God. It has been said that the essence of evil is not sin, but the failure to act. (copied) Jesus, in commanding the demon to come out of the man, cleansed the man’s heart and, by extension, created a context in which love could come through. As a result, the entire crowd was freed to act, to be the people of God.
In the end, love is essential to healing, particularly healing of the heart and soul. Without love there can be little healing. In exploring our own lives we are called to look to the barriers that keep us from trusting in the power of God to change our lives. It is so easy to believe in false gods: the gods of money, power, and possessions. Whether we have those things of the world in abundance in our lives or whether, as is true for so many people today, we live in fear that they are slipping away and that we shall be left destitute, frightened and wanting, we are still worshiping false gods.
In the end, only love can cast out evil and fear. It is only love that endures at all times and places and it is only the love of God that is totally unfailing. We heard a number of speakers at our convention this weekend speaking of our need to find new solutions and new ways of being in a world beset with economic woes, wars, fear and distrust. I would suggest that, if we examine our own lives, in the words of the ancient Hebrews, ‘purify ourselves,’ then we are set free…free to love all people. There can be new ways to be together in our families, our churches and in the world. It need not be either or but can be both and, including possibilities that we haven’t yet imagined.
Voices of authority can shake our present view of our world and challenge us to start anew…with God, with one another, and within ourselves. The theme of the Convention was: “That we all may be one: Making Disciples.” With that context we prayed a wonderful prayer that I would share with you:

Loving God, we seek the way, helping, watching, learning, leading, each step forging new links, each dialogue opening further the channels of peace and understanding. We stand poised on the brink of greatness, drawn by the Spirit into new realms of hope and trust. The barriers and crutches of past centuries are slowly crumbling. We pray the skeletons of division and discord will be laid to rest, and that the people of God will be truly mobilized. For these and all your mercies, we thank you and praise you, O God. AMEN

1/25/2009 - The Third Sunday After the Epiphany - Andrew Schneider

2009-01-25T11:14:00.000-05:00

“ For the present form of this world is passing away.” For the present form of this world is passing away”

When we hear those words in Corinthians it’s understandable and right to let our gaze look back at the events of this past week and say indeed the present form of this world is passing away.

For those of us who braved the cold or followed the events on television, for the strangers and citizens who joined together to mark this passing and the celebration that rippled out across this city throughout the country and indeed the world how can it be denied that present form of this world is passing away?

While the events of the past week weigh heavily on our minds we gather today to celebrate the Rite 13 of four special young adults. Rite 13 is a ceremony that helps mark their journey from childhood to adulthood. Each Sunday we gather to tackle and discuss and share questions facing them in their journey. For you four as well, it is safe to say the present form of this world is passing away.

So?

So, what does it mean to say that the present form of this world is passing away? Biblical scholars debate exactly what Paul was alluding to. Perhaps he was warning against the troubles that could come from being followers of Jesus, or maybe he was reacting to a specific crisis or event that was causing social upheaval or crisis. What we do know, is that Paul was presenting a sense of urgency, because “the appointed time has grown short.”

For Charity, Daniel, Allyson and Reid, your time as children has grown short. But, in reality, for all of us, today’s readings seem to be saying the same thing, work quickly, intensely, and for the things that you cherish most.

In the gospel, Simon, Andrew, James, and John, all abandon their fishing nets, with haste, to follow Jesus. Imagine poor Zebedee standing there with fishing nets in his hand watching his sons walking away with a long haired stranger. Something to keep in mind in the years ahead, for both our Rite 13ers and your parents.

And I believe Jonah felt the same sense of urgency after reconsidering God’s request to go to Nineveh. Jonah traveled to Nineveh to proclaim God’s message. And, it appears that the people of Nineveh also felt had the same sense of urgency. Despite being a city that took 3 days to walk across, within just one day’s walk “ the people of Nineveh believed God”.

In this brief passage, the obscure, post-whale, episode of Jonah’s life, we view God’s willingness and ability to forgive. God forgives Jonah for not going to Nineveh the first time - something else that parents and kids should keep in mind - sometimes asking or being asked once should be enough - and God forgives the people of Nineveh when they turn away from their evil ways.

Two years ago when I preached here at St, Margaret’s I focused on God’s greatest gift….his unwavering and unending love for us, for you. For me it is a personal and intimate love, not constrained or defined by denomination or dogma. But the more that I have thought about it, I no longer believe that God’s unending love is the hardest thing to believe or accept. Rather, it is God’s ability to forgive and even harder still is our ability to forgive one another.

Forgiveness. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Forgive Me. I forgive you.

Recently, I read a book on Abraham Lincoln, Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Team of Rivals….throughout the book what struck me, and which has apparently struck anyone who knew Lincoln or researched him, was that he was “unselfishly magnanimous”. In other words, he forgave very easily friends and foe alike and treated everyone he encountered with dignity and respect.

I thought of these words recently, when I read that Rick Warren was selected to give the invocation at President Obama’s inauguration. Probably, like many members of St. Margaret’s I was skeptical that Dr. Warren could give a benediction that would fully embrace all Americans and people regardless of who they were as individuals.

Yet, I was also disappointed how vitriolic the response was from so many who have been aggrieved by Dr. Warren and other conservative religious leaders who I believe attempt to narrow the scope of God’s love. Is not the power of forgiveness the power to forgive those who have hurt us? Who have demeaned us, cheapened us, belittled us, caused us physical pain, mental anguish. The forgiveness must come from the aggrieved not the one who aggrieves.

I also thought of that description of Lincoln and his ability to forgive when I read that John Podesta described President Obama as someone who operates in a “grudge free zone.”

For those of us who are in relationships, for those of us with children, or those of us with parents, or those of us with colleagues, and friends, and especially for those of us with in-laws, I do not have the secret to what makes it easier to forgive. I know that it’s easier to apologize than it is to forgive. I also know that just trying to forgive more and holding onto fewer grudges does help.

If you say I will forgive more, you will forgive more. If you say you will love more and begrudge less, it will happen. It must, or else we risk having what we say here in this beautiful sanctuary become hollow statements. As President Obama says in his book The Audacity of Hope, where we put our time, talent, and money, is a true test of our values, regardless of what we tell ourselves.

So, Allyson, Charity, Daniel, and Reid, forgive your parents and family members as they will forgive you. And, proceed with the haste of apostles on the beach when Jesus came to them, and think about what you value and hold those things closest of all.

I will close with the words of Dr. Warren on Tuesday that spoke most loudly to me:
When we focus on ourselves, when we fight each other, when we forget you, forgive us. When we presume that our greatness and our prosperity is ours alone, forgive us. When we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the earth with the respect that they deserve, forgive us.

Amen

1/18/2009 - The Second Sunday of the Epiphany / MLK Memorial - Dr. John Newby

2009-01-18T11:23:00.000-05:00

The Struggle is an Ongoing Process

Let us pray,
In gratitude, we pray to you Oh God.
For spiritual guidance in the words that we speak.
Direct our thoughts and fill our hearts and minds with your holy spirit.
Like your servant Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., guide us and all peoples and all nations through pathways of compassion, love, justice, and peace. Be a constant presence in our lives and draw us closer to you. Strengthen the bonds of good will among us so that in continuing our struggles,
We shall overcome, some day
Deep in our hearts, help us to believe that
We shall overcome, some day.

When I was first approached by Susan and Caron about delivering a sermon in recognition and honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who like Samuel was a trustworthy prophet of the Lord, we could not have imagined the joyous and historical nature of this week. While we proudly celebrate the accomplishments of our President-Elect Barack Obama, we are even more mindful of the monumental accomplishments and powerful legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. We stand on the shoulders of Dr. King and countless named and unnamed warriors of the civil rights movement. We owe so much to those who endured the police dogs, who endured the water hoses, the bloodied heads and backs, the broken bones, the insults, the home bombings, imprisonments, loss of jobs, and murders of the innocent. We are proud to memorialize them in our hearts and minds, knowing that we must continue to strive for those changes that the civil rights warriors fought so hard to achieve. The struggle continues and there is a place for all of us to stand up and be counted.
I met Dr. King on at least two occasions while I was an undergraduate student at Howard University in the early 1960’s. In those days, and it continues until today, prominent preachers, theologians, or academicians were invited to deliver the Sunday sermon at Rankin Chapel, located on the campus. Occasionally, Dr. King was our guest preacher. He had carefully studied the life of Mahatma Gandhi, that political and spiritual leader in India whose practice of non-violent resistance to tyranny and oppression helped lead India to independence. Dr. King adopted the strategy of non-violence and firmly believed that it was the most potent weapon to use in responding to the struggles of oppressed people to obtain their civil rights. When Dr. King received the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1964, he asserted: “Non-violence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time: the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.” In 1963 Dr. King had provided the following context of non-violence. “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.”
The time I recall meeting Dr. King was on a Sunday when he was our guest preacher and I was ushering at Rankin Chapel. Being an usher ensured that I would be a part of the service even if all of the seats and standing spaces were occupied. For Dr. King’s visits, the chapel was always filled to capacity as we listened to his thoughts about non-violence, the importance and timing of the civil rights movement, the plight of African-Americans in this country and the ongoing struggle to eliminate indignities brought about by segregation, blatant discrimination and violent reactions to peaceful protests. Awarded celebrity status, Dr. King was usually escorted from the chapel, after the service, to an awaiting car which had been parked beside the entrance to the chapel. On one bright and sunny morning, that car was a convertible that had the top down. Dr. King was invited to sit on the back of the car like a participant in a homecoming parade or as Susan did in the gay pride parade. Still in my usher robe, I approached the car and shook his hand before the car was surrounded by a throng of worshippers leaving the chapel. To all of the greetings, his response was a wide smile and a simple “thank you.” His voice was deep. He had dropped his serious demeanor. He was quite jovial and seemed to enjoy the attention from the crowd.
Inspired by Dr. King’s leadership, his perseverance and the energy of the civil rights movement, there were times when many of the students would leave the campus after a chapel service to participate in a university-sponsored march that picketed directly in front of the White House on Pennsylvania Ave. Waving signs and placards, we sang songs about being freed from oppression, discrimination, and the injustice of being treated as second class citizens. We always ended the picketing by joining hands and singing the comforting strains of “We shall overcome.” We truly believed that the energy of the universe was on the side of justice and that we were the rightful heirs of that justice which we would be ours someday.
In preparing these comments, I recalled some of the situations I encountered growing up in a segregated environment. In those days, there were signs displayed over water fountains that said either colored or white. When I first learned how to read, I thought that water coming from the colored fountain would come out in different colors. I recall getting text books that had been used and marked up with graffiti by white students but given to my high school when the white students got new books to use and mark up. In one supermarket that was frequented by many African-Americans, I recall that there were three bathrooms, one for white men, one for white women and one to be used by both African-American men and African American women. I never knew if both sexes were supposed to use the bathroom at the same time or whether there was some other race-related message that was being sent. In a department store where I worked during the summer, African-Americans could not eat in the dining room. I always thought it was strange that white customers would eat the food that was prepared by an entire kitchen of African-American women but would not sit down with them to share a meal. Then there was the director of personnel who would always say when she walked through the delivery office where I worked, “Good Night Boys.” Old or young, the African American men were always referred to as boys. I was never aware of any move- to- the-back of the bus incidents when I was growing up in Norfolk. However, I do recall that white passengers on the bus would often stand up rather than sit in a vacant seat beside an African-American. My father sold fruits and vegetables from a truck in a low income white project. For more years than I like to remember, I was the delivery boy. Occasionally, during the hot summer months, I would ask for a glass of water when I made a delivery. I was always given the water but also told that I could keep the glass. My father told me, after I had collected several glasses, that the glasses had been given to me because they would not be used again in that house after I had drunk from it. Never again did I ask for a glass of water while working in that project.
At least once a year during Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, we hear the familiar words of Dr. King’s “I have a Dream” speech. Those dreams had visions of equality for all and universal brotherhood, the vision of eradicating injustice and oppression, the vision of being judged by ones character rather than the color of one’s skin, the vision that our nation be transformed towards togetherness and away from divisiveness, and that there would be a ringing realization of freedom shouted from every village and hamlet in this country. In that speech, Dr. King raised the consciousness of the civil rights movement and secured for himself a place in history as one of the world’s greatest orators.
We are still striving towards the realization of Dr. King’s dreams. With few modifications, the contents of the speech are as relevant and timely today as they were 45 years ago. Many of Dr. King’s speeches, the marches, famous quotes and the rhetoric of the civil rights movement have been committed to history. However, the struggle for justice must be ongoing. We cannot be content with what we believe we have accomplished, we cannot be satisfied, and we cannot be complacent. With diligence and fervor we must strengthen our resolve to remove the obstacles that impede the quest for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Those obstacles that continue to be alive and well include Racism, sexism ageism, classism, elitism and the ongoing inequities and injustices leveled against those with a different sexual orientation. We must find creative, innovative, and more effective means of combating poverty, homelessness, health care and health care disparities, joblessness, abusiveness, hunger, treats to the environment, and greed. Dr. King cautioned, “A nation that continues to spend, year after year, more money on military defense than on ongoing programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death”
Being shown great thing from lofty heights (as alluded to in today’s gospel) whereby the glory of god is manifest is often portrayed in biblical teachings and interpretations. It is the context of Dr. King’s “I’ve Been to the Mountain Top” speech that was so prophetically delivered on the night before he was assassinated. The speech alludes to the bible story of Moses being taken by God to the top of a mountain overlooking Canaan, the Promised Land. Moses is allowed to see the Promised Land but told that he will not be allowed to cross over into it.
The speech is uncanny in what appears to be Dr. King’s prediction of his death. “Well, he said, “But it really doesn’t matter with me now because I have been to the mountain top…and I’ve looked over and I have seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.”

Why was Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., lifted up to the mountain top to see the Promised Land before he would get there with his people? What did he actually see when he was allowed to look over that place of complete satisfaction and happiness? Was he lifted up for being on the side of truth and righteousness as he sought to proclaim the good news of god in Christ? Was he lifted up because he sought to serve Christ in all persons and had loved his neighbor as himself? Was he lifted up in gratitude for his personal struggle striving for justice and peace among all people while respecting the dignity of every human being?
Perhaps, from that mountain top, Dr. King was allowed to look back over his past life of service and transformational leadership to witness people around the world crying out to be free, perhaps he saw again the importance of non-violence as the preferred method of bringing about social change, maybe he witnessed the unfolding of a human rights revolution and the resolve of oppressed people to gain their rightful place in the world. In looking back over his accomplishments, maybe the Nobel Prize he had won for his work to end racial segregation and discrimination was flashed in front of him or the passage of civil rights acts that he so strongly influenced, or his participation in the march on Washington, where he delivered the “I have a dream speech” that energized and galvanized the civil rights movement. In looking back over his life, maybe he was allowed to leaf through his letter from a Birmingham Jail in which he so strongly stated that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” In looking back from the mountain top, maybe he was also shown the work he did leading the successful Montgomery bus boycott that resulted from the courage and bravery of Mrs. Rosa Parks, who helped to pave the way to equal freedom and equal opportunity.
If, from that mountain top, Dr. King was allowed to see future strides towards justice, influenced by his leadership, he was surely shown the dismantling of Apartheid and the freeing of Nelson Mandela in South Africa. Then he would see significant advances in the rights of women to include their appointment to the Supreme Court, the selection of the first female astronaut, Shirley Chisholm becoming the first African American women to be elected to Congress and Geraldine Ferraro’s becoming the first female candidate for vice-president of the United States. Dr. King would be most gratified to witness the advances of African-Americans in the fields of business, in government, and in politics. Perhaps he was shown the Stonewall incident and the ongoing struggle for gay and lesbian liberation. Similarly, he would see that many of the major figures in professional sports and in leadership roles in the military would be African Americans and that an African-American woman would win the Nobel Prize for literature.
It is probably not a coincidence that the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King., Jr. immediately precedes the inauguration of Barack Obama as the first African-American President of the United States. In recalling many of the painful events that this country experienced, from the degrading circumstances that propelled Dr. King to prominence, to the election of Barack Obama, it is difficult to grasp all of what is happening this weekend. I never thought that I would experience such a forward moving event in my lifetime and I am sorry that my grandparents, parents, and deceased brothers and sisters are not here. I am proud of Barack Obama and I am proud of this country. It is hard to believe that an African-American family will occupy the White House as its primary residents considering that African-American slaves helped to build it not that many years ago. It is really a blessing to actually experience the occurrence of these events, to have lived long enough to be a witness to such a revolutionary piece of history. It is indeed a cause for celebration.

We praise God for the witness, vision, and non-violent perseverance of Dr. Martin Luther King. Jr. Dr. King paved the way for changes needed to pursue the realization of justice, freedoms, dignity, inclusion and equal opportunities Let us not forget that the struggle for human rights is not static but a dynamic and ongoing process that daily demands our attentiveness. Let us keep the faith. Let us always have hope for future days to be brighter than our yesterdays and let there be peace among all peoples and nations. Someday may all peoples of the earth witness those things that signify the coming of the glory of the Lord?
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,
You raised us up, so we could stand on mountains
You raised us up, to walk on stormy seas;
We are strong when we are on your shoulders,
You raised us up... to more than we could be.
• Can we transform the dreams of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. so that they can become realities in our daily lives? The now famous refrain must always be, yes we can.
• Can we continue to strive for equal freedom and equal opportunities for all people? Yes we can.
• Can we make this a land of hope, justice and peace? Yes we can.
• Can we work to eliminate prejudices, misunderstandings and hate that separate us from the love of Christ and the love of our sisters and brothers? Yes we can. Yes we can.
Amen!

The Second Sunday After Christmas - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 1/4/2009

2009-01-04T12:04:00.000-05:00

When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy…”

The Rev. Herbert M. Goetz, Jr., told this 100 year old Swedish story in his January 3, 1993 sermon at First Community Church. “A country doctor came to a farmhouse one night to help deliver a child. As the mother labored on a kitchen table, her husband assisted the doctor by holding up a gas lamp to illuminate the makeshift delivery room. After a time of courageous labor, the mother produced a fine baby boy. Then, to the surprise of both parents, the doctor announced that a second child was due to arrive. And indeed, the mother delivered a lovely daughter.
Her husband was already shaken by this unexpected turn of events, so you can imagine his astonishment when he heard the doctor say, “Hang on? I think there’s a third. I think we have triplets!” At this, the father began to back out of the room. “Hold it!” called the doctor, “Come back here with that light.” “Oh, no,” said the father, “it’s the light that attracts them!”
It was another light that attracted the wise men 2000+ years ago to that infant lying in a manger. A huge mythology has arisen about these men … just who and what were they? First, there could have been two or twenty – the Bible never mentions three. Furthermore they could have been of any race, though, it is unlikely in the ancient Near East that even one of them was Caucasian. They were probably Medes, a Persian tribe, who served a priestly function. They might likely have been Zoroastrians, astrologers, magicians, dream interpreters or alchemists. We do know that they were wise in regard to the heavens and the stars, for they identified that star and followed it. That light was so strong with such powerful attraction, that they left everything and set out on a long and dangerous journey. They represent, for us, that Jesus came for all people, not just the people of Israel. They were strangers, gentiles, the “others.” We know that they were willing to take a great risk, and that their search was deliberate, intentional. They did not just “stumble upon” the Christ Child. Further, they illustrated humility, one that allowed them to be led and to trust in God. They moved on faith and hope as open and vulnerable human beings.
When they arrived at the manger they recognized Jesus for who he was – and opened gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. The gold symbolized kingship out of the line of David. The frankincense, used in the temple as a symbol of prayer, indicated that he was the Holy One, sent from God. Finally, myrrh, that which is used to anoint the dead, symbolized that though he was royal and holy, he would surely die, that he was fully human.
The late Rev. Canon Linda Strohmier’s answer to the question: “Who are they, these wise men bearing gifts?” is “Well, friends, they are us.” We, like them, are outside, not a part of the covenant with Israel, we, too are foreigners and strangers.
The gifts of the Magi tell us something of who Christ was for them, but they also tell us, who bear his name, what we are to be. The gold calls us to obedience, to honoring the life of Christ by emulating that life. We who bear the sign on Jesus on our foreheads from our baptism are to be God’s hands and hearts in the world.
We are called by the frankincense to worship and to prayer, to a constant remembering the one who created us and the one who sustains us. We are called to share that worship with all whom God has made – to be open and inclusive.
We are called by the myrrh to remember that we, too, are finite, that our stay on earth is limited. We are called to live a life that matters while we are here, trusting that we shall join the one we worship at our death.
I would suggest that this Epiphany time, 2009, we are ones who are called to journey, to follow the cries of our fellow human beings in Iraq, Israel, Afganistan, in Washington, DC and wherever God’s children are suffering. We are called to give our time, talent and resources to those who are experiencing incredible loss and pain. Like the Magi we are to be intentional in our reaching out and sacrificial in our giving. Finally, we are to trust God that there is enough for all of us, that all of us are loved and that the abundance of wealth and love in this world are enough for everyone.
On this Sunday of Christmas II let us remember that wonderful little saying penned by someone who is anonymous:

The Work of Christmas

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among brothers,
To make music in the heart.

I can think of no better way that we could honor the incredible gift that we were given – that of God coming into the world as a human being, that assures us that to be human means to be loved by the Creator beyond our wildest imaginings. AMEN

Christmas Day - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 12/25/2008

2008-12-25T09:44:00.000-05:00

And the Word became flesh and lived among us… (NRSV, John 1:14)

Last night, I set up my crèche set. The crèche set is made out of banana leaves from a Caribbean Island and was very delicate. I reconstructed the manager scene with the Holy Family and animals to resemble a stable setting. The last piece I placed was baby Jesus in the manager. Mary and Joseph were protectively placed near the manager. I thought of the infinite magnitude of God’s love for humankind. A love that brought God closer to us as opposed to a love that is remote and untouchable.

Our traditional crèche scene or nativity scene is the symbol of the celebration of the miraculous birth of Jesus; the Holy Child born of the Virgin Mary whose adopted father was Joseph. Mary and Joseph were homeless and poor, wandering in Bethlehem. When we look at a crèche scene, we are reminded of the shepherds in Luke’s Gospel serving as witnesses to God incarnated in the person of baby Jesus in the manager. After an angel announces the birth to them, they decide to go see the miracle with their own eyes.

They found the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes in the manager. God lovingly came to live among humankind to bring us the gifts of salvation and grace. Today is the feast of the Nativity of the Lord known as Christmas Day. It is the celebration of the birth of Jesus, Immanuel “God with us.” Additionally, today we celebrate the power and intimate action of the Word becoming flesh to bring hope and light to the world.

Our Christian faith places demands on us to strive to have enormous faith and trust in God even when God’s actions are in comprehendible to us. This can be a difficult task. I am sure Mary did not understand everything initially that was to happen to her and yet later through the years of watching her son grow her faith grew stronger in God’s presence.

God was present with the Israelites through the images of the cloud by day, the pillar of fire, David keeping the Arc of the covenant, the provision of the manna, and messages received through the Old Testament prophets.

However, the Israelites were not able to maintain their faith as strongly as they had when they knew the presence of God was with them. (copied and adapted from the Lectionary, Dec.2008, p.29, Vol. XX, No.1) God had to do something radical and new to demonstrate the sustained love for them and for us today. God found a new way to bond with the people so they could recognize his presence once again.

The presence of God coming to live among humankind is recounted from different points of view in the Gospels. We are aware of Luke’s version of the conception and birth of Jesus to the Virgin Mary by the Spirit of God but not biologically by Joseph. Luke traces the genealogy of Jesus through his mother Mary’s lineage, as it was believed that Jesus was the son of Joseph. Luke ties Jesus lineage to son of Enos, son of Seth, son of Adam, son of God (Luke 3:23-38). Additionally, in Luke’s story includes the shepherds, the angels, and the stable. (adapted from Herschel Hobbs, The Illustrated Life of Jesus,Nashville, Tenn: Holman Bible Publishers, 2000,p.20).

Matthew uses Joseph’s lineage for the birth of Jesus. We know that Joseph is the adopted father of Jesus. However, Jewish law required Jesus’ lineage to be traced on the father’s side of the family because a line had to be established. Matthew begins his account with Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus covers fourteen generations from Abraham to David. It is during the Babylonian captivity that the Messianic hopes of the Israelites began to take shape in full force. The birth of Jesus, the son of God gave rise to the all hopes and desires of the people across the nations. ((adapted from Herschel Hobbs, The Illustrated Life of Jesus,Nashville, Tenn: Holman Bible Publishers, 2000,p.20). Thus, Mary became the blessed mother of all women, which she eloquently expresses in the Song of Mary, the Manificat.

We not only celebrate the birth of the baby Jesus who was God incarnate on Christmas but also the presence of the Word before creation. Apostle John shows us in his poetry that the Word existed before creation. For John, Jesus was present with God before creation. This means that Jesus existed with God even before Abraham walked the earth. For John, the beginning of the Jesus story, began to take shape before eternity and continues today. It continues because we know that God “created all things” in the world and God is in the world. John tells us that the Word becoming flesh in the person of Jesus gives us the power of becoming the children of God.

Christmas helps us to celebrate the faithful knowledge of God’s saving love and presence. Our faith heritage unites us to God from the creation story through the history of Israel to the incarnation, the birth of Holy Child, Jesus. (adapted from Homily Service, Taylor & Francis Group, Philadelphia: The Liturgical Conference, December 25, 2003, p.66)

We began our service today singing, ‘O Come All Ye Faithful.’ The Latin word for “come” means “be present.” Essentially our worship is empty void without the presence of God incarnate among us. (adapted from AHA December 25, 1997.p54). We have gathered - a community of the faithful remembering the scene of the crèche, the nativity - to stand firm in the faith that Christ is the final revelation of the one true God who lives among us always. The Gospel of John says, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The Word became flesh and lived among us…’ (John 1:1, 14, NRSV). Our worship epitomizes the presence of God incarnate within us.

Let us pray:

Almighty God we pray that we keep each day like Christmas with our lives telling the story daily: the story of how we cared for the presence of Christ entrusted to us as God entrusted Joseph and Mary by caring for each other and for ourselves.

May we share the Christmas story by embracing the most vulnerable in our society and to each other risking ourselves to love and to be loved, even as God does in this blessed Son, born to bring us love and hope in the world for eternity. Amen. (adapted and copied from David Klutterman, in WTW selected sermons by Evangel, Feb.6, 1996)

Advent 4 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 12/21/2008

2008-12-21T09:44:00.000-05:00

Text: Matt.1:26-38

And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one!” The Lord is with you.” (Luke 1:28, NRSV) The angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary for you have found favor with God, and now you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. (Luke 1:30-31, nrsv)

Last Sunday this scene was portrayed by our youth during the annual Children’s Christmas Pageant, which was just wonderful by the way. In the pageant Gabriel was standing right here with huge, white, and majestic wings saying these very same words to Mary. Mary was sweeping her home when Gabriel suddenly appeared out of nowhere and said to her, “Greetings, favored one.” Sometimes God has a way of sending you a message or sign when you least expect it. For instance, an angel greeted Zechariah while he was conducting his priestly duties in the temple. The angel informed him that he and his elderly wife, Elizabeth who had been barren for years would have a son. Zechariah did not believe the angel and was struck mute when he emerged from the temple. The birth of his son, John the Baptist *turned out to be a sign of the power of God.

Mary also was perplexed at seeing an angel standing before her. In our pageant, she stopped sweeping, dropped the broom, and fell to the floor in astonishment. We all would have been bewildered like Mary to receive such a greeting even though it was followed with reassurances ‘not to fear.’ The grace of God was upon her and she of all women was selected to give birth to the world’s greatest gift. The baby’s name was already selected, Jesus. The child would grow into greatness and be known as the Son of the Most High. He would rule the throne of David and rein over all nations from generation to generation. In today’s Old Testament reading, God sends the prophet Nathan to inform David that, “Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me; your throne shall be established forever.” (2Samuel 7:1:16, NRSV)

Mary, filled with faith, humility, and trust for God only asked one question, “How?” She asks this question as if saying, ‘Okay, I am on board. Just tell me how because I am not yet married to Joseph.’ This thirteen year old did not say, ‘Why me? I am too young.’ Nor did she turn aside and run away to save her promised marriage to Joseph. She patiently listened to Gabriel who assured her that she would not become pregnant by sexual intimacy.

On the contrary, the presence and the power of God with the Holy Spirit descended upon her and overshadowed” her like a cloud. Each Sunday we proclaim in the Nicene Creed, “We believe in Jesus Christ born of the Virgin Mary.” Today the dual nature of Jesus may continue to be a mystery for you but with faith like Mary’s, the Episcopal Church embraces this mystery as truth.

The angel clarifies and satisfies Mary’s question and she says, “Let it be unto me as you have said.” Mary serves as a model of steadfast faith for all men and women who trust in the promise of the Lord when everything you have been taught, told, and built in your life tells you to run. ((copied and adapted from Synthesis, December 23, 1990) I do not see Mary as a weak, submissive, and demure girl of 13. Mary’s faith and strength was grounded in the revelation of the power of God and the knowledge that nothing is impossible with God.” (copied and adapted from Synthesis, December 23, 1990)

The lives of all key players in the story of the birth of Jesus would be changed forever. Not only did Mary’s life change by her saying “yes” as a servant of God but a new community for Israel was also about to be born. This was the fulfillment of God’s promise from the house of Abraham to the house David.

We know that Elizabeth greets Mary later in the Gospel of Luke by exclaiming, Blessed are you among women, and blessed be the fruit of your womb (Luke 1:42) And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord (Luke 1:45, NRSV).

We do not choose God. God chooses us to be the vessels of peace and love in this world. The miraculous incarnation and nativity event exemplifies the wonder and power of God’s initiating action in the world. Mary is the model that reminds us to allow God to be active in us so that we may serve as faithful witnesses to God’s presence in the world. We are joyfully waiting to celebrate the first advent of Jesus. We, like Mary, are waiting with joy and hope, filled with the assurances that God’s power and grace is with us now and always. We too have found favor with God. O come, come Emmanuel. Amen.

The Third Sunday of Advent - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 12/14/2008

2008-12-15T12:19:00.001-05:00

Today is Rose Sunday in Advent…a time when we light the pink candle, wear rose vestments, and our lessons are optimistic and full of hope. The Gospel of John looks at the “why” of John the Baptist rather than the linear “what” of the other three Gospels. For once, our three lessons hold together this Sunday. The prophet Isaiah is speaking to the returning exiles from Babylon and proclaiming a Jubilee year, a time of hope and new life in which God’s promise is fulfilled as the people return from captivity.
The Gospel wastes no time in proclaiming that John was a “man sent from God.” However, it is explicit in saying that John came as a “witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him.” He is not the light itself; he is not the Messiah. In the context of this passage the Jewish authorities have sent priests and Levites to discover just who this man is who is attracting so very much attention. When asked who he was, John was most explicit in saying who he was not! This was not a denial, but a confession made in total humility. In doing so, John could be John, with no pretentions to being anything else. When pressed further John quoted from Isaiah saying: “I am a voice crying out in the wilderness. Make straight the way of the Lord.”
John proclaimed to people who were in the dark that the light was coming, that their pain and anxiety would be transformed into new, genuine hope. John’s voice calls out to us as well as to those first century Jews with a call of hope and challenge. We who know how the story ends and begins are called likewise to proclaim the coming of the light, the year of the Lord, the breaking in of the Kingdom of God. John was clear that the one who is coming is unknown to both the people and to John. We, too, believe that Christ will come again, but, like John, we have no idea what form that our Savior will take.
Too often the Christian message is that we are to be like Jesus. If that were even possible we would have no need of God. Instead we are to live our lives consistent with our call knowing that, in our own imperfection, we cannot possibly be infallible. God, in creation, made the relationship between God and the people very clear – God is God and we are human kind. Any pretense otherwise is simply that…a pretense. In many ways this is incredibly liberating. Just as John could be John, so can we be who we really are. The question then is for each of us and for the church: Who are we? This Rose Sunday we don’t have to BE light, but simply witness to that light. The word “witness” is used sixteen times more often in John than in the other three Gospels combined. It has been said that, in the beginning of the Gospel of John, God has put the world on trial with all of its sinful darkness, just as Jesus’ life was ended as a result of a trial. (Copied)
We are called to face who we are and who we are not. If we own that we cannot save ourselves, we must admit that we are vulnerable and mortal. With that honest knowledge, we are to repent of our separation from God, ourselves and our neighbor, and prepare to give honest testimony to what we know to be true. We are to do so in our words, in our lives, and in our very being. This means throwing off many of those things of the world that we use to protect and shelter ourselves, hence this is not a soft, sweet experience but one that has overtones of fear and the unknown. Even as we wait in the dark for the transcendent God to enter the world as the immanent God, we do so with the hope that the testimony of John promises and that our hearts know to be true.
The letter of Paul to the community at Thessalonica gives us some clues as to how we are to testify. We are to rejoice, to pray and to give thanks in all things. We are to open our hearts to the prophets and the Holy Spirit, while testing the prophetic voices for their truthfulness. We are to hold fast to what is good and abstain from any evil. All of this is important so that, when Christ comes again, we shall be seen as faithful in so far as we can be in all of our humanity.
Too often we interpret this to be just “doing” for others who are in need. That is critically important, but is too narrow a view. If we are to, with John, make straight a pathway for God, we must manifest that testimony in every single aspect of our lives. The heart of the teaching of John is one of incredible hopefulness, for the promise is that there will come a time when there is no darkness, just the light of God’s presence.
We know it is coming as we experience the love we receive from one another, the love and support we give to those in need, and the promise of the Resurrection…that God’s love is infinite and goes beyond death. As our seminarian, Sandy, pointed out to me this week, there is a person sent by God whose name is yours. The voice is yours and mine. AMEN

Advent 2 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 12/7/2008

2008-12-07T09:43:00.000-05:00

In the name of the one holy and undivided Trinity.

I would like to revisit our Collect…Merciful God, who sent your messengers the prophets to preach repentance and prepare the way for our salvation: Give us grace to heed their warnings and forsake our sins, that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ our Redeemer; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.] Amen. (Collect for Advent II, Book of Common Prayer, The Episcopal Church, New York: Oxford Press, 1979. p.211)

In using our Advent Collect, we pray to our merciful God to give us grace to do nothing that would block God’s presence from our lives so that we may greet with joy the coming of Jesus Christ. In our Eucharistic prayer, we proclaim the mystery of faith, which is “Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.” (Collect for Advent II, Book of Common Prayer, The Episcopal Church, New York: Oxford Press, 1979. p. 363) This morning I would like to focus on the good news that “Christ will come again.”

Today is the second Sunday in Advent and we are compelled to look deeper into the vision of God’s promise for the gift of salvation. Advent compels us to wait vigilantly, to prepare vigilantly, and to sustain our faith with the hope and anticipation of the first and second coming of our Lord, the Messiah. Some of you probably know that Advent means ‘an arrival’ or ‘coming.’

I mention this because it is easy to mistakenly think of Advent merely as the liturgical season of four Sundays when the Church prepares for the celebration of Christmas (Christ’s first arrival). This probably applies to most of us and, let’s face it - when we were children, this was the time to find out where all the gifts were hidden before Christmas Day arrived.

This is also the time when Christmas shopping may create considerable stress for us with so many purchasing decisions to make. Plans and strategies are devised to determine the best times to get to the stores before crowds hastily dash to the counters and race down the aisles to obtain the desired items before someone else get to them. Some folks will just collapse from the exhaustion by Christmas Day. Peggy Lee used to sing a song called, “Is That All There Is?” Certainly, we are going to do some kind of preparations such as shopping for gifts to share with loved ones and friends, preparing all sorts of delicious foods, and all the related merrymaking that takes place leading up to Christmas Day. All of this is appropriate after all some of you are graciously shopping for gifts for families at Mary’s Center.

However, this is NOT ALL THERE IS to the season of Advent whose emphasis sometimes gets glossed over making this time appear only as a blur in our busy daily lives. Advent extends far beyond these four Sundays before Christmas. It has been said that we are Advent people throughout the year. J. Barrie Shepherd says that, “We need to be reminded to look forward at least once a year...

Therefore just when calendars are growing old weary of themselves—the tattered, dog eared, tail end of the year—we name it “Advent” - change the furniture change the color scheme (note we have gone from green to blue-purple), dig out five candles and holly wreath (note our advent candle wreath), and kindle hope again with orisons, chants, hymns, clear words of ancient expectation, in the midst of which, from time to time, eternity—in human form—takes shape, draws near.” (copied and adapted. J. Berrie Shepherd, in Presbyterian Survey,Dec.1992, p.4 from Synthesis, Advent 2B,Dec.5, 1993, p.3)

We are a community of faith that actively responds to God’s actions with open hearts by waiting, watching, and preparing for the second coming of Christ. We faithfully pray with expectancy and hope that one day Christ will come again. We want to be prepared for that glorious day and meet that day with joy. We are called to seek, listen, and watch for the redemptive presence of Christ in our lives daily.

Our scriptures today challenge us to expand our understanding of Advent. We are making ready the new life promised to us by the prophets of the Old Testament (Isaiah and Malachi) and John the Baptist, the New Testament voice in the wilderness referenced by the prophet Isaiah. God calls us daily to draw near. In Mark’s Gospel, John the Baptist’s mission was to draw near all those who would listen and turn to God with repentance. John the Baptist was the forerunner clearing a way for the “one coming after him,” whom John proclaimed was to be even more powerful.

The people came by the thousands from the whole Judean countryside - perhaps resembling the expected crowds that will be converging on the National Mall next month for the Inauguration. What is important to remember is that with the advanced work of John the Baptist, the people then - as we do now - clearly wanted to claim the hope, love, justice, and peace offered by acting on the message to ‘prepare the way by making the path straight for the one who is coming to save all the nations.’ This is the promise of Advent because “Christ has died, Christ is risen and Christ will come again.”

We are committed to a new life in Christ as baptized Christians. God has already begun to act in our lives. The season of Advent reminds us that we are called to remove the things that block us from receiving Christ with joy by clearing the way to make a straight path for God in this world: to eliminate injustices, to study war no more, to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, establish environmental stability, and maintain global partnerships for development (from the Episcopal Church Millennium Development Goals). Our ability to receive Christ with open hearts and joy enables us to love our neighbor and better serve our God.

Let us pray:

Merciful God, give us, our nation, and its leaders a spirit of generosity for the good of all people. May our hearts, like yours, be pierced with sorrow for the evils of the world. Help us to dismantle the barriers that separate rich nations from poor nations, that we might be empowered to build together the just and peaceful world that you intended. (Prayer of the EDOW Millennium Development Goals)

Amen.

Thanksgiving Day - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 11/27/2008

2008-11-27T12:29:00.000-05:00

It has been said that "Thanksgiving is ultimately a day for remembering our dependence upon God." (Copied) The danger for us, however, is the same as for God's Chosen People in Deuteronomy -- that we will begin to believe that we have earned what we have. In that lesson Moses describes the wonders of the Promised Land that God will give to the people. He contrasts that to the land they have left. He then warns them to thank God for all that has been given and not believe they have created it themselves.
This Thanksgiving Day in 2008 we are in the midst of perhaps the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. I suspect that most of us have begun to believe that what we have is the result of our work alone. We forget that God provides everything…including our intelligence, our education, our families and homes. We become like the ten lepers, diseased from the inside by an exaggerated sense of our self-worth. Charles Brown (source unknown) suggests a reason for only one cleansed leper to return and give thanks to Jesus:

"One waited to see if the cure was real
One waited to see if it would last.
One said he would see Jesus later.
One decided he had never had leprosy.
One said he would have gotten well anyway.
One gave the glory to the priests.
One said, 'O, well, Jesus didn't really do anything.'
One said, 'Any rabbi could have done it.'
One said, 'I was already much improved.'"
(Copied)

The test of true gratitude, dependence upon God, comes during the difficult times, not the times of plenty. During times such as these it is easy to become anxious and afraid – afraid to make decisions, afraid to be generous and afraid for our personal future. How ironic this is, for this is the time to reach out to others, to pare back some of our luxuries, and to thank God without ceasing. We are to remember that God's Kingdom is not characterized by wealth and plenty but by abundant love and self-giving.
The Pilgrims had a difficult time that first year. We often think of them as seeking religious freedom, and they were, for themselves only. They were fleeing the Anglican Church in Great Britain, certain that Puritanism was the only true way to worship God. They became what they fled. It took many years before true religious freedom was established, and one wonders if it has truly come in all its fullness in this rich land of ours.
Despite the uneasy economic climate I have seen new life and energy in this parish. It has been noted recently by a number of people who have encountered us for the first time. I suspect that we as a community have been jolted to realize how fortunate we are. As a result, perhaps our hearts and minds have unfolded a new level of gratitude to God. In a few moments we shall celebrate the Eucharist together, that great feast makes us one with all Christians today, all who have come before and all who will come after. The heart of the Eucharist is the hinge that unites the Liturgy of the Word and Holy Communion – The Great Thanksgiving. Let each of our hearts be suffused with gratitude this day for all we have been given…for life, for hope, for friends and family and for the unqualified love that surrounds us in Jesus Christ our Lord. Let us pray:

We come to this table today, O God, humble and thankful and glad.
We thank you first for the great miracle of life, for the exaltation of being human, for the capacity to love.
We thank you for joys both great and simple:
For wonder, dreams and hope;
For the newness of each day;
For laughter and song and a merry heart;
For compassion waiting within to be kindled;
For the forbearance of friends and the smile of a stranger;
For the arching of the earth and trees and heavens and the fruit of all three;
For the wisdom of the old;
For the courage of the young;
For the promise of the child;
For the strength that comes when needed;
For this family united here today.
Of those to whom much is given, much is required. May we and our children remember this.
Amen
(Copied)

St. Margaret's Day - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 11/16/2008

2008-11-16T12:22:00.000-05:00

"…if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in." (Isaiah 58:10-12)

Once again we celebrate St. Margaret's Day in honor of St. Margaret of Scotland. For those of you new to the parish, the origin of the name came not from this famous woman, but from a relative of one of the parish's benefactors. The name of St. Margaret of Scotland was purely an after thought. However, I can't help but believe that the character and life of this good woman has helped to shape the parish we are today. Tom Head, in his forum between the services will talk about the history of our church, noting that much of who and what we are today was not won easily but was very hard fought!
Margaret was a remarkable woman, as you might note in the brief biography distributed with your bulletin. She transformed her husband, her household, the Scottish Church and the face of her nation. She did all this while raising eight children! Margaret didn't effect these changes through heavy-handed power or wealth, but through love, prayer and a singular focus on Holy Scripture and Jesus Christ. She was highly intelligent, deeply empathetic and understood that we are given custody or stewardship, not ownership, of all creation and of one another. Her compassion and determination made an impact on all facets of Scottish life. Above all, she was a woman of prayer and steeped in compassion and love. We are called to walk in her footsteps.
We are in the midst of great anxiety this year as well as in eager anticipation of a new beginning politically. One hopes that the latter will go well beyond politics to transform us as a people as well as a government. Living in Washington, however, we know that that won't happen without help. Politics as usual can quickly consume even the most deeply grounded hope and anticipation. With the election of president-elect Obama we may have begun to lay to rest one of the ugliest and most shameful parts of the history of the United States. It has been said that, with this election, race has become just another issue, not THE issue. As we know only too well here at St. Margaret's there is plenty of prejudice
and marginalization still to be addressed. One hopes that our young people will have a better vision of differences from that of previous generations.
I would suggest that, following in St. Margaret's footsteps, we have much to offer our community in bringing about the many changes necessary to reflect the Kingdom of God. The lessons chosen for Margaret's Feast Day are some of the richest and most beautiful in Holy Scripture. They remind us that, in response to the incredible gifts and boundless love given to us by God, we are to reach out to all those around us. We are to seek justice, to help the poor and to be a place of welcome, comfort and love for all who are afflicted in heart, body, mind or soul.
During these troubled times this will at times be very difficult and cause us to sacrifice for what we believe. With the economic realities of today one can only imagine that, in 2009 the Fannie Mae Walkathon will be a thing of the past. Coupled with increased unemployment and the plunging of the stock market, we could see double the number of clients at Charlie's Place in the year ahead with perhaps much fewer resources with which to care for them. The need for Thanksgiving meals, Christmas presents, the furnishing of transitional housing, the services of a doctor in already poverty-struck Honduras will only multiply. If one adds an ageing building that is essential to our mission and ministry we shall be called to be creative and intentional in our stewardship of our resources. A wise Warden once said to me: "Susan, do not be troubled, if we do the right thing the resources will follow." I am praying that he will once again be correct in the year ahead.
On the bright side, and there is one, St. Margaret's has never been more energetic, happy and active. Each new person who comes in our doors brings new gifts and vision to our community. It is amazing that almost all of our buildings' spaces are in use almost all the time. I am particularly struck by the growth in our youth ministry and the energy brought to learning about our faith in Education for Ministry and On the Way Bible Study. This is a parish that is intellectually curious as well as deeply committed to worship and the Gospel imperatives! Our sick and shut in parishioners are drawn close to us as we carry the bread and wine from the altar to each on a regular basis. Dignity and two prayer groups meet here infusing the sanctuary with new life and hope. Though we are not perfect, we strive to treat one another with kindness and dignity. When we slip, we apologize and promise to do better. We try to listen to views other than our own and our Vestry struggles mightily to reach consensus and understanding as it deals with property and finances. This is a parish that is energized by incredible lay leadership. The playing field is even, not hierarchal, and our changes and ministries are begun and sustained by committed Christians balancing their work here with their day jobs.
I pray that we shall continue to be a beacon in an often dark and frightening world. Who and what we are can boldly show what it means to be a parish of radical hospitality and inclusivity, one that can only be generated by deep, Christian love for one another. As Paul said to the Church at Philippi:

“Rejoice in the Lord always: again I will say, Rejoice. Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.
(Philippians 4:4-9)
May God bless the people of St. Margaret's and all those who have come before and those who will come after us. May God bless all those we serve and care for, those for whom we open our hearts, our doors and our treasure. May that blessing ultimately enable us to recognize the face of Jesus Christ in all that we meet. May we be worthy of the name of Margaret of Scotland as we praise God in joy, laughter and thanksgiving for the multitude of gifts we have received. AMEN

Twenty Sixth Sunday After Pentecost - Sandy Webb, Seminarian - 11/9/2008

2008-11-09T12:23:00.002-05:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.

I have yet to see my first Salvation Army Christmas Kettle of 2008, but as I read today’s lesson from Matthew, I cannot help but think of their slogan: “Sharing is Caring.” Jesus certainly approves of sharing, and every kindergartener knows that sharing generates good will, civility, and kindness in a way that refusing to share does not.

God’s most intimate desire is that everything in creation will be in right relationship with everything else. Sharing promotes that good order.

This sermon was a struggle. I could have written something about preparedness, joining the chorus of preachers who admonish Christians to get ready for Christ’s return. Yet,something else in the text has caught my attention. Something else just doesn’t make sense. Let’s think about the story again:

Ten bridesmaids prepare for a wedding. They’re probably twelve to fifteen years old. They’re smiling and laughing as they fuss over all of the little details. Their hair is just so, their flowers masterfully arranged, their dresses perfectly aligned. The bridegroom’s delay gives them a chance for some more carrying on before they welcome the guest of honor. Their wait becomes a slumber party, and they nod off amidst all of the merriment, wide smiles on their faces, new friends on their minds. Anyone
who has attended a youth group lock-in knows what I mean. It’s quite a day.

When the bridegroom actually arrives, the story becomes far less idyllic. Five of the bridesmaids reach into their pockets, pull out flasks of oil, and refill their flickering lamps. The other five reach into empty pockets, and realize that they have a problem. Sheepishly, they ask their new friends to share what they have. Selfishly, their friends decline. Surely there would be a few drops of oil to
spare, especially with the bridegroom so close at hand. Yet, seeing that oil is scarce, the amply resourced bridesmaids hold tight to what they have for fear of running out.

Shockingly, Jesus seems to celebrate this behavior. The greedy bridesmaids are described as wise. The less fortunate fools find themselves out on the street, having been denied by the bridegroom they set out to honor.

In praising parsimony, Jesus leaves the parable open to a number of problematic interpretations. We could conclude that Jesus wants us to protect our own futures by jealously guarding all of our resources. We could conclude that Jesus wants us to tell the less fortunate that they must fend for themselves. We could even conclude, amidst our energy crisis, that Jesus doesn’t want us to run out of oil! Tempting and timely as those interpretations may be on the Sunday after Election Day, they
are not Jesus’ message.

To accept these literal interpretations is to deny the second Great Commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”1 To accept these literal interpretations is to deny Matthew’s famous ending of this very same chapter: “Truly I tell you, just as you did not [feed, welcome, clothe or visit]one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.”

Perhaps some insight into Jesus’ meaning can be found in his tricky last line: “Keep awake, therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” Many translations suggest that “keep watch” would be a better rendering. Lifeguards keep watch at lakes. Soldiers keep watch at forts. “Keeping watch” involves more than consciousness. “Keeping watch” implies vigilance, protection, and stewardship. “Keep watch, therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.”

In the next chapter of Matthew, Jesus is in Gethsemane before his arrest. He uses the same phrase again, asking Peter, James and John to “keep watch” with him. In his darkest hour, Jesus begs for the faithfulness and companionship of his closest disciples, and rebukes them when they fail to provide it. The bridesmaids also fail. Each thinks only of herself; not one keeps watch.

Do you suppose that the wedding is really all that joyous? The groom is grieved to the point of denying any knowledge of half the bridal party. How much could he celebrate amidst that pain? Could the remaining bridesmaids party hearty, knowing that they did not even try to prevent their friends’ suffering? Aren’t the guests burdened by the sight of five empty chairs at the head table, each one testifying to disorder in the world, and brokenness in relationship?

At a deep and profound level, something is missing. The celebration is incomplete. The world is in a state of disorder. This is no reward. Five bridesmaids had a problem, but all ten suffer in their own way because relationships were broken. Keeping watch involves sharing our burdens as well as our resources.

Jesus has not changed his mind on issues of selflessness, charity, and love. We are not permitted to look away from the poverty and loneliness in this hurting and broken world. Selfishness and complacency amidst all of the suffering that surrounds us can only be described as sin.

In the epic election season just ended, I have learned more than I ever cared to know about “Joe the Plumber” on one side, and about “Joe from Scranton” on the other. However, in an election in which religion played an undeniable role, I have heard precious little about “Joe from Nazareth,” and more specifically about his baby boy, sent to redeem this broken world.

What if the day and hour of Christ’s return had come sometime between the Iowa Caucuses and last Tuesday? What if the day and hour of Christ’s return comes sometime between now and coffee hour? Would Christ find the world in good order? Would Christ find us keeping watch?

These are the questions that we must always keep at the front of our minds. We cannot afford to take a hiatus. We cannot afford even an hour, even a minute, even a second. Jesus tells us that we must always keep watch. Always, for we know neither the day nor the hour.

Some of the parables in Matthew refer to the outer darkness where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, but this one does not. This story just ends. The foolish bridesmaids find their way home, and hopefully learn an important lesson about preparedness. The greedy bridesmaids also find their way home, learning instead a lesson about charity. Both live to see another day, and both will be given
another chance to get it right.

God gives us plenty of chances as well. God became flesh in Jesus Christ for the express purpose of restoring right relationship, but after two thousand years, we keep getting it wrong. Every day, we have dozens of opportunities to help restore right relationship in the world. While we avail ourselves of many such opportunities, we let many others pass us by. Like the bridesmaids, we often fail to
keep watch.

The kingdom of heaven is promised to us collectively, not individually. We cannot enjoy the fullness of God’s promise until everyone is able to enjoy it together. None can celebrate while any are suffering.

Maybe this is a sermon about preparedness after all. Christ will come again, and the whole creation needs to be ready. Jesus charges us to keep watch by preparing ourselves, and by packing a few extra provisions to share when our sisters and brothers come up short. By both preparing and sharing, we help restore right relationships on earth, and help bring about the kingdom of heaven.

Amen.

All Saint's Day - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 11/2/2008

2008-11-02T12:21:00.000-05:00

May the words of our mouths and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing and acceptable to your sight, O Lord, our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

Apostle Paul prays for the Ephesians, “I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints…You are no longer strangers and sojourners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.” (Ephesians 1:15a, 19-20, NRSV)

We are celebrating All Saints Day today although it was actually yesterday. This feast day originated in the Syrian Church referred to as the Feast of All Martyrs honoring martyrs such as Stephen, Perpetua, and Ignatius. However, the question arose as to who was considered a saint. This question caused liturgical conflict within the church. The medieval church thought they had a solution for this conflict. They would have two days to acknowledge the saints. (Homily Service, p.4, Nov.2006)

Thus, some churches celebrate All Saints Day on November 1 and All Souls on November 2. All Souls Day is devoted to offering prayers for all departed souls. However, after the Reformation All Saints Day was retained but in some cases both days were dropped. Nevertheless, after the First World War, many Protestant churches reinstituted both days by combining the acknowledgement of all the faithfully departed regardless of whether those persons were canonized or not. The Episcopal Church has designated All Saints Day as a principal feast day worldwide traditionally celebrated on November 1(or the first Sunday in November) since the 4th century. (copied and adapted from Homily Service, p.4, Nov.2006)

During our procession, you noticed we walked around the church saying the names of all persons the congregation of this parish are remembering on this day because they are the saints who have gone before us. We remember them, their lives, and their faithfulness to God. These persons--the martyrs and saints of the whole Church are being remembered today because during their lifetime, they were for the early Church and for us today the “great cloud of witnesses” that ran the race of life with perseverance--letting nothing separate them from the love of God and guidance of Jesus Christ in their lives.

The Saints are our loved ones and the church martyrs who taught us how to endure the race that is set before us as followers of Christ. The Church saints we honor include: Richard Hooker (priest), Jonathan Daniels (seminarian), Teresa of Avila (a nun), Martin Luther King, Jr. (civil rights leader), Margaret of Scotland (a queen), our neighbors, uncles, aunts, parents, grandparents, friends, teachers, and the countless unknown persons who receive no notoriety for their faithful acts of compassion. They were the examples for us and helped us along our way. These saints continue to enjoy a new state of life that is without want and filled with eternal joy and happiness.

In the Beatitudes of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus begins to teach the disciples of they and all who follow him can have joy and a state of happiness as a gift from God. Jesus references those who are in a right relationship with God-the poor in spirit, those that mourn, the meek, and those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Jesus describes a rule of life that will bring a state of blessedness to the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, and the persecuted. Jesus purpose was to outline a new way of relating to others. This was the challenge for all the saints who have gone before us and it is our challenge today. The good news is that God does not expect perfection just a desire to love God and love others.

We are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. This household was built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ…as the cornerstone. When we are baptized, we enter the Church as saints not because of our deeds or lifestyles but only because of God’s grace. We become part of the communion of saints belonging to God. (copied and adapted from Synthesis, p.2, 1991). In our collect today we hear that God knits us together in communion and fellowship in the mystical body of Christ our Lord. We are called to be ever more mindful of what God has done for us and to be open to God working through us.

At St. Margaret’s, there are known and unknown saints within our faith community. Those who tirelessly help at the rummage and book sale; Custard’s Last Stand; share communion with our sick and shut-in; lead our youth and adult education programs; feed and clothe our clients at Charlie’s Place; purchase food for Thanksgiving Day dinners for our neighbors; purchase Christmas gifts for families at Mary’s Center; and walk for the homeless. Additionally, there are those who sing in our choir and serve in the worship services. We have those who use their voices for justice and equality, who mentor an ex-offender, who offer a shoulder and an ear with compassion for others. I am looking at the saints of God before me who have touched my life and yours.

We are called as baptized saints and Christians to be stewards of the ministries in this very church where we worship every Sunday. I encourage everyone to discern and think about your God given gifts and how best to continue to use and offer your time and talents at
St. Margaret’s. Apostle Paul reminds us that we are called to give thanks to God who has made us worthy to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. (Colossians 1:12, NRSV)

We can all rejoice today with faithful living with the assurances of being counted among the saints that have gone before us as Jude proclaims, “See, the Lord is coming with ten thousands of His holy ones…” (Jude 14-15, NRSV)

We are called to live in the communion of saints in this life and the life to come. Some of you maybe familiar with these lyrics, “When the saints, go marching in, O when the saints go marching in, O Lord, I want to be in that number when the saints go marching in.”(Negro Spiritual; arr. by Stephen Key, #595 in African American Heritage Hymnal, GIA publications, 2001.)

Let us pray:

Almighty God, your saints are one with you in the mystical body of Christ; give us the grace to follow them in all virtue and holiness until we come to those inexpressible joys which you have prepared for those who truly love you; you have always taken humankind of every nation, age, and race and made them saints; like them, transformed, like them baptized in Jesus’ name, take us to share your glory. Amen. (New Zealand Prayer Book, San Francisco: Harpers Collins Publishers, Inc.,
p. 670-671)

Pentecost 24 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 10/26/2008

2008-10-31T14:55:00.000-04:00

Once Jesus arrived in Jerusalem, the Sadducees and the Pharisees were determined that he be killed. They challenged him three times in the hope that he would implicate himself. Last week the Pharisees pressed him about paying taxes to Caesar.

The second challenge was by the Sadducees, but it is not included in our lectionary. In it, that group of wealthy landowners who were related to the priestly class, asked him about the resurrection. Since they believed only in the Torah, they did not believe there would be resurrection of the dead. A man was to live on through his children and his land. As a result, there developed what is called a levirate marriage. If a man died with no offspring (male) his brother was to marry the widow in order to produce children for him. Otherwise, his life would be incomplete. The Sadducees posed a hypothetical question of seven brothers who married the same woman asking whose wife she would be at the resurrection. Jesus replied that they “…knew nothing of the scriptures or the power of God.” He asserted that there would be no marrying in the resurrection, and that God is God of the living, not the dead.

I include this second challenge for it is, once again, an example of a religious group being so certain of their own ideas that they cannot even have faith in the ultimate power of God. This has been an issue fro the Christian Church and for our Anglican branch of the same. It is also amusing because for those who are Biblical literalists, this must pose a problem. First, the brothers most certainly had wives of their own, so, at the least they were committing multiple bigamy! I suspect that would not fly in any Christian denomination in this country in 2008.

The third challenge, our Gospel for today, is issued once again by the Pharisees. This is the most serious of all, for Jesus is asked which commandment is the greatest. By now the anxiety among the disciples and the other followers must have built to mythic proportions. It was inevitable that enough evidence would be accumulated to kill him. Whatever answer Jesus gave he was bound to alienate one group or another. However, his response from the Shema and Leviticus could not be challenged. He asserted: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Again, Jesus gives no neat list of things to do, but instead presents a challenge.

In times of high anxiety all of us want a simple “to do” list that will guarantee calm and normalcy. Unfortunately, that list does not exist, and the solution to our fears is profoundly gray. Yet, we are commanded to love – not just those like us, but even our enemies. This is both a great blessing and an incredible challenge. First, Jesus is not talking about emotions, but about the will to care for the other. The two commandments are interdependent, for how can we love God whom we cannot see unless we learn to love those who live near and around us. Further, if we don’t know god’s love, we have precious little to give to others. Love as an act of will involves choosing to seek the good for the other even in the face of anger, revulsion, fear or pain. It means that, though the perpetrator must suffer the consequences of his or her behavior, and, the more horrific the behavior, the greater the consequences. We need to weigh our response in terms of what is the good, for that person and for the community. Loving our neighbors requires us to look squarely at who and what they are, to wash away any denial or arrogance, and to see them as children of God. this is no small task as we as individuals and as a community know.

In the face of all of this, we know one thing to be true: God is with and within us. That is the promise that has been iterated since creation. That was the reality for Jesus as hung upon the cross. God was with him, suffering with him in a ghastly event that seemed hopeless. It seemed that evil had conquered, yet, that evil was transformed into the greatest triumph of all time. “My ways are not your ways, says the Lord” becomes a working reality when we understand that God’s Kingdom will not conform to human expectations.

We live again in anxious times as we deal with two wars, economic uncertainty, global warming and an adjusted position in the world. We are called to adopt a position of love, thanksgiving, hope and trust. We have been given an abundance of gifts, not the least of which are the ability to give and receive love and to think, to reason and to act. God’s purposes are not ours to determine; we are simply to trust that they will be known to us in God’s time. We are loved beyond our imagining, and that ultimately is our meaning.

Johann Arnold has said: “…unless we live for love we will not be able to meet death confidently when it comes. I say this because I am certain that when our last breath is drawn and our soul meets God, we will not be asked how much we have accomplished. We will be asked whether we have loved enough. To quote John of the Cross, ‘In the evening of life you shall be judged on love.” (Johann Christoph Arnold, Synthesis, 10/27/02)

AMEN

Pentecost 23 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 10/19/2008

2008-10-21T10:10:00.001-04:00

Let us pray: "Dear Jesus, we acclaim you as 'Savior,' we lift up your name, and laud your presence among us. But we do not always live as if you were Savior. So many conflicting claims are made upon us. We want to love you, but we also want to love our families, our work, and our nation. Sometimes, we don't know how to love you as we ought. Sometimes we lay aside our love for you in order to be faithful to these more alluring allegiances. Rule in our lives, Jesus. Reign among us. Be sovereign. You have stamped upon us your image."

(William H. Willimon, adapted)

There is a story told of a pious pastor who had been a teetotaler all his life. He was invited to dinner by new parishioners. "Would you care for a drink?" the waiter asked. "I’ll have a martini," said the parishioner. "Will the Reverend also have a martini?" the waiter asked. "I'd sooner break all Ten Commandments." said the pastor. ""I didn't know we had a choice!" said the parishioner. (Copied)

Today's Gospel is about choices, choices which are not always as easy as the one, apparently, for the pastor in this story. Matthew poses the first of three challenges to Jesus which is intended to trap him. Matthew places this story after the Triumphal Entry and before Jesus' arrest. They are convinced that he must be killed but are hopeful they can find a way in which to do this that will not anger the crowds. The passage itself is full of irony. First, they begin with false praise, a fact that is not lost on Jesus. The question is: "Is it lawful to pay taxes to the Emperor, or not?" (Mt.22: 17) Jesus calls them hypocrites in response and asks why they are testing him. He then asks to see the coin used for the tax. At that time there were two sets of currency – the Hebrew currency which, after Israel was conquered could only be used for the temple tax and had no image and the Roman currency which had an image of Caesar on the front who was purported to be a God. Sure enough, they had a coin – even on the temple grounds showing Caesar to be a God. Clearly, they had bought into the system. When they affirmed that the head and title on the coin was the Emperor's, Jesus said: "Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor's, and to God the things that are God's." (MT. 22:18-21)

As Jews they had been taught that since the beginning of time all creation was God's. Consequently Jesus' response was discomforting and discouraging. They couldn't trap him, and found that his answer was spiritually unsettling.

The issue of Church/religion and State can be a complicated one, and this passage addresses just that. It is not about the separation of Church and state but forces us into making choices about what is properly the state's and what is God's.

As members of a nation we are called to pay taxes to ensure that civil needs are met. Further we are called to obey reasonable laws of the land in order to assure that we live in a safe and secure society. We are also called to the civic responsibility of voting for those who will enact and assure that the laws are obeyed. We need the order that is brought by the state in order to live stable, healthy and holy lives.

We were charged to make no graven images. Consequently, the image of the Emperor on the coin was a problem for the Jews. However, in making choices then and today we need to identify God's image. As Christians we believe that all of us together are the image of God, the Imago Dei. Therefore, how we live is critically important. Throughout the centuries we have seen the Church/religion unhealthily bound up with the state. Few wars have been fought without the wide river of religion under-girding their fierce nationalism. There are clergy today who believe that they have a right to preach civic politics from the pulpit, further muddying the water. As an aside, they do have the right but then must forego their tax exempt status! Throughout history, when people are threatened, such as on 9/11, they may turn first to God but quickly revert to trusting the state.

If we are the image of God, then after doing our civic duty, we are to be the people of God, not an easy or safe thing to do. We are called to speak truth to power, to reach out to those most vulnerable in our society, and to worship our creator God with uncommon fervor. That is our charge as Christians and as members of this parish.

Our annual stewardship drive begins today with looking at how we spend and can use our time and talent as God's people. Our Mission Statement printed in your bulletin forms the foundation for this part of the campaign the second about treasure which will follow. Our time and gifts are given us by God. We are called to be stewards of all that we are and all that we have. A steward is the overseer of that which does not belong to him or her. It is clear that everything belongs to God and we are to care for it during our short time on earth. This earth, this building and community, our children, friends and fellow parishioners, and all of our blessings are under our care. It is so easy to slip into believing that they are ours and not God's!

This parish has many fine ministries, both formal and informal, the former are listed on the card you should have received in the mail this week. Almost every single one is totally open – there is room for everyone's gifts and interest. This is not a parish where one must earn one's way. The welcome is clear: Come join us! I urge you to think about how you spend your time and talent, to embrace that which excites you and, yes, to let go of that which does not.

Let us render to God all that we are – our gifts, our creativity and our joy. We are stewards of the earth and all that is in it from the very beginning of creation. We have it for a time to care for and enrich it. This is true for our natural world, our nation, our city, our church and our families. All is gift and we are to use it wisely and humbly, always remembering the extraordinary love of God that has bestowed this on us.

Let us pray: "Creator of the universe, infinite and glorious, you give us laws to save us from our folly; give us eyes to see your plan unfolding; your purpose emerging as the world is made; give us courage to follow the truth; courage to go wherever you lead; then we shall know blessings beyond our dreams; then will your will be done. AMEN "(The New Zealand Prayer Book.)

Pentecost 22 - Alexander "Sandy" Webb - 10/12/2008

2008-10-12T12:50:00.000-04:00

In the name of the One, Holy, and Undivided Trinity. Amen.
For the last three weeks, we have walked with Jesus from parable to parable as he describes the kingdom of heaven. The parables are challenging, but their theme is simple: the kingdom of heaven is surprisingly inclusive.
Anyone and everyone who accepts Christ’s offer of salvation will find a home in the kingdom of heaven. Salvation is a matter of faith, not piety. Salvation is a matter of diversity, not uniformity.
Salvation is a matter of God’s generosity, not our entitlement.
My sisters and my brothers: We are God’s chosen.
Consider this week’s episode: A king has planned a wedding banquet for his son, a royal reception worthy of his prince. Only the finest foods have been prepared, and the aroma of savory delicacies wafts through the palace. Anticipation is palpable. Waiters rehearse their grand procession, glasses clink as tables are set, and stray notes languish in the air as instruments are tuned.
Then a servant tells the king that there are no guests.
You can almost hear his response: “No guests? What do you mean there are no guests? We’re having a wedding reception, the food has been prepared, the table is set. How can there be no guests? Not even one?”
Can you imagine the king’s frustration? This is an utter disappointment, a personal insult, a national affront. We almost expect the king to dismiss the staff and throw away the food. But, he does not.
Instead, he sends his servants into the streets with instructions to bring in everyone they find, both good and bad.
Soon, the king’s court is teeming with guests. Think of Bob Cratchit’s house in Dickens’ Christmas Carol after a repentant Ebenezer Scrooge invites all of London over for a holiday meal.
But, unlike Cratchit and Scrooge, the parable’s king probably knew exactly who he would be receiving. The streets to which his servants went were the king’s own streets, and most of the people there would have been his subjects. These people would have included his officials, the merchants who fueled his economy, and the protestors who challenged his policies. The king sent for the people who were entrusted to his care and who were wholly dependent on him. The parallel to God is thinly veiled.

Luke’s gospel ends the story here, with a loving king embracing his subjects. However, Matthew’s theology requires a word about judgment. There is no Tiny Tim, no “God bless us, every one.”
Instead, a man is thrown into the outer darkness for wearing the wrong clothes.
He offers neither excuse nor explanation when the king asks him why he is underdressed. He does not say, “Your majesty, I couldn’t afford a robe.” He does not say, “Your majesty, I didn’t have enough time to go home for my robe.” He does not say, “Your majesty, when I arrived, the closet where everyone else got their robes was empty.” Any of these responses might have provoked sympathy in the generous king. Yet, Jesus tells us that the man is speechless.
He probably isn’t expecting to get caught. He wants to fly under the radar, and march to the beat of his own drummer. But the king takes notice. He takes both notice and great offense. The king’s invitation is gracious, and all he expects in return is a similar level of graciousness. But that graciousness is what he cannot seem to find.
Who is this unfortunate character? If we are God’s chosen people, who is God’s reject? I suspect that with fifteen minutes and a copy of the Washington Post, we could create quite a list of people we think should be left out of the kingdom. My list would be diverse, beginning with the drug dealers who corrupt our youth, and ending with those incessant telephone voices that tell me to press “1” for this and “2” for that. I also suspect that many of us, including me, might end up on someone else’s list.
Fortunately, our lists are not God’s lists. Think about the man in the story. We are not told whether the he is one of the good or one of the bad. We are not told whether his street clothes are clean or tattered. We are not told about his political views, his religious practices, or his occupation. We are not told any of these things because they do not matter. He might as well be one of us. In fact, he is probably one of us.
Jesus reduces this complex human being to a flat, single-dimensional caricature because all that matters is his response to the king’s invitation. The expelled man represents anyone and everyone who says “no” to God.
The parable is actually something of a romance. Person A chooses Person B, hoping against hope that Person B will respond favorably. Sometimes it works, and love yields relationship. Sometimes it doesn’t, and hearts are broken. But rejection does not keep the broken-hearted king from inviting more guests. He wants guests that badly. He loves his people that much.
Perhaps God is a foolish lover, but how lucky we are to be the object of God’s affection. God invites each of us to St. Margaret’s despite our diverse ages, ethnicities, and family structures. Our invitations do not discriminate based on access to education, money, or power. We are hardly the elite patrician assembly that one would expect at a royal banquet. Yet, here we are, together, celebrating with our Lord. Literally coming to God’s table and eating the food that God loves us enough to offer.
It does not matter who we are, how we got here, or where we came from. All that matters is our response to Christ’s invitation. We are God’s chosen, and God is waiting for our response.

God waits to see if we will follow Christ when the world wants us to betray our friends, seek revenge, or say unkind things. God waits to see if we will follow Christ when the world wants us to cheat on our taxes, exploit the poor, and climb the corporate ladder at the expense of others. God waits to see if we will follow Christ when the world wants us to ignore injustice, disregard oppression, and abandon the impoverished.
God waits to see if we will put on our modern-day wedding garments, woven together from the fibers of love, charity and justice.
Yet, God does not force us to cover our sin stained selves with this garment. God chooses these robes for us, and hopes against hope that we will accept them, but the choice is ours. We decide if we are going to yield to the ways of God or not. And that decision is critical. That decision changes us from being called to being chosen. That decision determines our citizenship in the kingdom of heaven.
When someone offers you a wedding robe, put it on. Don’t ask questions or make excuses, just accept God’s invitation. And, when you have the chance, offer robes to others. Gather their wearied weakness in a soft, white cloth, and let our foolish lover of a God embrace them as God as always wanted to do.
Amen.

Pentecost 21 - John Berry - 10/5/2008

2008-10-05T12:48:00.000-04:00

In the Old Testament, Elijah encounters God at the entrance of his cave, not in the earthquake or gale of thunder, but in the smallest– almost imperceptible breeze. If God who is almighty and more marvelous than the morning star, cloaks that glory within a breeze, then we – so distracted with the flash and bustle of modernity, must begin any search for the God of creation with extreme care and great humility.
I propose that in order to truly celebrate the vision and passion of St. Francis and his attention to the many marvels of God’s love and presence in creation, we must begin our search apart from the charisma of the panda or elephant – marvelous though they may be – and away from the roar of the lion and cry of the eagle.
Instead, let us begin our search for the God of creation amidst the dust – that from which we came and shall return – and the teaming, but silent, foundations of the pyramid of life upon our planet.
Here in the grass, what Walt Whitman refers to as the “handkerchief of God” let us seek to lift a corner and see what we will find.
We, approximately 43,000 species with backbones, are an all too proud lot. We tend to overlook the greatest volume of creation – the nearly one million described species of invertebrates carrying on the bulk of work required to make our planet habitable.
If that didn’t inspire humility, consider that there are 7 times the number of beetle species alone, than all of vertebrate species taken together.
More impressive than sheer numbers of species is the sheer body mass. E.O. Wilson has found that a hectare of Amazon rainforest might hold a few dozen birds and mammals – but over one billion invertebrates, and they make up 93% of the dry weight of all the animal tissue in the hectare. Clearly, we are guests in an invertebrate world. And we could not live apart from these small marvels. The plankton, corals, crustacean, algae and bacteria, recycle dead vegetation and animal matter and make the nutrient cycles which support all plant and animal life. Unlike us, they work cradle to cradle -- reusing, recapturing and recreating life in an endless cycle of rebirth.
Our modern world recoils with fear from bacteria – unaware that life itself is impossible without them. Microbes within us -- 128 species of bacteria in our stomachs alone, digest our food and combat infection. We are only beginning to uncover how important microbes both within and without are to our survival. Scientists are finding that each crevice of skin harbors its own unique, site specific community. The bacteria of your forearm is actually different from the adjacent elbow and even from your right forearm.
We are only now beginning to appreciate just how complicated, inter- reliant and connected these thousands of microbial communities are – and how delicate their balance.
Much of vertebrate life emerges from a germ-free amniotic sac into a birth canal that immediately “baptizes” the new born with bacteria. This welcome embrace is one of the mother’s greatest gifts – and studies have shown higher rates of allergies and complications when it is deprived, as in caesarian birth.
Of course there are bacteria which are unwelcome and can cause illness. Medicine and health research is now recognizing that our strategy of using broad spectrum antibiotics – killing the good with bad – may be very counter-productive, and so more refined and targeted approaches are required and counseled for the future.
Widely used antibiotics in animals we rely upon for food can also upset the balance of our bacterial world in ways we are only beginning to understand. And though largely invisible to our eyes, these tiny creatures are equally vulnerable to extinctions and disruptions by humans as our fellow larger invertebrates.
We need to appreciate that this unseen world is not all bad – and our effort to achieve “sterility” everywhere may in fact be unhealthy. Anti-bacterial soaps should only be used in hospitals – if anywhere, not in your house. Studies prove plain old fashioned soap works just as well in removing invading and dangerous microbes, without killing good bacteria on your body, in your house and more importantly, in our rivers and streams.
Consider avoiding “antibacterial” products. They increase the resistance of bad bacteria and because they rely upon synthetic products, like Triclosan, they both persist down your drain and into our waterways, showing up in our world’s food chains.
Some convert to dioxin when either exposed to sunlight or heat. Triclosan is one of our most recurrent pollutants and is found in over half of tested water from streams and rivers, as well as in the flesh of wild fish and sadly, now in human breast milk.
We must appreciate that bacteria are what makes life possible. Consider our soil, it is made fertile by bacteria – and their thread like filaments near roots allow plants to absorb nutrients. It is not plants such as clover, soy and alfalfa that fix nitrogen in our soil, but the bacteria colonies located in and around their roots. Cooperation and collaboration are the rules in this unseen world. So not only are bacteria essential to our health and survival, but maybe God has hidden in these small marvels of creation a reflection of the values commanded of us -- that is, cooperation and collaboration, otherwise known as “charity.”
We should demand that our government impose tight control and strict regulation over our use of fungicides, pesticides and synthetic fertilizers which can cause irreversible damage to the delicate balance God has ordered, sadly often even before we understand how important and marvelous that balance is.
That care and balance also apply as we move from the invisible to the visible world. Some of the most beautiful creatures of our invertebrate world are our butterflies, bees and native pollinators. Most of our fruits, vegetables and seed crops require pollination. So too do the fruits, nuts and berries required by birds and wildlife for survival.
They are declining across our world, and it is happening because our tendency is to over react to one problem, unaware of our impact on another. Our fear of Japanese beetles and grubs in our lawns and pests in our crops, have us applying millions of tons of pesticides aimed at one or two invertebrates – but hitting thousands, upon thousands, killing or impacting the good with the bad. If instead of making war against weeds and pests in our backyards, we were instruments of peace, miracles would happen to rival those of St. Francis.
If you are willing to tolerate some dandelions, Japanese beetles and a little black spot on our roses, I promise you, we will be rewarded with more bumble bees, butterflies and fireflies, not to mention box turtles and spring peepers.
God calls us to care – without fanfare or thunder. God calls us to appreciate what a fine and care-filled tapestry the knitting needles of evolution have wrought through the ages.
God calls us to conserve each detail so beautifully bestowed in abundance throughout this precious tapestry of life. May we, like St. Francis before us, treasure this handiwork of Heaven, repairing our sinful tears and holding every glorious thread intact – until we can return it whole, to the artist who created it.
Amen.

Pentecost 19 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 9/21/2008

2008-09-21T12:47:00.000-04:00

"Beloved preacher and teacher Fred Craddock tells about being on a flight when they still had smoking sections on planes. He was seated on the aisle in a no smoking section. Across from him sat a man who lit up a long, black cigar. Soon the area was filled with foul-smelling smoke. Craddock stopped the flight attendant, a very attractive, young woman and said: 'Am I in the wrong section? I asked for no smoking.' She turned to the man across the aisle and said: 'Sir, this section is no smoking.' The man ignored her and kept puffing on his cigar. Craddock complained again. Again she reminded the man he was in the no smoking section. Again she was ignored. Later on the flight attendant was coming down the aisle with drinks when they hit an air pocket. The sudden turbulence caused her to dump the drinks right into the lap of the man with the big cigar. But that's not all. Seeking to correct her balance, this very attractive woman fell backward…right into Fred Craddock's lap. Says Craddock with a sly grin: 'Now don't tell me there's no God.'"
(Craddock Stories, St. Louis, MO: Chalice Press, 2001)

We all wish that things would turn out as tidily as in this story. Good works get praised; sin receives retribution. The truth is that we waste a good portion of our lives comparing ourselves to others. From the time we are small, particularly those of us with siblings, chant 'It's not fair' whenever we don't feel properly rewarded or attended to. This lies at the heart of the parable from Matthew that we hear this morning.
It is important to look at the context of this parable. It is preceded by the story of the rich, young man who all of his life had kept the law. He went away sorrowing when Jesus pointed out to him the one impediment for his salvation…his wealth. To give it away was impossible for him. After that story Peter asks Jesus what would become of the disciples who had left everything to follow him. Jesus replied that they would be with him…but reminded them that the first would be last. Following the vineyard story the mother of the sons of Zebedee asks Jesus to place her sons at his right and left hands in paradise. All of this point out the nature of the Kingdom of God, and that it is antithetical to the values so treasured in the world.
We in the US find imbued in our culture the concept of equal pay for equal work. However, so often the privileged have access to the most lucrative and powerful jobs. It is easy to turn a blind eye to this until we experience the calamity of this past week on Wall Street and here in DC. In preaching on the parable of the workers in the vineyard, The Rev. Jeb Stuart Magruder took as his recurrent theme the question: "What is more important to you, your rights or your relationships?"(First Community Church, July 26, 1987)
There is evidence in this fiscal crisis, as in the hurricanes and 9/11 that Americans are able to move beyond rights and self-righteousness and reach out in relationship. Jesus would have this be the norm not the exception in our behavior.
In a nutshell, this parable has a vineyard owner hiring itinerant workers early in the day at a given price. They go to work at dawn. He finds that he needs more help, perhaps to get the grapes in before it rains. He goes back to the gathering three more times and hires more workers. In these cases he promises only to give them what is 'right.' At the end of the day he pays the last workers first giving them one denarius, the amount promised the earliest contract workers. The latter then assume that they will be paid more. When they are not they complain. The owner would have none of it, saying that they received what had been promised.
This, as we know, is an allegory for the Kingdom of God. It is a story not about fairness, hard work, or hours spent, but the abundance of God's generosity; God's limitless grace. The first workers begrudged the owner's generosity to those who had not been hired early in the day; those who, also, needed to feed themselves and their families. In each case, those who came first and those who came last had to rely upon the trustworthiness of the owner.
In this parable, as in that of the rich, young man, it is abundantly clear that we are saved by grace not a book-keeping tally of our accomplishments. Robert Capon has said that: "If the world could be saved by bookkeeping it would have been saved by Moses, not Jesus Christ." The law had not worked, so God gave up salvation by the books, cancelled everyone's record and rewarded all equally and fully with a new creation in Jesus Christ's resurrection." Capon goes on to say that "an eye for an eye" just doubles the number of eyeless people. (The Parables of Judgment, Robert Farrar Capon, pp 55-56, Eerdman's Publishing, Grand Rapids, MI, 1989.
We are no different from those early workers. How frequently we assume that, if we do the 'right' thing, we'll received recognition, reward, loving or even health. Somehow, that sense of what is fair or just becomes indelibly etched into our minds. We then become attuned to production, production often to the exclusion of the relationships in our lives. If our expected reward doesn't occur, we become angry and jealous – believing that we deserve better and asking 'why me?'
The parable makes it clear that God is not like us. When the Kingdom comes in all of its fullness we will experience a new reality. We are to expect the unexpected. Reward will not be the purpose for labor in the Kingdom. We will be rewarded not for our achievement or lack thereof, but according to God's generous grace. That grace is not dependent upon our length of service, achievements, or merit. I, for one, am delighted by this. I, too, get angry, grumble, feel jealousy and want what I think I deserve. Thank God I won't get my just desserts!
Because of this we are called to collaborate with God by extending the generosity and grace we have received to others, by loving without qualifications, by recognizing the good portion and the value of the other. We are to be open to God so that we can know that infinite capacity for forgiveness, acceptance, generosity and love—in one word, grace. Because of that grace we have hope. Because of the hope we can be open to give and receive love that is beyond imagining: a love that has no strings attached. AMEN

Pentecost 17 - The Rev. Susan N. Blue - 9/7/2008

2008-09-07T12:37:00.002-04:00

"Owe no one anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law." Romans 13:8

The rain of Hannah, on the heels of Gustav, poured down yesterday – reminding us that three years ago at about this time Katrina struck the Gulf Coast. Three years earlier terrorists struck our country on 9/11. We are profoundly aware that we have no control over suffering caused by nature, but have some control over the suffering caused by humankind. We called for a war on terror against the instigators of 9/11 but, thus far, have only begun to address the serious environmental factors that possibly contribute to the acts of nature. The suffering is real and we are called as a community and as individuals to respond to our fellow human beings who are in trouble.

Our Gospel from Matthew today speaks to the nature of community and what it means to be the people of God. I understand that the Rev. Canon Mary Sulerud preached at the Cathedral recently. She said, as I understand it, that: "Diversity and inclusivity are civic values, whereas our Christian value is love that leads to transformation." Jesus preached that all things needed for salvation were covered in the Summary of the Law: that we are to love God with our hearts, and souls and minds and to love our neighbors as ourselves. Our community and all Christian communities are under girded by this primary value.

In the Gospel passage for today Jesus calls for a radical concern for the other, particularly those lost or troubled, not an autocratic methodology to bring "people in line" or a prescription for excommunication. The New Interpreter's Bible (Volume III; p 379, Abington Press, Nashville, Ill.) emphasizes that being the community of God flies in the face of the radical individualism of our churches and communities. It affirms that sin is not an individual issue between ourselves and God or even just between two people, but has a profound affect on our church and community. The author reminds us that "…to pray is to say "our Father," even in the privacy of our own room." (ibid.) (Mt. 6:6, 9)

Each of us knows that unresolved disagreements can grow and affect the community or family as a whole. Jesus is here challenging us to deal fairly with one another "with radical grace and forgiveness." "The process protects the community and individuals within from the arbitrary actions of an individual or small group of individuals." (ibid.)

This has profound implications for our nation (we claim the USA is 'one nation under God'), for the Anglican Communion, the Episcopal Church and St. Margaret's.

In Paul's letter to the Romans he affirms that loving God and one another fulfills all the commandments. He further warns that the time is short, that salvation is near, saying: "The night is far gone, the day is near." We are charged as individuals and as a community to put aside negative behavior and to take on the mantel of love.

This challenges each of us to examine who and how we are in the context of our homes, our church and this city of Washington. How we are speaks volumes to others who see us in the neighborhood, who are clients of our homeless programs, who function with us in the Diocese or those who enter our doors as newcomers.

I have seen in my own life and in the lives of people in this parish the transformation that has happened through the power of love given and received. I have seen it happen between individuals, and I have seen it happen in our community as we meet differences with radical love and forgiveness.

I am delighted to be back with you. You have changed me and taught me much about the power of love in the church. Let us start this year holding that standard high for all of us. We are only God's people in so far as each and every one of us is, loved, included and valued.

So, welcome home! Welcome home despite the rain, wind and turbulence of our natural world. Welcome home to a place where you can forgive radically and love deeply, and receive that same forgiveness and love in return! AMEN

Pentecost 16 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 8/31/2008

2008-08-31T12:43:00.000-04:00

Text: Matthew 16:21-23

In the name of the one true God and the mediation of our hearts. Amen.

Life and death are not easy to talk about but this is a topic we will address in our gospel today. We heard in Matthew’s gospel that, Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hand of the elders, chief priest, and scribes. He will be killed and on the third day be raised. Peter, in shock, pulls Jesus aside and tries to talk him out of going. However, Jesus snaps back at Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things." (NRSV, Matt.16:21- 23).

Peter and the disciples must have felt as if they had been hit with a curve ball that came out of nowhere. But the thing is, they were not ready to catch this one and Peter drops the ball like a hot potato. It is difficult to endure suffering. “An accident, an illness, the death of someone close to us can threaten to throw us into grief and fear carrying the potential of possibilities that can even incapacitate us. In some cases, how we suffer speaks volumes about our understanding of our own faith capacity and our understanding of God” because we can become our own stumbling block and impede the potential of our spiritual growth (copied and adapted, “Emphasis” July/August 2008, p.61)

We all have endured some type of separation or loss from someone or something dear to us: the loss of a pet; loss of a home; saying good-bye to someone moving away; children leaving for college; or taking your little one to kindergarten for the first time. Events like these are perhaps likely to cause emotional trauma and a sense of uneasiness. These are the times when we want protection for ourselves and for those we love. In some of these instances, it is hard to let go and yet we have to give permission or receive permission in order to let to go.

We can expect many difficult life changes to occur. Additionally, whether these changes are known or unknown, they can still result in feelings of anxiety; fear; despair; pain and depression. Embracing change is a part of life’s reality. Change is not easy to grasp or understand especially when we do not like it or want to face the difficulties.

What we hear in Peter’s rebuke to Jesus is shock and despair. He tells Jesus, "God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you." The thought of Jesus’ death and suffering is more than Peter can comprehend and accept. I remember the dreadful night my grandmother had a sudden heart attack. I prayed to God with every ounce of faith in me, “If you call her home to you, I will understand.” Early the next morning the hospital called and gave us the news of her death. In my anguish, I cried to God that she was not supposed to die. I was angry with God for taking her from me. I felt empty and my life changed forever.

On the emotional level, I was crying out with devastating pain and yet the rational side of me knew that people did not live forever because we are mortal. I did a flip-flop just like Peter who had previously told Jesus that he was the Messiah, the Son of the Living God and then later tries to block and prevent Jesus from carrying out his full ministry that includes suffering, humiliation, crucifixion, and death. Peter and the rest of the disciples were not be prepared for this news. It changed all of their perceptions and expectations of their long awaited leader. Peter was horrified hearing this news because he had not counted on such mishaps and changes of this nature to happen to their Master and friend.

In their own turmoil, perhaps the disciples forgot that the Messiah, Jesus was standing before them in human form but had a divine nature as well. It just did not seem to register with Peter that Jesus also told them he would be raised on the third day. This was and is joyous news. I think they forgot that witnessing Jesus healing the sick and raising others to life from death was miraculous. I think we also forget the miraculous things God has done in our own lives. We see that Jesus was not promised an easy life in his earthly journey and public ministry. The disciples will not fully understand how their lives will change until the revelation of Jesus’ death. Jesus understands that in order to prepare them, he will need to explain more than once that his ministry will and must include his death and resurrection. The disciples will not fully understand Jesus the Messiah until after his resurrection.

Exactly one year ago, I watched my mother as she lay dying. A bright and radiant light seemed to cover her face. This was something I had not seen during the entire time that she was ill. However, on this particular night, the night before she died, she looked beautiful and not sick at all with this bright glow. What I learned from that experience was that my mother had said yes to God and was ready to return to her creator. Her eyes lovingly said good-bye to me that night. Early the following morning after she died I anointed her feet with oil I noticed her previously swollen legs and feet had returned to their normal size in preparation for her journey home to God.

Today, on this first anniversary of her death and new life without me, I learned that my faith has grown and deepened with an understanding that in death there is life that never fades. There was a time where I was my own stumbling block impeding my faith to grow. The loss of the three most important people in my life has deepened my faith over time and brought me a sense of peace. The pain of their physical absence used to cut me to my core as I struggled to adjust to not seeing them anymore. Of course, I miss them.

However, I now understand that my mother, father and grandmother have never completely left me. I know most assuredly that their souls live on in me everyday. I feel their love and their presence daily because of the promise of Jesus who gives us victory over death. They live on eternally because Christ lives eternally. This is the Good News…it is with immeasurable love that Jesus gave his life as a sacrifice for us to have eternal life. Thank goodness, Jesus was not deterred from his journey to Jerusalem.

We are called to remember that it is with immeasurable love that God’s presence is with us even when things are just not going well in our lives and when we are encountering challenging circumstance in our lives.
We are called to remember that we are blessed with the divine love of Jesus who offers us unending power of the Holy Spirit today. Henry J.M. Nouwen wrote in A Letter of Consolation, divine love that resides within enables us to live the promised life of the risen Christ because love is stronger than death. It is God’s love and the Spirit of the risen Christ that opens our eyes to see and experience the power of the Holy Spirit and all that is visible as Jesus shows us the wondrous love he calls for us to enter more fully with God and with each other the love which give us eternal life.

Let us pray:

In all its beauty, our creation groans.
It is the hallmark of life and living that there is
Sorrow in the world.
Help us to see in this struggle for living
Not death-throes, but birth pangs:
Not endings, but beginnings.
In suffering, let us see the promises for the future
As the outcry against desolation in the present.
In that honest protest, is the dawn of new justice.
Just as the Cross brings the hope of resurrection.
In suffering, are the seeds of joy,
Hidden from our gaze.
Though we cry…,
No waste or frustration is too great for Christ
To be turned into that which blesses.
No suffering so deep, Christ gives no life…
In God who gives abundant life.
(copied and adapted from www.churchofscotland.org.uk/worship)

Amen.

Pentecost 15 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 8/24/2008

2008-08-24T12:42:00.000-04:00

Text: Exodus 1:8-21

In the name of the one holy and undivided Trinity.

We live in a diverse world with different cultures, languages, and customs. Sometimes a visitor from another country can create and experience tension due to not understanding some of the differences with cultural norms. The visitor may sometimes be expected to conform to the norms of their new surroundings or adapt in some way to the traditions of their new environment. Cross-cultural sessions were a large part of my Peace Corp training.

When I lived in rural a village in The Gambia, West Africa I was led to a baby lying on a blanket in his mother’s house. The baby appeared to be ill. It was apparent to me that the infant was about to go into convulsions. I noticed that his spine had an alarming curve indicating possible meningitis or something critical was happening. The child was limp and semi-conscious. I was perplexed and wondered why his mother had not taken him to the village health clinic.

I had to make a decision quickly as the health educator in the village. Should I do the customary thing, which was to leave the child unassisted without medical attention because permission from the father was required or should I intervene and get help? The mother and I tried to communicate in the local language. However, it was impossible to understand each other. Boldly, I swooped up the baby and ran as fast as I could to get him to the clinic. The baby’s mother ran after me after me with fear and hope in her eyes.

The physician assistant explained to the mother that the baby was very sick and needed immediate attention. I could see fear in her eyes as I later learned in Muslim families, the husband must make all the decisions for the family. I knew how upset her husband would be with her so I asked her to have her husband come and see me. I felt I had to answer to the father. He was able to understand what I had done to save his son’s life. This cultural battle was a very difficult situation for me to experience at the early onset of my arrival to the village. However, I could not let that baby die.

The preservation of life is very much the business of God as the creator of the universe. God offers us the opportunity to have an intimate relationship meaning one that is close and personal rather than distant God. God knows us by name and calls us to be unified under one faith, one Lord, one baptism as the people of God. Our creator is intimate with us and apart of our lives daily. God was revered as the one true God of the Israelites and the one true God of Joseph. Therefore, Joseph’s people, the Israelites had faith in God. The people of God were commanded to be fruitful and multiply in the land given to them.

In our Exodus text, the new king, whom is nameless, does not have the same relationship that Joseph had with the Israelites. The text reveals that the new king did not know Joseph, which suggests that the new king did not know God and underestimated the sovereign power of God.

Obviously, this new king seemed determined to think he could decimate all male Hebrew babies in efforts to eliminate the tremendous population growth of the Israelites. The new king perceived this population surge as a threat to his power. The new ruler feared they would rise up against him in revolt or worse yet leave which would deplete his cheap labor. The king instituted extreme new policies that inflicted harsh labor upon the Israelites.

Additionally, the king calls on the services of two midwives to participate in his plot to kill Hebrew male babies at birth. Both Shiphrah and Puah , were women who revered God much more than the king. Their origins remain a debate to this day among scholars as to if they were Hebrew or Egyptian. They boldly defied his edit to them by allowing the male babies to live. Their courage, strength, and tactics used to out wit the king was duly rewarded by God. These ordinary women were slaves to the king and respecting his authority was absolutely expected by the king. However, they knew to whom they belonged and were not afraid to demonstrate and show the king that God had their loyalty. It is in part because of these two women that Moses survived.

In the New Testament, Jesus was preparing the disciples for their future mission. They needed to know that their future mission was building a new community, the Church. The disciples knew boldness was going to be required to go against the grain of their society. However, they knew they had to do it. We are called to stand in boldness knowing who and whose you are.

In our society, we encounter differences in values, cultures, attitudes. Our call as followers of Christ may entail making decisions that separate and set us apart from societal tradition. We joined picket lines to support the end of a partied, we raised our voices against injustices (for example ending genocide in Dafur), and sign petitions as peace advocates. We are called to stand up with boldness using our faith as the rock of Peter to be God’s vessels of love and peace because we share one bread and one cup. Amen.

Pentecost 14 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 8/14/2008

2008-08-14T12:45:00.000-04:00

The Lord is kind and merciful; slow to anger and rich in compassion (Psalm 103).

Matthew’s Gospel continues Jesus’ discourse on forgiveness and sets the stage for the reality of the kingdom of heaven. In the kingdom, the relationship among the people of God is sealed with love and the tireless ability to forgive others infinite numbers of times. For the disciples of Jesus’ time, this was the model of the new community - the Church and it continues to be a model today – our model - for Christians living in a broken world.

Healthy homes, schools, roadways, and our nation have one thing in common—each environment relies heavily on people to contribute what is necessary to maintain peace and harmony with each other. Unified communities are strengthened by healthy relationships that foster the spiritual well-being of all.

Towards that end, the most effective remedy for discord and broken relationships among us is forgiveness. The Greek word for forgiveness, aphiemi means, to let go – to set free. Forgiveness is something we choose to do or not to do. For relationship building among the people of God, forgiveness is to be offered and accepted unconditionally because we are loved and forgiven unconditionally by God for our thoughts, words, and deeds – those done and left undone through prayer. Forgiveness can be considered a unilateral choice that does not depend upon any change in the behavior of others. (copied and adapted, Synthesis, Sept.14, 2008)

This is clearly Jesus message of renunciation in seeking revenge on someone who has caused hurt or injury. This was alluded to in the Old Testament where Lamech attests that he will avenge himself seventy-seven fold on anyone who attacks him if Cain is avenged seven fold (Gen.4:24, NRSV).

In Matthew’s Gospel, Peter thought his offering of suggesting forgiveness of seven times was quite sufficient and generous because this measure extended the traditional teaching of the rabbis who taught three times constituted sufficiency for offering forgiveness for the same offense. This teaching was based on the book of Amos.

The difference in the scripture of last week and today is that the emphasis of forgiveness is placed on the assumption of repentance. We are called to look at the forgiveness of others with radical mercy based upon the foundation of God’s forgiveness with mercy and compassion for us. “So God (my heavenly Father) will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart." (NRSV, Matt.18:35).

Former Archbishop of South Africa Desmond Tutu wrote that, “To forgive is not just to be altruistic. It is the best form of self-interest. Forgiveness is also a process that does not exclude hatred and anger. These emotions are all part of being human…the depth of your love is shown by the extent of your anger.” He goes on to say that forgiveness for him is, “the belief that you can come out of the other side a better person than the one being consumed by anger and hatred.”

Tutu is speaking from his own experiences and others who suffered the atrocities of South Africa’s apartheid. The point here is that forgiveness has the power to transform a person and therefore a community. Jesus taught forgiveness because he knew that this was how the Church was going to have the opportunity to experience the transformation of personal relationships within our communities and within nations. It is when we are able to forgive and accept someone that we see that person in a different light. Apostle, formally Saul, was no longer an enemy to the original apostles of Jesus when they forgave him. Later after trust, established Paul became a friend and brother.

When we think about it, forgiveness is not an easy thing. All too often, our emotions are involved in the process. The lesson of forgiveness was one of the hardest things I have had to learn. I have struggled with it a number of times and yet I can tell you that there is nothing like the feeling of liberation that forgiveness and reconciliation brings to the heart, mind, and soul of the forgiver and the forgiven. We all have had to cope with putting an end to an unhappy situation that entailed forgiving - the teasing friend at school, an abuser, an addict, the driver who caused a fatal accident, the negligence of a healthcare facility, the driver who cut you off in rush hour traffic, an inflexible colleague, or marriage partner and on and on. We have been given many opportunities to practice forgiveness but it not always easy to take that first step.

We often need the power of the Holy Spirit to give us the capacity to let go and keep an open heart because we may feel otherwise – trapped in the revolving door of our emotions. However, the grace of God and forgiveness is a gift. This gift so lovingly given to us by God must also be passed on to others lovingly - with mercy and compassion as brothers and sisters in Christ. We are called to remember that love and forgiveness is limitless. Forgiveness offers a way for the Christian community to stay in check, remain a prayerful front, and hold Christ in its midst. (copied and adapted from The Oxford Bible Commentary, p 867.) Our spiritual well-being is restored in a healthy manner through the release of forgiveness that can serve as a powerful healing force in all sectors of our society globally.

Let us remember these words of our sequence hymn:

“Forgive our sins as we forgive, you taught us Lord to pray; but you alone can grant us grace to live the words we say.”

Amen.

Pentecost 13 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 8/10/2008

2008-08-10T12:42:00.000-04:00

Let us recall God’s revelation to Abram. Then Abram fell on his face; and God said to him, "As for me, this is my covenant with you: You will be the ancestor father of a multitude of nations. No longer will you be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham: ,for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you to your offspring after you. And I will give to you and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding; and I will be their God." (Genesis 17:1-8, NRSV)) Much later God says to Jacob, “Genesis 35:11 And God said to him, "I am God Almighty; {11 Hebrew El-Shaddai} be fruitful and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations will come from you, and kings will come from your body. The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you." (Genesis 35:11-12)

Joseph is the most popular son of Jacob and his story is familiar to us. Actually, the story of Joseph is the story of Jacob’s family and this last in a series of patriarchal stories from the book of Genesis.

It is sometimes apparent to us that certain family behaviors are cyclical and appear from one generation to another. We observe that Jacob demonstrated his confidence and love of Joseph over all his other sons. Jacob gave all authority and trust to this younger and favorite son, Joseph. The rationale given to us for this preference is that Joseph was born to Jacob and his beloved Rachel who died giving birth to Jacob’s second and much loved son, Benjamin. However, the sons of Leah and those of Jacob’s other concubines were not favored.

You can certainly appreciate why these half brothers did not appreciate hearing about the dreams that Joseph shared with them. Jacob drove an even wider wedge of hatred among the brothers when he presented Joseph with a beautiful ceremonial robe made with appliqué ornaments of fine multicolored colored threads. Such a garment signified that Joseph was exempt from doing hard labor being over dressed for doing the ordinary work of shepherds. Perhaps, this is why he was at home with his father most of the time instead of out herding sheep with his brothers. Jacob kept certain things close to his chest and did not disclose what God had in store for his son in Joseph’s dreams. Jacob, like Mary the mother of Jesus, pondered all of these things in silence.

Perhaps one of our most contemporary associations to Joseph is in the play that dramatizes his life, Joseph and His Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Jacob’s family was entangled with jealously, envy, and hatred. There was no “shalom” between the twelve brothers. In fact, they reached a boiling point that resembles the scene in the movie, “Network” where one of the characters, a news anchor, races to a window, shoves it open, sticks his head out and yells, “I am mad as hell and I am not going to take it any more!” The brothers had reached their breaking point. Moreover, one day when they were out herding sheep, they were presented with an opportunity to get rid of Joseph. Joseph is sent by his father to check on his brothers’ welfare. As Joseph approaches, they hatch a plot to kill him. They strip him of his robe and toss him in a cistern. Rueben, the oldest brother manages to persuade his brothers not to kill Joseph but to spare his life so that his blood is not on their hands. Judah, another brother, suggests on an economic opportunity by selling Joseph to the Ishmaelite traders, which they agree upon for 20 pieces of silver. Thus, Joseph is sold into slavery and taken to Egypt. Through these actions, the brothers find a way to preserve the life of Joseph. Thus, they “would not take his life or shed blood and later be guilt ridden.

We do not hear Joseph say a word. However, lying in the pit alone and frightened with no water or food, he must have wondered what would happen to him. He knew that his brothers hated him and there was no one to help him. He probably also thought that he would never see his father again.

Families that encounter divisions sometimes experience splintering and isolation that festers into severe rivalries. However, this is a story of the providence of God. In Joseph’s case, God’s providence was present and worked everything out behind the scenes for the good of not only the nation of Israel but for us in the future. God softened the hearts of the older half brothers who spoke out against doing physical harm to their brother, Joseph.

The evidence of God’s providence and power through love transformed these brothers to think differently. God used Reuben and Judah as partners in realizing the promise made to Jacob to be the father of nations, which they were not aware of at the time. We are called to allow ourselves to be used by God each time we commit to our mission to stand and speak out for injustice whenever the opportunity arises to the best of our ability.

God’s love is the power and driving force to oversee the plans of prosperity promised to and for all people. He loved us first and nothing shall separate us from the love of God, says the apostle, Paul. The new nation of Israel is about love and not hate. Jacob experienced an incredible moment of forgiveness during his reconciliation with his brother Esau. Thus, their relationship was healed.

God’s love is the power and driving force that God uses to oversee the plans of prosperity promised to for all people because loved us first and nothing shall separate us from the love of God, says Apostle Paul. The new nation of Israel is about love and not hate. Jacob experienced an incredible moment of forgiveness during his reconciliation with his brother Esau. Thus, their relationship was healed. Joseph and his brother’s relationship will also be restored through a similar lesson because the actions of the brothers will assist them for their own provisions later. They were unaware of this as they ate their lunch after throwing Joseph in the pit.

We are called and challenged to fall into the safety net that is cast out by God to follow the divine purpose of our lives. Sometimes, we may not see it but we know it is there to catch and guide us in the forms of prayer, other individuals, or circumstances. A safety net was there for Joseph to fulfill the promise of God’s covenant to Jacob such as the stranger who guided Joseph when he was looking for his brothers, the dreams that gave him a glimpse into his future, the brothers who helped to save his life and the caravan of the Ishmaelites. The caravan actually consisted of Joseph’s distant relatives because he is the next family link to the covenant of God. You may recall these are the descendents of Abraham’s and Hagar’s son, Ismaehel.

Can we recognize the safety net of love that God provides in grace to us? Listen to this. I used to watch the Red Skelton Show with my father…Mr. Shelton told this story. There was a fellow standing in knee-deep water after a flood in Louisiana. Some men in a rowboat passed by and said to him “Get in.” He responded, “Oh no, the Lord will take care of me.” Soon, while he is sitting on the porch, the water has inched up to his waist. A second rowboat comes by and they say the same thing to him, “Get in.” He says to them, “Oh, no, the Lord will take care of me.” By this time, he is on the roof and the water is up to his neck. A helicopter comes by and he says the same thing, “No, no, the Lord will take care of me.” Well, he drowned. He gets to heaven, meets the Lord and asks, “What happened?” The Lord says, “I don’t know what happened—I sent two rowboats and a helicopter for you!”

We are the benefactors of many saving acts of grace and safety nets of care that God places before us daily. May we always give thanks and gratitude to God for our creation, preservation, the blessings of this life, and above all, the immeasurable love of God that is free just for the asking.

Amen.

Pentecost 12 - The Rev. Caron A. Gwynn - 8/3/2008

2008-08-03T12:40:00.000-04:00

Text: Genesis 32: 26-31
Then he said, "Let me go, for the day is breaking." But Jacob said, "I will not let you go, unless you bless me." So he said to him, "What is your name?" And he said, "Jacob." Then the man said, "You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed." Then Jacob asked him, "Please tell me your name."…And there he blessed him.

In 1999, eight of the top fifteen television cable programs were wrestling matches. The wrestling matches were watched in nearly three million homes and brought in about 1 billion dollars for the Wrestling Federation. [Homiletics/Aug.1999, p.49]

When I was a child, we did not have pay per view. But on Friday or Saturday evenings, my grandmother watched the heavy weight-wrestling matches. I could not understand her excitement in spending an hour watching men body slam each other to the floor or twirl and toss each other into the ropes of the wrestling ring. In order to win, the wrestlers have to position themselves to over power their opponents in a pinned down, suppressive position for a full count of three seconds by the referee.

This sport requires considerable skill and strategy. The crowds’ cheers and jeers seem to propel their favorites to furiously clobber their opponent, sometimes-drawing blood and bruises. The sole purpose of stepping into the ring to wrestle is to emerge as the victor and capture the grand prize money or the championship belt. I suppose my grandmother, found excitement in anticipating the victory of her favorite wrestler and champion. The wrestling announcer would exuberantly proclaim for the spectators, “the winner and reigning champion is….at the conclusion of the match.

In Genesis, we have a story of an unusual wrestling match between Jacob and a mystery man. This event occurred the day before Jacob was to meet and attempt to reconcile with his brother. Jacob was afraid his brother still wanted to carry out his death threat against him for stealing his birthright from him.

On his way, during the night, he encountered a violent stranger and there was a struggle between them. However, there were no crowds cheering these wrestlers on to victory. It was, however, an intensely fierce struggle. Jacob and his mysterious opponent wrested throughout the night until dawn. They tossed, turned, and wrestled with each other with all the persistence, tenacity, and heart thumping energy they could muster. There was no referee to monitor the match, so hitting below the belt was not off limits. Jacob did not initially know whom he was wrestling until daybreak the next morning.

The two men were well matched. Jacob could not over power his opponent and the mysterious man could not overpower Jacob. Jacob struggled with the mysterious and apparently supernatural person whom he perceived to be God. Jacob was persistent because he wanted something very badly -- a blessing that he did not have to steal in a deceitful manner as had been his custom. Jacob refused to let go until his blessing was received. I believe this mysterious being was God. God with loving care would not let Jacob win but wanted their struggle to end before daybreak. However, Jacob was unyielding.

We will not let go of all of the things we want from God as well. Only you know what your deepest desires are from God in whom no secrets are hidden. Sometimes, we obtain our desires and sometimes we do not just like Jacob. Simon Tugwell said God chose to come in human form to overthrow the strength and impressiveness of the world. Sometimes, we nay find ourselves disappointed after continuously asking God for things. We think of God as a dispenser of the good things we desire. However, actually God has nothing to give us at all except God’s loving, caring, and intimate presence in our lives. God does not come all the time with strength like the rock of Gibraltar. God did not come in strength that night to wrestle with Jacob. Tugwell continues, “God is similar to a judo expert who uses the strength of his opponent to bring him to the ground. It is an art of self-defense proper to the weak.

The mysterious, supernatural man asks Jacob his name. knowing that name, Jacob meant ‘supplanted or heel grabber. The stranger, however, did not reveal his name to Jacob. Instead, he granted Jacob a blessing, which transformed Jacob from a ‘heel grabber’ to the father of many nations that would be the twelve tribes of Israel. From this point on, Jacob would be known as Israel in reference to Jacob’s struggle with God. Israel means “God fights or God rules.” In the dark, deliberate battle of that night, while Jacob was in a vulnerable state God was revealed to Jacob at his own level as a human being. Jacob’s prayer of deliverance was answered and Jacob’s life was to be used to maintain God’s covenant with Abraham. We pray as the benefactor of Jacob’s received blessing, to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
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This is a familiar story, though it is strange for most of us. I believe that God, seeing Jacob’s faithfulness and trust, enabled Jacob’s eyes to see that he was wrestling with a supernatural being. This mysterious man was not his brother’s guardian angel. Neither was he Jacob’s, subconscious or a river demon, as some biblical scholars believe. Jacob names the place, Peniel “face of God.”

Jacob is in awe not only from seeing God “face to face” but in surviving such an encounter. Jacob stayed in the pocket just as a quarterback is expected to do. Jacob would never have become the newly transformed man without enduring this experience. Jacob emerges from this encounter with the fears of his brother’s retaliation completely dispelled. Jacob feels compassion for Esau for the first time. We know the brothers’ reconciliation is successful.

I doubt that anyone here has been a professional wrestler. However, I am sure that you have had a something in your life that may have resembled a wrestling match or a struggle. The struggle may have pertained to a new direction in your life, elder care, school issues, friendships, family, colleagues or any number of concerns.

However, if you stayed in the struggle and wrestled with the issue to the best of your ability, God is in the apparent chaos with you and engaging with you along the way. At the Pasadena Playhouse acting school, two students were jointly voted “least likely to succeed.” Their names were, Dustin Hoffman and Gene Hackman. One can only conclude that they wrestled with this early stigma. However, they did not give up. They remained persistent in their struggle and proved them all wrong. Their victory has been a productive acting career. (Homiletics/July 2005).

We have all had painful experiences. However, God cares enough to confront us. God cares enough to engage us in our life struggles because we have the opportunity to emerge as new people for God’s purpose in our life while we struggle to figure out what that maybe.

I remember very often reading repeatedly during my struggle s to my life’s purpose especially prior to and during my vocational discernment, the scripture that speaks of God as the potter and we are the clay. Often our struggles, our hurts our repenting, our brokenness, our search for faith is what shapes us into being God’s own as in a new creature. God initiated the struggle with Jacob for a purpose. God initiates struggle within us for a purpose. God calls upon our faith and boldness to strive through our struggles with the strength of God at our side.

God reminds us that we are “marked and sealed” as during our baptism with the caring love of God. We are all welcomed at the banquet table during the Eucharist meal in fellowship in the loving covenant of God. A new life is found in the outstretched arms of God even when it appears that God is wrestling with us. We are called to stay ‘in the pocket’ of the struggles of life, because we know when we do we come to know the blessings, mercy, and grace of God.

Amen.