Naming the Mission

By the Rev. Dr. Paul S. Nancarrow

This sermon is based on Deuteronomy 34:1-12

An audio version of this sermon is available here.

God led Moses to Mt Nebo, to the top of Pisgah, and from there God showed Moses the whole of the Land of Promise, the whole territory God had covenanted to give to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and their descendants, the land toward which Moses and the people have been journeying for forty years. From the top of that mountain Moses could see Dan in the distant north, and the territory of Naphtali around the shores of Galilee, and Manasseh and Ephraim along the Jordan, and Judah reaching into the south — the whole land in panorama, a sweeping vision of the place of the promise of the mission of God.

And what strikes me as particularly interesting about Moses’ vision is that the place-names — Dan and Naphtali and Manasseh and Ephraim and Judah — are all names of Israelite tribes, they are names the people will give to those places in the future, when they settle there. When Moses looks out, of course, those lands are still inhabited by Canaanites, the Israelites haven’t moved there yet, they haven’t given those lands their names yet. For Moses to look and to see Dan and Naphtali and Manasseh and Ephraim and Judah is almost as if Moses is having a moment of double vision: as if he sees the land as it is, and yet also perceives and knows and names it as it is yet to be. It’s as if Moses can already see the potentials of God’s mission for the people taking shape, as if he can already see in the land the society of justice and peace and faithfulness and love of God and love of neighbor that is the people’s side of God’s covenant with them, the people’s part in the covenant that will be the sign of God’s blessing for all the families of the earth. In that moment of double vision, seeing the land with the people’s names, Moses knows that, whatever difficulties may lie ahead, the future of God’s mission with the people is assured.

And in that way, I think Moses’ moment of double vision serves as a model for us, an invitation to us to look at our land and our people and our mission, and to see them as they are, and at the same time to perceive and know and name them as they are yet to be in God.

We are now in the midst of October, our Stewardship Month; we’re hip-deep in pledge drive and parlor meetings; we’ve got Stewardship Moments in the services and a box for completed pledge cards in the back of the church. And at pledge drive time we always try to be realistic about the state of our church as it is. Dealing with pledges and budgets, we know we need to face the facts about revenues and expenses, about stagnant income and rising costs, about utility bills that go up and insurance premiums that increase, about maintaining a historic building and growing a graying membership. During our parlor meetings people have been asking pointed nuts-and-bolts questions about our discretionary spending, and our mission budget commitments, and the health of our endowment, and the demographics of our membership — and those are questions we should be asking, those are concerns that are part of our being realistic about who and where we are. Like Moses looking at the lay of the land and seeing it as it is, so we have to look at where we are and be honest about what we see.

But also like Moses, when we look at the lay of our land we have to see it too as it has the potential to become. As each of us considers how best to steward the time and talent and treasure God activates in us, so that we can participate in God’s mission to renew the world — as we calculate the church’s needs and our pledges — we have to be able to look ahead of us and name the places God is calling us to go.

We have a historic and expensive building; but it is also a beautiful building; and I believe the ministry of beauty is something we offer our community; and I think we should look ahead and name where God is calling us to go in supporting and expanding our ministry of beauty to a world that all too often seems ugly and tawdry and cheap.

We know that the church of the 21st century is experiencing changes in people’s patterns of membership and attendance, and those changes can be quite a challenge to some of our traditional ideas of how to do church; but we also see many congregations around the country developing new ways of focusing on faith practices, and gathering new kinds of communities both in and outside of the church building, and creating new ways for people to participate online and on their own time and in ways that make the most sense for them; and I think we at Trinity can look ahead and name where God is calling us to go in creating new ways for people to participate in our mission.

We know we are still bogged down in the Recession That Just Won’t End; but we also know that this congregation is full of people who have remarkable skills and talents and gifts and resources, and that even when money is tight we can find creative ways of coming together in the spirit of wisdom to name the new directions we will go to do the work of God; and when we do the work of God we love, the money follows — sometimes in the most surprising, unexpected ways — but always, when the love of God is the motivating factor, the money follows.

Like Moses on the mountain, we in our pledge drive look out at the lay of our land, and see it as it is, and at the same time perceive it named with the potentials of God’s mission that are yet to be. And it is to the future of that mission that we pledge our support.

May God grant us the gifts and the courage and the generosity to name God’s mission we see before us — and to go forth and do it. Amen.

Divided Loyalties

The Rev. John Wilkinson 10/16/2011

This part of Mathew’s gospel deals with Jesus ‘s triumphal entry into Jerusalem.  He attacks those for whom religion was a vested interest.  He cleansed the temple and cursed the unproductive fig tree.  The chief priests and elders responded by challenging his authority and he responded with a series of parables that continued his attack.  After the first two parables the chief priests and Pharisees realized that he was speaking about them, and wanted to arrest him, gut they feared the crowds so they conspired to destroy Jesus.  They tested him, gut to no avail and then they resumed heir counter-agents Jesus’ influence either by discrediting him in the presence of the crowds or by causing him to make a mistake that will get him in trouble with the Romans.  Our gospel lesson is the first o several questions with which the leadership attempts to discredit Jesus.  “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor of not?  We know that you are sincere and teach the way of God in accordance with truth and who deference to no one;  for you do not regard people partiality.  Of coursed this is a “No win" answer.  The problem for Jesus is that if he answers that they are lawful hr will alienate the people who hate the tax and if he answers that the taxes are not lawful the Romans will arrest him for sedition.  Either way he  his answers, his enemies win, but Jesus has another answer “show me the coin.  Many of us face similar issues in our daily life when we face “either or questions and we have what I call divided loyalties”  I don’t mean those rare dramatic moments, such as occurred in some families during the Civil Was when one son enlisted with the Union and another with the confederacy or when your teens says “why do I have to do this or that, cause it doesn’t seem fair cause everyone else is doing it. .  I talking about something that does not happen between people so much as within them,  and that is not a matter of rare dramatic moments, but  turns our to be a way of life where to be a way of life wherever with our family members our workplace, our community organizations, our friends we end up in  commitments that unnecessarily challenge one another for our attention and time and resources.  An old phrase for what we find ourselves repeatedly doing is “robbing Peter to pay Paul.”  A new term for this is juggling or multitasking (Doing nothing well”) 

Perhaps the problem of divided loyalties has grown worse as life has become more complicated.  But the problem is an ancient one and it is featured in the story about Jesus and a question  that is asked of him. 

The people who engage Jesus in conversation include disciples of the Pharisees.  These movement, the old men, the wise heads but they are the young upstarts, guys with far more brave  than stature,  Their elders send them in this errand to confront Jesus because they don’t want to risk their reputations, reputations. They are young upstarts however, are still wet behind the ears.  They do not yet have reputations to risk. 

So these fellows approach Jesus and attempt to butter him up.    Jesus recognizes they are up to no good.  He is aware of malice and accuse them of putting him to the test calling

There inquiry is more than a question about taxes, it is more about issues of church and state.  Irt addresses then indexing  hzlldngd ov ci icdc loyzlgidx, not only in regard to choices between government and God, but in the many circumstances, some of them large, others seemingly small, where we find that divided loyalties pull us tiresomely in one direction , then another .

Jesus recognizes his interrogators are up to no l good He is aware of their malice and accuses them of putting him to the test. Calling them hypocrites.  This is no friendly rap session between teacher and students.  It is a full-blown confrontation Jesus asks for a Roman coin the sort used for tax payments.  Someone produces one, Jesus ACERTAINES FROM JHIS INTERROGATORS THAT THE IMAGE AND INSCRIPTION ON IT ARE INDEED THEM EMPEROR’S

HE THEN BRINGS THE CONFRONTATION TO ITS CONCLUSION WITH A JUDGEMENT SOME OF US CON QUOTE “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are he emperor’s and the things that are God’ give to God.

Everyone present knows what Jesus means by this, The coin can be given to the emperor; after all, it has his name and portrait on it by his authority.  He is entitle to have what is his, but  more importantly,  the true king God himself is also entitled to what bears his portrait and that is every human  person  for each is created in God’s image.  We bear the divine image as much as the Roman image.  We bear the divine image  Giving o God what belongs to God is the big issue, it is through resolving this issue that you come to know what to do about but about taxes but ABOUT YOUR TAXES AND ABOUT EVERYTHING ELSE.

What Jesus tells his interrogators is in response to their one malicious  question offers us a basis for resolving our many questions about divided loyalties which we raise in a spirit of honest discipleship.

We also are to give God what belongs to him that bears his image and name.  We are to give ourselves to God.  Not once only but repeatedly.  Giving ourselves to God is to be characteristic of our lives, something that defines and shapes who we are.  On that basis and only on that basis are we equipped to address completely other claims made upon us.  This involves rejecting those that lack legitimacy.  It also involve recognition of claims that are legitimate, and acknowledge the proper place for each  in the ever-shifting network of relationships which is our life.  We are called upon simply to give the emperor what belongs to him.    We are called upon as well to give to relatives, friends, strangers, and all other people whatever it is of us they can rightly claim.  We are charged with the creative and challenging tasks of transforming our diverse and divided loyalties into s unified life governed and directed by our supreme and absolute loyalty which is God and God alone.

Nobody says this is easy, all of us make mistakes along the way but we recognize the task for what it is, and the wonder of it is we must recognize the task for what it is, and the wonder of it is that putting God first the other appropriate demands made of us fall into their places, so that divided loyalties become united in a life that is diverse ever-hanging and creative

Loving God first and foremost gives us the wisdom and the orientation to love others in their uniqueness in that are right for them and for us.  Once we give ourselves absolutely to God, then remarkably we are free to give to others in ways that are gracious and life-giving rather than distorted an destructive, all of our loyalties worthy of the name this blend into a single one.  No longer are these loyalties divided; instead we recognize how, deep down, they are in concord, for each is an invitation from God, moving from loyalties divided to loyalties united has a lot to do with giving yourself totally to God, giving ourselves simply by considering all this generosity, as though we’re asked to put on a picnic for the immediate world.  The logistics overwhelm u.  But when we get the tune right by giving ourselves to God and to no longer picture ourselves as givers we are receivers.  Recipients of divine generosity, this is the truth of our lives and we recognize it.  So we can give to God our entire selves.  We are not the source of that current, but it is ours to enjoy and transmit.

The Generosity of God

October 9, 2011 ; Philippians 4:1-9

The Rev. Shelby Ochs Owen, Trinity Church, Staunton

“Be of the same mind in the Lord.”

In today’s reading from Philippians, Paul urges Euodia and Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord.  Apparently there has been some dissension between these two faithful women who have worked side by side with Paul when he had been with them.  Even though they labor for the sake of the Lord, rivalry and tension are evident between these two women.  Avoiding the choosing of sides and avoiding a harsh reprimand, Paul addresses the issue with encouragement and simply reminds them to be of the same mind in the Lord.  So often folks say we need to go back to the ways of the early church forgetting that all was not perfect within the church even then.  I want to share a more current church story.

Three Huts

One balmy day in the South Pacific, a navy ship noticed smoke coming from one of three huts on an uncharted island. Upon arriving at the shore they were met by a shipwreck survivor. He said, “I’m so glad you’re here! I’ve been alone on this island for more than five years!”

The captain replied, “If you’re all alone on the island why do I see THREE huts.”

The survivor said, “Oh. Well, I live in one, and go to church in another.”

“What about the THIRD hut?” asked the captain.

“That’s where I USED to go to church.”

No, all is not perfect within the church even when only one person is the member!  Not all was perfect within the Philippian church, and yet, even in the midst of Paul’s acknowledgement that there is conflict in the church there is a noticeable thread of joy that permeates his letter.  This joy that we see throughout the letter as well as in this passage for today is not about a transient, fleeting joy that comes when everything seems to be working well but a deep, lasting joy that comes from what Christ has done for them and what God continues to do through them. This joy “in the Lord” comes from a deepening relationship with Christ.

When Paul urges Euodia and Syntyche to be of one mind in the Lord, he is in essence reminding them that Christ emptied himself, humbled himself and was obedient to the point of death, a reiteration of Paul’s claim he makes earlier in the second chapter of this letter.  God’s generosity was revealed through Christ.  Christ gave all for the good of all. 

God calls us to unity through Christ.  What does it mean for us as a community to have the mind of Christ, to be of the same mind in the Lord?  How do we get there?  Paul says, “Let your gentleness be known to everyone.  The original Greek (epieikes) that here has been translated “gentleness” has a more positive tone denoting generosity toward others.  The New English Bible translation uses “magnanimity” which may be the more helpful and accurate translation here.  When we find ourselves in a place of disagreement, a place of tension, while working alongside our fellow Christians, can we be gentle, better yet can we be generous in our assumptions of others, can we magnanimous in our response to our neighbor?

This is the time of year when we think more deeply about stewardship, begin to think more deeply about what this church is to which we may or may not give our time, our money, or talents. Sometimes it is tempting to think that we as individuals are self-sufficient, that we can or should do all things on our own; so many voices in our culture point to this idol of self-sufficiency.  But Paul turns this idea of self-sufficiency on its head as he urges the church to be of one mind in the Lord.  Paul is NOT encouraging folks to be a bunch of single member churches like the poor fellow on the South Pacific island!  Paul encourages church members to lean on each other, to stay together, to be of the same mind as Christ.   He goes on to state how we do this, “whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”  The beauty in Paul’s words speaks to a depth of love for the community born out of the love of God.  He says, “Keep on doing these things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.”  Paul embodies the gospel message and calls the Philippians to nothing less.

We are not a perfect bunch.  There will be times when we disagree; maybe it will be about whether the children’s moment should take place in the presence of the congregation or elsewhere; maybe it will be about how much money we spend on outreach or youth or salaries; maybe it will be about whether or not we read aloud the names of the folks on our prayer list.  Whenever you get two people in a room there are bound to be disagreements, and if you believe the South Pacific story, all it takes is one person to have a disagreement.  When conflict happens can we look at whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is pleasing, whatever is worthy of praise and think about these things?  Can we be open to the possibility that we may need the other person’s opinion to come to the fuller place of truth?  Can we keep on doing these things that we have learned from one another, things we have learned from the apostle Paul, things we have learned from Christ, that to humble oneself and empty oneself is to give generously the way Christ gave himself for us that we might have life in the fullest and that the God of peace would be with us?

No, we are not a perfect bunch. Sometimes we will want to be a church of only one member. Sometimes like Euodia and Syntyche we will have conflict. Sometimes we will do and say things that are hurtful and sometimes miss the mark even while doing the work of the gospel.  But with God’s help we can become our better selves through the faith community. We are a bunch committed to doing the work of God which means remembering that our unity in Christ is what matters.  Every time we come to the communion rail we profess this truth, that in Christ we are one.  As we offer our gifts of time, talent and treasure, may we offer them freely and generously with the joy that comes through our relationship with Christ and one another.  There is no doubt in my mind- we need God and we need one another.

Amen.

Celebrating God’s gifts

Matthew 21:33-46; October 2, 2011

The Rev. Shelby Ochs Owen

Trinity Church, Staunton

Today’s Gospel passage is a tough one!  It contains a parable of judgment and as difficult as it may be for us to hear, it must have come as a heap of burning coals to the heads of those Jewish leaders who were listening to Jesus.  As Matthew has written it, the parable is clearly allegorical.  The landowner planted a vineyard, leased it to tenants and went to another country.  When the harvest time came, the landowner sent his slaves to collect his fruit and when the slaves were murdered he sent his own son.  Then the tenants murdered the son, too.  When Jesus asked the Jewish leaders, “Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?” the leaders responded with self-condemnation, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruit (RSV version) at the harvest time.”   They had not yet seen themselves in the story.

These religious leaders who were outwardly claiming to be followers of God’s law refused to listen to the prophets who had been sent to them and to their forbears; they refused to honor God with the gifts he had entrusted to them; and they refused to see the ministry of Jesus as God’s presence among them.  They seemed oblivious that God was actively in their midst.

Their rebellion against God resulted in their inability to tend rightfully to the vineyard that had been entrusted to them, the Kingdom of God.

During the month of October here at Trinity we will be focused on stewardship, focused on how we can tend rightfully to the vineyard, focused on what God is doing in our midst, and focused on ways in which we can join God’s party!  HE IS RIGHT HERE IN OUR MIDST!  What a wonderful truth to consider!  The Holy Spirit is upon us working through us, equipping us to join God’s activity, to be co-creators with the Divine.  What an amazing reality!  As Christians we have inherited this vineyard, we have been invited into the Kingdom of God and we are expected to yield good fruit!  So how do we go about producing good fruit?

I think first we must consider the source of all our being and get some perspective on who we are and whose we are.  I can remember as a young child my mother explaining to me that I did not belong to her (fortunately she did not say this when she was put out with me!).  She said I did not belong to her as her possession but that I was God’s gift to her and that I had been entrusted to her care, but that truly Ibelonged to God. 

The Rt. Rev. Gregory Rickel, bishop of the Diocese of Olympia shares this story as it relates to our parable of today, “[There was] a story about a farmer who told the preacher he was tired of hearing that we didn’t own anything, and that it all belonged to God.  The farmer invited the preacher over for dinner, and after dinner took him out to look over his land.  He had him stand and look in all directions, and he said to the preacher, ‘As far as the eye can see, that is all mine. Now can you really stand there and say I don’t own it?’ The preacher just smiled at him and said, ‘Ask me that in a hundred years.’”

This concept of not owning anything seems strange to many of us, especially living in a capitalistic society.  Was the farmer convinced by the preacher in the story that he really didn’t own anything? No doubt that farmer had worked hard for all that land or perhaps his forefathers and mothers had worked hard for it.   He earned it; he deserved it!  Why did he have the need to know it was all his, that he owned it?  One can almost see his fists tightening as he insists on ownership; one can almost see a narrowing of vision as the farmer expresses his self-satisfaction.   Are we ourselves convinced that we don’t really own anything?  If we take a look at some of the things we think we own, we may be surprised at the reality of the situation.  How about our money?  Do we own our investments?  If we take a look at the volatility of the stock market over the last couple of years, we can clearly see our investments are beyond our true “ownership.” 

Or take a look at our children.  We may think they are “ours,” and we may try to direct them, to control them, to nurture them, to encourage them in ways that we see as in their best interests but do they actually do all the things we would have them do? No. They certainly do not!   Our children do belong to God, and perhaps only when we give them completely to God, do we have peace.  Is our time really ours?  Have you seen what happens to a blank square on your calendar, to a day that you think is yours?  Things happen and the day does not often go the way you had planned.  What about our own health? Do we own it?  What about our first breath?  Did we determine that our life would come to be?

When we reach a point of surrendering all that God has given us, we have a new found freedom with our “things”-our time, our money, our talents and that freedom gives us the ability to move past giving out of obligation to giving out of wonder and celebration. Something within us opens up, our fists relax and we are more at peace. 

God is at work in and through this church.  If you want to see evidence of God’s action, just come hang out here for a few days in a row, sit on the bench by the labyrinth.  You will see folks coming and going to Bible study groups, serving the poor among us and beyond us in numerous ways, practicing in the choir; you would see youth coming to Sunday School, members who are finance experts planning the best use of our resources and lay folks taking communion to many who cannot come to church.  It would be an interesting experience to put it all on the high speed camera to see members joining in with God’s activity as they offer their gifts to God. And then we must consider those who are joining God’s work outside of this property.  The notion is mind boggling and amazingly wonderful. 

At my home parish, as a humorous outreach effort the church had T-shirts made up that said, “Jesus is coming. Look busy!”  I am not asking you to get busy. We are all busy enough. Busy is not the goal.  God calls us to look first to God for how we spend our time, our resources, our talents, that our very lives would point to the reality  that all we have is a gift from God. The Jewish leaders of Jesus’ day seemed to believe they owned their religion, enough to block God out.  Can we give full ownership of our lives over to the one who created us, who redeemed us, who sustains us? Can we invest in the things of life that matter most such as our endeavors toward worship and outreach, mission and spiritual formation through the offerings here at Trinity?

May we tend rightfully to the vineyard God has given us and enter into God’s kingdom joyfully. Let us offer to God that which already belongs to Him, that has been entrusted to us.  May we give generously and joyfully of ourselves: our presence, our time, our resources, yes, our money, our talents, …our very breath.  None of us knows what the outcome of our offerings will be, but as we yield control to the Holy Spirit, God’s fruit will be yielded as well, seen and unseen.   And as we begin to see we are part of something so much greater than ourselves, we can’t help but celebrate - can’t help but join God’s party.

We are not dead yet

Philippians 1:21-30; September 18, 2011

The Rev. Shelby Ochs Owen; Trinity Church, Staunton

Why Go to Church?

One Sunday morning, a mother went in to wake her son and tell him it was time to get ready for church, to which he replied, "I'm not going."
"Why not?" she asked.
I'll give you two good reasons," he said.

(1), they don't like me, and

(2), I don't like them."
His mother replied, "I'll give you two good reasons why you SHOULD go to church:
(1) You're 39 years old, and (2)  . . . . . .  you're the pastor!" 

So why do we come to church?  Of course, we come to church for a variety of reasons.  If we did a survey at the end of the service we might be surprised at some of the answers.  Some might say, “to worship God”, “to sing”, “to please my wife”, “to see my friends”, “to be an example to my children”; some might even say “it helps my business to know more people” (and who’s to say that God doesn’t work through even motives like these?).  God knows our hearts and minds and whatever the surface reason might be for coming to church, the deeper reason for our gathering together is to pull us up out of our small, individual worlds, to recognize and be a part of something greater than ourselves, to wake us from our slumber, to set our sights on the Holy One, the Divine, to breathe in the new life that the Spirit offers.  We are looking for something that we do not yet have, something that cannot be found on our own, something that can help us grow and breathe fresh air.  Theologian Paul Tillich said, “beyond anything else, the church is simply primarily a group of people who express a new reality by which they have been grasped.”  This new reality is Christ.  We come to church, we are church because Christ has indeed grasped us and calls us together.  And he calls us to fruitful labor through which we can express that new reality.

In our reading from Philippians the apostle Paul speaks an amazing truth of his faith.  He just as soon die as live, which sounds depressing until we see just how profound and exhilarating his faith is.  “For to me, living is Christ and dying is gain.  If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which I prefer.  I am hard pressed between the two; my desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better; but to remain in the flesh is more necessary for you.”   Paul’s deepest desire is to be with Christ; he is ready to die as he knows that just as we express in our own burial servicewhether we live or whether we die we are the Lord’s possession.  And yet, his chief mission on earth is to bring the good news of Christ’s love and redemption to as many people as possible; Paul says, “ to remain in the flesh is more necessary for you”. His mission is for others. He even acknowledges that his stint in prison, from which he writes this letter, has done wonders to bring the gospel to more people. His mission is clear.  So even though his desire is to depart, to die, that he would be with Christ, he is compelled by his mission here on earth: “If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me.”

Over the course of my ordained ministry I have encountered a few deeply faithful elderly women who have shared with me that they were tired and they were ready to go, ready to die, ready to meet God. Their “golden years” weren’t feeling so golden and they wondered why God wouldn’t take them.  I don’t think we have to be elderly to have wondered this same sentiment at times.  Perhaps as a depressed teenager we have wondered, “Is this really all there is to life? Well I don’t need it.” Or perhaps we have gone through some deep sorrow or string of disappointments that has us shouting, “Just take me now, Lord!” 

But here we are. In the flesh.  Not dead yet. Perhaps we are not yet finished with our “fruitful labor”and it is time to consider, like the apostle Paul, that perhaps we exist not only for ourselves but to proclaim through our lives the goodness of God, the reality of Christ.

Like many of you I attended several concerts at the Staunton Music Festival a few weeks ago.  At a concert that featured Beethoven, I read this in the bulletin, quoting Beethoven himself: “Oh, it seemed to me impossible to leave the world until I had brought forth all that I felt was within me…with joy I hasten towards death.  If it comes before I have had a chance to develop all my artistic capacities, it will still be coming too soon despite my harsh fate…Come when though wilt, I shall meet thee bravely.”  Beethoven had contemplated taking his own life as his deafness developed and yet he knew his “fruitful labor” was not yet over.  As one whose faith in God was experienced through art, this response of continuing to write music in spite of the difficulties was a true act of faith.

So what might be our “fruitful labor” by which we can express the new reality of Christ?  Here we are at the beginning of a new program year at Trinity.   If you look around you there are umpteen opportunities for folks- the music program, foreign mission trips, a prayer ministry, Bible studies, parlor groups, a book group, serving in our multiple outreach programs, all of which point to the reality of Christ.  One day this week we had a deeply troubled sojourner stop by Trinity.  I was carrying a box of Rolling Pin Bakery donuts, (and only feeling a little guilty about it since I was planning to share them), when I came across this bereft young man sitting on the bench by the labyrinth.  Obviously he had already been inside where someone on our staff had given him a Bible; after a conversation with him, I offered him a donut, invited him to stay for the healing service and for noon day lunch before he caught the 1:00 train back to his home.  Once we were in the healing service, the others who attended that service offered him a loving ear, asked what he needed, prayed for him and gave the young man a tour of the church. The reality of Christ was palpable in their respectful and loving attention.  I don’t know what became of the sojourner. I pray that he made it to his destination.  What I do know is that the church, here manifest in this group of caring individuals, offered him their “fruitful labor”and the sojourner offered his own remarkable faith to us.  Each person who encountered the young man gave him what they could give him.  Sometimes we miss the mark. Sometimes what we can give does not seem to be what a person needs but we try anyway and let God handle the results. 

Here we are. In the flesh. We are not dead yet. While we wait, can we offer one another the reality of Christ?

How Do We Forgive?

By the Rev. Dr. Paul S. Nancarrow

This sermon is based on Matthew 18:21-35

An audio version of this sermon is available here.

In our Gospel reading today, Peter asks Jesus how often he ought to forgive someone who wrongs him. How much forgiveness is enough? How big should our Christian forgiveness be?

It is a question that is especially poignant for us today, on Sunday September Eleventh, 9/11, the tenth anniversary of the worst terrorist attacks our country has ever known. On this day we look back on the shock, the horror, the anger, the grief we experienced ten years ago, when airplanes were used as bombs, and centers of finance and defense came under attack, and thousands of people were murdered in an act of undeclared, indiscriminate, and immoral war. On this day we reflect on everything that has happened in the ten years since those attacks: war on terror, homeland security, coalitions of the willing, attempts at saber-rattling and attempts at peacemaking, culture wars, atheist denunciations of all religion as inherently violent — a world perhaps more fragile, more fearful, more vulnerable than it’s ever been before. And on this day we ask about the role of forgiveness in all of this: How can we forgive those who did this? Should we forgive those who did this? Is forgiveness even the proper category to invoke when we’re talking about things like terrorism and security and international policy and people who have no apparent interest in living and letting live with us? On this day of all days, we hear Peter ask Jesus “How much forgiveness is enough?”, and the question goes right through our hearts.

And as we struggle with that question, and with Jesus’ answer to it, it is important that we keep in mind just what Jesus means by “forgiveness.” In Jesus’ teaching, forgiveness is something more than just saying “It’s okay” or “No harm done” when someone hurts you; that’s not forgiving, that’s just papering over the hurt, that’s just pretending things are alright without making them alright. In Jesus’ teaching, forgiveness is something more than waiting to see if the other person is willing to make up to you before you’ll be willing to make up with them; that’s not forgiving, that’s emotional hostage-taking. In Jesus’ teaching, forgiveness is nothing less than making a new beginning, so that right relationships of mutual well-being can flourish.

That’s what’s happening in the parable Jesus tells in answer to Peter’s question. There was a king, Jesus says, who had a slave, probably a high official in the king’s court, who had mismanaged the king’s accounts badly, very badly, to the point of losing ten thousand talents, which in Jesus’ time would be an unimaginable, astronomical amount of money. The debt threatens to destroy their relationship — literally, the king is planning to sell the slave, and his wife, and his children, and his possessions — and that will remove him from the royal court, that will end his relationships in the palace household, that will take away the only livelihood he’s ever known. Breaking relationship with the king means pretty much losing everything. So the slave pleads, and, even though they both know it’s impossible, the slave promises the king that over time he will pay back everything he owes. But the king has a better idea: he cancels the debt; he clears the books; he transfers money out of his own treasury to make up for what has been lost by the slave’s mismanagement. In this parable the king acts in an extraordinary way to create a new beginning, to remove and clear away all the mistakes and the errors and the ill-will from the past, and to create anew the conditions required to build up a right relationship of mutual well-being between them. As Jesus teaches it, that is the real meaning of forgiveness.

And new beginnings for right relationship is also supposed to be the meaning of being forgiven. When the forgiven slave goes out and meets a fellow slave who owes him a hundred denarii (chicken feed compared to the slave’s own former debt) he goes ballistic: he grabs him by the throat and demands payment and throws him in prison. What he should have done, Jesus makes clear by implication, is to share his new beginning with his fellow slave, to cancel the debt and clear away the old ill-will, to create anew the conditions for right relationship between them. He should have acted from his own new beginning to create new mutual well-being for them both. The fact that he did not do this shows that he has not really understood what the king has done for him, he has not really accepted his own forgiveness, he has not really taken on the work of living into his new beginning. The king ends up reinstating the debt and demanding it be paid, because the slave never really let go of it in the first place. Forgiving and being forgiven both depend on making a new beginning.

And perhaps that’s the important part for us to hear on the anniversary of 9/11. How can we forgive? What does forgiveness even mean in the aftermath of terrorist attack? It means working to make a new beginning. It means not getting stuck in the loss and the anger and the ill-will of the past, -- not ignoring them, but not getting stuck in them -- but clearing the way so we can move forward. It means reaching into our own resources, our own courage and goodwill and creativity, to begin again where things have been taken from us, to start anew where there has been loss. In means working seriously, and intentionally, and prudently, and generously, to create the conditions required for right relationships of mutual well-being wherever we can reach: in our homes, in our communities, in our nation, in our world; in our finances, in our policies, in our military actions, in our environment; with our allies, with our enemies, with those who are strangers to us, with those who believe differently from us, with those who wish us well, and with those who wish us harm. It means refusing to be terrorized, refusing to give in to fear, no matter what happens, because we know that nothing can separate us from the love of Christ, and perfect love casts out all fear. For us, on this tenth anniversary of 9/11, forgiveness means committing ourselves anew to God’s work of making new beginnings in our world.

Peter asked Jesus how much forgiveness is enough; and Jesus answered that forgiveness is not a question of enough, forgiveness is not measured by amounts, forgiveness is opening ourselves to be channels of the creatively transforming grace of God. Let it be our prayer today that we may be channels for God’s creative transformation on this anniversary and always.

Amen.

Ceremonies of Identity

By the Rev. Dr. Paul S. Nancarrow

This sermon is based on Exodus 12:1-14
An audio version of this sermon is available here

Sometimes you see something in a scripture story that you’ve never seen before, something that’s been there all along but you’ve never noticed, and it changes the whole way you understand that story. That kind of interpretive discovery can be a great gift from God.

That’s what happened to me as I was looking over our first reading today, the Exodus account of the institution of the Passover meal. This is one of those stories I’ve read dozens of times — even preached on a few times. It is part of our lectionary for Maundy Thursday, so every year during Holy Week I’ve heard and reflected on it again. I thought I knew it pretty well. But in looking over it this time, it occurred to me that this story tells of the first time the people of Israel ever had a ritual, a sacrifice, a ceremonial meal, that they all had in in common, that they all did at the same time and in the same way and for the same reason. To be sure, there are rituals and ceremonies in the scripture stories before this. Noah made a sacrifice to God after the flood. Abraham built altars at places where he had significant encounters with God, and he offered sacrifices on them. Jacob set up a pillar and ceremonially anointed it with oil where God appeared to him at Bethel. There are plenty of rituals in the scriptures before this. But all of those were personal rituals, household ceremonies, sacrifices that marked important moments in the lives of individuals or families, but didn’t really reach any farther than that. The institution of the Passover meal is the first time in the story of the people of Israel that they have a specific ritual, a shared ceremony, that reaches beyond the individual, the household, the clan, the tribe, to unite the whole people in one identity as the people of God.

And that’s important, because shared ceremony is one of the strongest ways to bring people together and give them a shared community. Think about it: before this, what did the people of Israel really have to hold them together? They had stories they could tell, stories of Abraham and Sarah, and Isaac and Rebekah, and Jacob and Rachel and Leah and Bilhah and Zilpah, and Joseph and his brothers, the twelve sons of Israel. But all of those stories were generations old by the time of Moses; they were good stories, but they didn’t give the people much of a sense of what they could do together to be a people. By the time the people had multiplied in Egypt, as we heard in our First Testament reading a couple of weeks ago, I’m sure their sense of tribal bonding from ancient parents had become somewhat attenuated, and the only shared reality they felt was the reality of brutal oppression and hard labor. In fact, some historians suggest that the Hebrew people enslaved in Egypt did not in fact have a common ancestral background at all — that some had stories of their ancestor Abraham, and others had stories of their ancestor Isaac, and still others had stories of their ancestor Jacob, and it was only later editing that put those stories together and made them successive generations — but in Egypt all they really had in common was that they were slaves and they wanted to be free. Some historians argue that this ragtag bunch of West Semitic slaves wasn’t really a people at all, until God acted to make them a people.

However that may be, whether the people really were twelve tribes descended from common parents or whether they were historically distinct ethnic groups, the point is that by the time of Moses the only thing they had in common was being oppressed, the only thing they had in common was their suffering. But God acted to change that. God acted to liberate them. And the first step in that liberation was when God gave the people a new way to think about themselves, a new way of knowing themselves as the people God saves, a new identity, not as slaves, but as God’s own. And the core of that new identity is that they are the people who do the Passover.

Think for a moment about what the Passover ceremony says about the people who do it. They are to celebrate the ceremony in the first month of the year, at the beginning of the calendar — which says that this ceremony is for them a new beginning of time, the beginning of a new time in a new life with God. They are to eat the Passover with their sandals on and their walking sticks in hand, dressed for the road, ready to go at a moment’s notice — which says that they are a people who pay attention to God’s call and will follow God’s lead. They are to take the blood of the Passover lamb and put in over the doors of their houses as a sign — which says that they are a people God saves from death and rescues from destruction. The Passover ceremony unites the people in a ritual way they’ve never been united before; and it tells them something about themselves, about who they are as God’s people, and what that means; and it calls them forward into a new life of freedom and covenant and living God’s mission in the world.

And if we think of the Passover that way, what can it tell us about our Eucharist? Matthew, Mark, and Luke tell us that Jesus began the Eucharist at a Passover Seder, so of course there is that very deep connection. But beyond just that historical connection, I think these two ceremonial meals do much the same things for us who celebrate them. As the Passover did for the Israelites, so our Eucharist brings us together and unites us in ritual reality, and it tells us something important about who we are as God’s people, and it calls us forward into freedom and covenant and living Christ’s mission in the world. We celebrate our Eucharist on the first day of the week — which says that this great thanksgiving is the beginning, the origin, the reference-point of all our works and days in Christ. We recognize in this ritual meal the Body of Christ, the substantial presence of Jesus with us, and the Blood of Christ, the essential power of Jesus’ life in us — which says that we are people saved from death and empowered to love as Jesus loves and be wise as Jesus is wise and live as Jesus lives. We receive this bread and wine as food for the journey — which says that we know ourselves to be called and sent to bring Christ’s love to all the world. Our Eucharist ceremony, like the Passover in Exodus, is the sign of God’s call to us to be a new people living a new life.

Sometimes you look at something familiar and discover in it something new. May this familiar Eucharist ceremony be a new discovery for us this day — may it be a new gift of God’s saving and creating grace for us all. Amen.