Acts 10:44-48

John 15: 9-17

Will you pray with me.  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you our creator, redeemer and life sustainer, Amen.

The reading from the Gospel of John continues that which Alex read for us last week.  These passages are referred to as Jesus’ farewell discourse for Jesus death is imminent. This is Jesus’ last flesh and blood opportunity with the disciples to look them in the eye and review with them what is most important. What they must not forget.  Jesus knew that the end was near, so very near and that he very little time.  Each moment he had left with the disciples mattered a lot.  Each word he spoke was important and hung in the air like a jewel.

Now Jesus could have filled those last hours with a lecture on church doctrine and polity — on what we are to believe and how we are to be.  We probably could have benefited if he had spent some more time on those

really difficult doctrinal issues about which volumes have been written and that nonetheless leave many of us scratching our heads.  Doctrines like the incarnation – how can God become flesh?  Or like atonement – how is it exactly that Jesus died for our sins?  And it actually would have been extremely helpful and would have saved a lot of heart ache if he had spelled out specifically God’s views on same sex marriage and on whether gay, lesbian and transgendered people are fit for ministry.

But he doesn’t.  He didn’t. All of that was not on his mind that day close to the end.  All of those doctrines and issues of polity may be important, but they were not what was most important to Jesus, it seems.

So what was?  What was most important to Jesus?  What was it that mattered so much that Jesus wanted to be absolutely sure those that follow him never forget? What was the substance of Jesus’ farewell discourse?

We heard Jesus say it last week and again we heard it today.  He says it says it quite clearly and quite emphatically, he says it over and over.  He says   “Abide with me.”

In this 15^th chapter of the Gospel of John, in this farewell discourse Jesus says “Abide with Me”  not just once but seven times between verse 4 and verse 11.  We know that repetition is a highly effective way of making sure particularly in the spoken word that those listening remember and retain a key point.

But what does “abide” mean.  What does abiding in Jesus look like? The original Greek word that is translated as abide is Menw, and while I personally like the word abide it does not carry the force or muscle that is in the original Greek.  Menw means to remain, to stay, to take up one’s place and not be moved from it.  Menw is what Jesus says to his disciples in the garden of Gethsemane on the night of his arrest, when he tells them to stay with him, remain with him while he goes off to pray.  What Jesus is asking, I think, is that we see that we are a part of God’s life and that God is a part of our life.  We belong to each other.  That we keep God in our minds and on our hearts.

For me that means trying in how I walk through my days to open up space in my conversations with others, in how I see the world around me, in my quiet musings for God.  It is about realizing that I am in a committed relationship with the sacred, and that I am to be  mindful and dwell in that relationship as I walk through my days.

Abiding is the affirmation of belonging from which all of the rest of Jesus’ teaching in this discourse flows.  When we abide in Jesus as the branches abide in the vine, the life force that flows through the vine also flows in and through us.  We share in the love that is God.  And when that happens, Jesus tell us, when the love that is God flows in us as well, then our joy is complete and we give forth lasting fruit – we become a transforming, healing, life generation presence in the world. The starting place of all of this, is not believing the right way, or being the right way.  The starting place of all of this is simply opening ourselves to the gift that we belong. We belong to each other and we belong to God.  That’s the whole of it.

Now one of the things that I love best about this church, that I love best about each and every one of you is that you know the importance of belonging.  This church in the fabric of our being is about belonging.  It is about welcoming people into this gathered community not because they believe in a certain way or live in a certain way but because each and every one of us before we believe a thing or do a thing we already belong. We welcome all into our life together because God has already welcomes all into life with God.  “You did not choose me,” Jesus says, “but I chose you.” If God has already chosen all then how can we not do the same?

This is what is at the heart of Peter’s revelation in the reading from the book of Acts today.  This is the Peter who was Jesus disciple who tries so hard to get things right.  Now after Jesus death and resurrection, Peter and the other leaders are trying to figure out who exactly should be included in this new community of followers of Jesus.   Who should be in and who should be out and where is that line that defines.

Just before the passage read for us today, Peter had received a vision and has been told to go to the house of a Cornelius who was a Greek, and a leader in the Roman army.  So Peter goes to Cornelius’ house which was pretty radical in and of itself and then once he is there, Peter begins to teach those gathered in Cornelius’ house about Jesus as he was instructed to do in the vision.  What happens next is shocking and something Peter could never have imagined in his wildest dreams.  The Gentiles, those Romans, who are listening to him begin speaking in tongues which was a clear sign to everyone that the Holy Spirit was upon them.  Just like the Holy Spirit was upon the disciples on the day of Pentecost.  And so he says “Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing there people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have.”  As if to say, can any human being decide to exclude another from the community of God if God has already welcomed them into it?

I do not think that there is a more needed message in this divisive time when so much of our public discourse is about who is in and who is out.  Who deserves and who does not.

But it is also needed I believe, because of as Sherry Turkle in her book Alone Together writes that we are a deeply lonely society.  Never before in the history of humankind have we been immersed in a such an extensive web of connection than we are now in this digital age.   We can visit just about any corner of the earth in a few clicks. Our news feeds are full of the status changes of our facebook friends, but for so many people, there is no one out there there when what one really needs is a shoulder to cry on or a hand to hold.  We may be connected, but connection alone does not assure that our deep need for belonging and intimacy is met.   Or as Robert Putnam puts it we may still go bowling but we these days we are Bowling  Alone.

I believe that what the world needs so very much right now is to know what it is to abide in love.  To come home to a deep sense of belonging to God and to each other.  To come  home to a deep knowing that the beginning of all we do or believe or are is our connection to the sacred source of Love.  The love that birthed the universe is the love that stirs our hearts when we offer a shoulder to cry on or a hand to hold.  We are connected to God and each other in a web not of anonymity but one of life giving, wound healing, world changing love.

So let us love with abandon.  Let us welcome all with an ever widening embrace, and let us abide with God in whom we all belong.   Thanks be to Love. Thanks be to God.  Amen

I grew up in the hills and valleys of rural, Upstate NY.   Think:  field and cows and trees, more fields and cows and trees.   Growing up, we spent a lot of time at the house of our family friend Jane.

As you rounded the bend in a non-descript, dirt road, you encountered a wonderful, country home.   A big house with a large porch sat on the top of a hill.   A friendly golden retriever would trot down the driveway to greet you at your car.   Stepping out of the car the countryside rolled on for miles.  They had a big barn, and rows and rows of Apple Orchards as far as the eye could see!

But none of those were my favorite thing about going to Jane’s house.   Tucked up a small hill, off to the side of the big house were rows and rows of raspberry bushes.   Every summer, the kids from the neighborhood and I would wait anxiously for the raspberries to start to blossom.   We would fill our pockets, and baskets, and mouths with as many fresh sweet, sun ripened raspberries as we could find.   One year, as we made our way through the raspberry bushes, we discovered a new section of grape bushes.   Big, tall, vines filled with ripe, warm purple grapes.   We filled our baskets with those too, lying on our backs in the grass; we ate ourselves silly while the sun warmed our faces.

Wise to our fruit raiding escapades, Jane began to teach us how to tell which grapes were ripe and ready for picking, which needed just a little more time to grow, and which weren’t any good to eat.   The ones that weren’t any good we could pull from the vines to make room for new fruit to grow. Rather than simply stuffing our pockets, we would carefully look for the bright purple color that said the grapes were ready to come from the vine and explode with warm showers of flavor in our mouths.

At the height of the season, we would walk with Jane as she gathered baskets and baskets of beautiful grapes from the vines.   She would take them inside, clean them, and prepare them for canning.  Soon the cupboards (and our Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches) would be filled with delicious grape jam.   She taught us not to simply throw away the grapes that had a bad spot or two, but to gently cut away the rough spots, so they could be used for something good.   You might say, she pruned them.

In this week’s Scripture passage from the Gospel of John, Jesus uses the imagery of vines and branches like the to help us dive deeper into what it means for our life together both as individuals, and also as Christian community.  In John’s Gospel, Jesus is the vine, and we are the branches, but each of us plays a role for the larger good of the whole, and of the community. Like the production of batches of jam, the production of spiritual fruit is contingent on the health of the entire body.

In a world that keeps us moving at lightning fast pace, focused often only on our individual lives, it is easy to miss the opportunity to pause.  It is easy to overlook the incredible places of beauty, or to stop and taste the sweetness of a summer grape fresh from the vine.

I want to share with you this morning some of the places I have seen you bear fruit in my 8 months with you this year. You have taught me so very much about the wonderful things we can achieve when we reach beyond ourselves and come together as the church, when we abide in the vine that is Jesus.  Embodying today’s Gospel passage, you have stepped out of the demands of a world that pushes you only to focus on yourselves, and joined hands in service to the Living God.

I have seen the fruit you have produced in the newcomers who have poured through our doors on Sunday morning looking for a new kind of church.  For a place where they can come, whoever they are, wherever they are on life’s journey.   They have wondered (some silently and some aloud) is there a place for me here?  You have answered with a resounding yes.  In a world that teaches us to fear the other and cast out the stranger, you have taught the world that perfect love casts out fear.

I have experienced it in the sweet faces of our extended church family at the Waban Health and Rehabilitation Center.   The ministry a dedicated group of you has helped to plant there extends our church beyond its doors and showers God’s unconditional love to those who need it most.  It is church at its very best.

I have seen it in the wisdom and institutional memory of the women of the Lunch Bunch.   The way they have cared for, tended to, and carried forth the legacy of the Union Church for so many years.  If you have not yet had an opportunity to share a cup of tea with these women, these pillars of the community do not miss it.   I promise, you will be glad you did.

I have heard it in the laughter of the Union Church children pouring through our hallways and classrooms.  From preschool to high school, they fill our building with joy, vibrancy, and vitality.  They challenge us to ask and answer the hard questions.   They have humbled me with their commitment to church, and as young people of faith.    And I am here to tell you I made it out of the youth group campfire having eaten only 2 s’mores!!  Kathy and Buzz can tell you that was no small feat.

The list goes on and on.

Much like rounding the bend on that dirt road toward the once unexpected oasis of Jane’s farm, I had no idea what to expect the first Sunday I traveled up Beacon Street to begin my ministry with you.   As I walked into Starbucks for what would become my weekly Sunday morning latte, I remember thinking:  WHAT am I getting myself into?  Like the not quite purple grapes on those summer bushes, I felt not yet ready to be plucked from the vine.

Now, I won’t speculate on who the Union Church golden retriever is greeting us all at the door every Sunday, but sufficed to say that I had nothing to fear.   You all welcomed me as you continue to welcome one another with a warmth and outpouring of God’s love beyond measure.

You have taught me so much about just how good church can be.   You have formed me as a pastor, and as a person.   You have helped me to allow God to prune back the branches of things that were no longer working for me, so that new fruit could be born in my own formation.   You have helped to make real to me the truth that at some point we are all called to be different parts of this story at different times (the gathered fruit and the gatherer, to prune and to be pruned etc).

I will miss you all tremendously as we part from one another this week.   I will carry your love, your support, your stories, and all of our experiences together in my heart as we set out to plant new fields of ministry apart from one another.  I trust that as we abide in Christ so too will we abide with one another in our hearts even though we are parted.

My prayer is that the Holy One will continue to bear fruit among us.  May She will help us to see when we need to prune or be pruned.   May the Spirit will help us hear the call to gather, or to be gathered. May we always take the risk to step out of our chaotic individual lives into the rich sunshine of the larger body of Christ.  Most of all, I pray that we will be led to places of pause full of blossoming bushes of ripe summer grapes, gushing with sweetness, and ripe for the picking; mysterious, holy, glorious fruit, just waiting for us to find it.  Can you taste it?  Amen.

Living Waters Prayer Group will meet Monday, May 7 at 7:30 a.m. in the side chapel.

 Bible Study continues with the Book of Acts, and will meet next on Sunday, May 13th at 8:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.

 Volunteer needed to assist Kathy in the Faithful Friends class on May 13 and May 20.  If you can help out on either of these dates, let Kathy know.

 Youth Group meets Sunday from 4:00 to 5:30 p.m. at church for all kids in sixth grade  and higher.  We will be walking over to Freeze, so be sure your kid comes with a few dollars for a tasty treat.

 It’s time to register for Sunday School 2012-13 year.  Registration forms are available here and on the CE bulletin board in the Crocker Chapel.   

Next Sunday is Mother’s Day,  and our special offering that day will be for our music ministry.                                             

 Join us on May 19th, from 9:00 a.m.-12:00 noon. for a time of spiritual renewal.  We will learn about priest and prolific author Henri Nouwen and share in a guided meditation  of thoughts on the Prodigal Son passage from scripture.

Book Group has been re-scheduled to Tuesday, May 29 at 7:30 p.m.

Mark your calendars: Our church-wide Annual Meeting will be held on Sunday, June 3^rd  (right after service)

-Annual Reports Offered

-Approve the Budget

-Approve the Committee nominations

-Envisioning Reviewed

“Living Resurrection” Heidi Ward

Bible Study continues with the Book of Acts, learning about how the Jesus movement came together after the resurrection of Jesus, and through their commitment and compassion became the church that we inherit and live into today. Come join us.
Don’t worry if you don’t know much about the Bible or that you have lots of questions about what you believe and understand.
That’s the point of us gathering – to learn and grow together. So come with your questions and come with your hunger to grow in faith just like
our ancestors of so long ago. Bible study meets each Sunday morning at 8:00 a.m. 

Stacy will be on vacation until Tuesday morning April 24th. Kent Wittler is the deacon of the month and can be contacted for urgent pastoral care matters.

ReNew: the ‘Green’ Camp at UCW happens June 18-22 from 9:00 a.m. – noon. All kids currently finishing K-5th grades are invited. Invite your friends too. Registration forms and flyers are available at www.ucw.org and in the Crocker Chapel.
The whole church is invited to help prepare for Camp UCW. Search your recycle bins, your basements, your attics and even the back of your sock drawer for items on our collection list. Then bring them in to the donation bin located in the Crocker Chapel. Items needed: Old greeting cards, picture calendars, magazines with pretty pictures,
old and incomplete board games egg cartons gardening books and magazines, empty yogurt and margerine containers, (individual and quart-sized)
clean junk (boxes, cans, plastics bottles, empty containers, washers, nuts, bolts, wire, carpet tubes) world maps, light-colored socks.

Special Council meeting on April 28th from 9:00 a.m. -12:00 noon. Committee chairs or members are particularly encouraged to attend, but all are welcomed to come and hear about how each committee envisions adding to our life together over the next 3 to 5 years, and specifically what the committees plan for the year ahead.
We will meet in the reception room.

The special Nicaragua worship service will be held on April 29.

A church-wide clean up is planned for the afternoon of Sunday, April 29th, from noon to 4:00 p.m. Come for an hour, or the whole afternoon!

Book Group has been re-scheduled to Tuesday, May 29 at 7:30 p.m. We are reading “Dying to Be Me.”

Note from HR Committee: The HR Committee will begin the annual review process regarding our church staff and pastor. We will be looking for feedback from Church Council, Church Committees, and congregants regarding various aspects of our church life and in particular, the ways in which our staff support and contribute thereto. It is the Committee’s plan to complete the review process in advance of our annual meeting in the beginning of June. Should you have any questions or comments, please be in touch with Lara Gund, Karen Weisgerber, or Tom Vawter.

1 John 1:1-2:2
John 20:19-31
“Being is Believing” Rev. Stacy Swain

 Will you pray with me.  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you O God, our rock and our redeemer.  Amen.

I have to tell you, the only thing I hate more than someone telling me what to do, is someone telling me what to believe.  It’s true.  Mark, my husband, will attest to it –  there is an obstinate streak in me that is a mile wide and twice as deep.

This has made my relationship with organized religion, particularly when I was a teenager, rather rocky.  Especially so during that year of confirmation class.  The minister spoke with such conviction about what the church said about God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, sin, forgiveness.  And we were instructed to listen carefully, take notes and be prepared to pull it all together and make it our own in a cohesive personal belief statement.

One class, I will never forget.   The minister was telling us about the Easter miracle, how Jesus’ death was an atoning sacrifice for our sins.  Of how the blood of Christ had purified me from all sin. Of how I was now to be Christ-like in my living.  She was clearly so excited about all of this, so clear she was offering me an incredible gift to be cherished.  But I couldn’t quite believe it.  I could not quite see how all of that could be real.

After she finished, I remember stating quite emphatically before her and the rest of the class that 1) I never asked Christ to die for my sins so I take no responsibility for him having done so and 2) that I knew myself quite well and I doubted very much that I was purified of anything and  3) that I had no interest in being Christ like if being Christ like lands you on a cross.

I can only imagine how fresh I must have sounded then, but looking back on it I think there was a part of me that felt that all of this was far too important for me to take it on her word only.  If I could not see it for myself,  if I could not put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I would not believe.

And I am afraid that that confirmation class curriculum is much of what the Christian message is these days.  So much of traditional Christian theology prescribes what is and what one should believe.   And I am afraid that that message can be particularly challenging, particularly jarring at this time of Easter.   How are we to really understand what happened between that first Good Friday and Easter morning? What impact does whatever it is that happened really have on our lives today?

Because honestly, do we really know what happened?  The gospel accounts were written decades after the fact.  They are not journalism reporting.  They are not reality TV recording what is.   There wasn’t a security camera outside the tomb that day.  No one pulled out their Iphone to make a video when Jesus appeared to the rest of the disciples gathered behind locked doors.  All we have is someone else’s word for it and thousands of years of Christian tradition that have tried to explain and make sense of a belief system that is handed down to us today.

And all of that can leave us feeling a bit queasy, particularly in this Easter season when we hear the soaring phrases,  “Christ is Risen.  Death is defeated.  Love is stronger than hate.  God wins.”  “You have been wiped clean of sin so go and live Christ-like lives.”  In this season that is the heart of our faith and that calls for such conviction, for such confirmation of all we belief, we may feel rising in us a desire not to consent but to contest, not to believe but to question.  Do I believe this?  What does it mean to really believe this?

And this is compounded, I think by an overlay of what theologian Douglas John Hall calls Christian triumphalism[1] — this rosy optimism that on the far side of the empty tomb all is as it should be.  We are all set. Life is good, Salvation is guaranteed. Hall claims that this rosy optimism crept into Christianity during the time of Constantine in the 4^th century, when Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire and has been with us ever sense.  All we have to do now is have faith and believe and everything will work out just fine.

Now I don’t mean to be a downer but the problem with all of this soaring Easter celebration, Christian triumphalism, this rosy optimism, is that it is wonderful here in the space of this sanctuary but it fades far too quickly when we go down the front steps again back into the brokenness of the world and pain of our lives.  How do we reconcile the Christian message of God’s triumph over evil through Jesus with what is happening right now in the world?  We may walk away from church wondering if any of that has to do with any of this anyway; wondering if the Christian message while beautiful — can actually speak to our lives right now or is it rather irrelevant. It is no wonder that the pews are empty in so many churches across the country.  One gets tired of being told just to take it on faith, just believe it to be true without any evidence that it actually is.

 ~~~~

 But all of this insistence on belief,  all of this conviction and rosy optimism, when I peal back the layers of Christian doctrine and try to get back to what it may have been for those first followers of Jesus, well I just don’t see it.  What I see is a fragile community trying to figure out what it is to live out of love in a world that shouts fear.   Digging down deep, Hall find what he calls Christianity’s “thin tradition within Christian history that tries to proclaim the possibility of hope without shutting its eyes to the data of despair.  This tradition insists that authentic hope comes into view only in the midst of apparent hopelessness.  This thin tradition is grounded in this world, like the cross of Calvary, and it will not abandon this world for all the hope of heaven. The most significant thing this tradition has to teach us is that the authentic expression of the Christian hope depends upon the encounter with the despair that is native to our own time and situation.”[2]

To peal back the layers of Christian doctrine and try to get at what it may have meant for those first followers of Jesus on that first Eastertide is, I believe, to wrestle with the stark truth that the Lord has risen indeed but we have not.  We are broken still.  Jesus may be in glory but we face the howl of despair and the chasm of meaninglessness that pervades our culture but that we as a society for the most part refuse to acknowledge or address.  John is quite clear about this.  Living in the post resurrection world does not mean we are living in a world without sin.  In fact “if we claim we have not sinned, we make Jesus out to be a liar and his word is not in us.”  To live in a post Easter world is to be honest and open about our doubt, our brokenness, our disbelief.  To be open an honest about all we with which we wrestle, all that keeps up from God.  To be a Christian is not be perfect, it is to accept our brokenness and essential nakedness in front of God.

In the opening chapters of Genesis, the first tendency of Adam and Eve after having eaten the forbidden fruit was to hide.  They covered up their nakedness and hide from God.  And we have been trying to hide ever since.  The triumphalism of Christianity in its worst form is just one more thing we are hiding behind. This thin tradition seeks to divest us of all that we have attempted to use for the covering up of our essential nakedness.[3]

But if you read the story, it is all there.  Their essential nakedness is there.  They are not clothed in conviction, not draped in belief.  Mary, the eleven disciples including Thomas are naked in their sorrow, their fear and their doubt.  The Christian faith clearly began not with certainty but with question.

Serene Jones, a theologian, pastor and now president of Union Theological Seminary  calls Thomas the “the incredulous nonbeliever who hides inside every believing Christian – the questioner in us that resists easy answers to hard questions of faith, who always wants a little more proof.  Doubt follows faith’s lead, stalking its edges with quizzical uncertainties, poking at belief’s soft spots, and stirring up those still waters we are always seeking.” [4]

My faith is emboldened by Thomas.  For Jesus seeks out Thomas.  Thomas does not need to clean himself up, put on convictions that may not fit  before he is worthy of meeting Christ.  Just the opposite seems true. The Risen one come through a locked door, “Jesus refuses to let dead bolts or chains block the movement of love toward the one who lacks faith.”  And so too, I believe, it is with us.

Serene Jones says it so much better than I ever could so I will quote her here: “When doubts crowds out hope, we can be confident that Jesus will come to meet us where we are, even if it is out on the far edge of faith that has forgotten how to believe.  God comes seeking us, stepping through the walls that hardship builds around us, offering love at the very moment that grace seems nothing but a farcical ghost story told by not to be believed friends.”

This is what I love about what I have learned is at the heart of faith and what I have experienced over these years for myself as true.  This is also what I love about this gathered community.  The starting place of a relationship with God is not conviction of belief but honesty of being.  It is a willingness to gather together without pretense, without hiding our doubts, fears and disbelief under rosy optimism and Christian triumphalism.  It is about being fully human.  Jesus took on flesh and walked on this earth.  He ate and slept. He laughed and cried.  He was afraid and he was overcome with joy.  Why?  Why did God go through all of that?  Well I think it is because God wants our faith to be not something we think about but something we are.  Ours is a flesh and blood God.  Put your finger here; see my hands.  Reach out your hand and put it in my side.”  Belief is about being who we are right now.

And that for me is the good news of Easter.  We do not need to pass some kind of bar of cleanliness, perfection or belief to be welcomed into the gathered community of faith.   We need only bring who we are.  Our authentic selves full of faith, fear, doubt and belief.  It is from here we begin.  It is from here the risen one meets us.  Amen

Bible Study continues with the Book of Acts, learning about how the Jesus movement came together after the resurrection of Jesus, and through their commitment and compassion became the church that we inherit and live into today. Come join us.   Don’t worry if you don’t know much about the Bible  or that you have lots of questions about what you believe and understand.  That’s the point of us gathering – to learn and grow together.   So come with your questions and come with your hunger to grow in faith just like  our ancestors of so long ago. Bible study meets on Sunday mornings at 8:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study with coffee and lots of curiosity.

 ReNew: the ‘Green’ Camp at UCW happens June 18-22 from 9:00 a.m. – noon.  All kids currently finishing K-5^th grades are invited.  Invite your friends too.  Go here  for registration forms, and here for a brochure. Also look for forms in the Crocker Chapel.

 Special Council meeting on April 28^th from 9:00 a.m. -12:00 noon. Committee chairs or members are particularly encouraged to attend, but all are welcomed to come and hear about how each committee envisions adding to our life together over the next 3 to 5 years, and specifically what the committees plan for the year ahead.  We will meet in the reception room. 

 The special Nicaragua worship service will be held on April 29.

 Stacy will be on vacation beginning Monday, April 16^th and returning to church on Tuesday morning April 24^th.  Kent Wittler  is the deacon of the month and can be contacted for urgent pastoral care matters.  The office will be closed on Monday and Tuesday, April 16 and 17.

 Note from HR Committee:  The HR Committee will begin the annual review process regarding our church staff and pastor.  We will be looking for feedback from Church Council, Church Committees, and congregants regarding various aspects of our church life and in particular, the ways in which our staff support and contribute thereto.  It is the Committee’s plan to complete the review process in advance of our annual meeting in the beginning of June.  Should you have any questions or comments, please be in touch with Lara Gund, Karen Weisberger, or Tom Vawter.

A church-wide clean up is planned for the afternoon of Sunday, April 29^th, from noon to 4:00 p.m. Come for an hour, or the whole afternoon!

If you missed it, go  here for the last issue of Keeping Current, our monthly newsletter.

Easter Sunday, Rev. Stacy Swain

John 10: 1-19

Will you pray with me, May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our rock and our redeemer.  AMEN

The cross was to have changed everything for nothing can ever be the same after a cross death.

And that’s the whole point really– the whole point of the spectacle of crucifixion was not only to punish the dying but also to terrorize the living.   To look upon the brutality done to a broken body would be to sear that image onto the heart forever.  And in Jerusalem in the first century one could not help but see cross deaths, for the staging ground for crucifixion was in a prominent place, right outside the city’s main gate. A place all would have passed by.   A cross was, in essence, the first century’s equivalent of a bill board advertising quite clearly what one could expect if one tried to take on Empire.  One look at a cross death was meant to change that kind of thinking forever.

Jesus hadn’t been much trouble when he was in Galilee.  The powerful elite of Jerusalem were not that bothered even when great crowds began to follow him.  They thought that those people in that back water region of Galilee were just a bunch of misfits anyway, poor, uneducated, not of any consequence. It he wanted to give them something to feel good about, so be it.  Nothing could come of that.

But when he came up into Jerusalem?  Well for them that was another matter all together.  And entering the great city in the way he did?  Coming up to the city with a procession, with shouts of Hosanna and palms waving in the air.  As if he s a victor returning from battle.  A conquering King returning to his city.   Well that was just downright provocative!

And then if that were not reason enough, they argued the very next day he goes into the Temple, and begins upending the tables and acting like he owned the place.  Like he was a new king overturning a well honed system of political and economic power, overturning the religious collusion with that power.   Well, that was down right, dangerous.

He had to be stopped, thought those in power.  The people were starting to believe that what he was saying was true.  That the kingdom of God was at hand.  That the reign of love and justice was breaking into the world and recreating God’s shalom right now.  That living together in peace where all had enough was possible.  Well that could not go on any longer.   The cross will change all of that talk of nonsense the power-filled thought.

And they were right.  The cross did change it all.  All of the hopes and dreams, the future that seemed so close and so real to the followers of Jesus while he was among them, well all of that died on the cross that day.  They had wanted it so much.  They had even begun to believe it possible.  Had begun to believe that their lives mattered and that the suffering they endured was as painful to God as it was to them.

But, the pounding of those nails woke them from what they realized must have just been a dream; the broken body of Jesus woke them to the brokenness of their own lives.

And we don’t talk about this much, but I bet that many among those followers of Jesus felt betrayed by him when he died that day.  Some may have even found fury in their hearts.  Why had he brought them to this point?  Why all this talk abundant life, of  being gathered together as a new creation, unfolding under the care and attention of a God.  Why all this talk when just the opposite was true. Just look at him there. Look at him dying.  Doesn’t his suffering prove his word a lie?

And so for this Mary wept. She wept on the day he died. She wept throughout that Sabbath Saturday and she was still weeping when she came to the tomb that Sunday morning, this Sunday morning.   She was weeping for Jesus whom she loved, yes, but she was also herself.  She was weeping for all that was dying inside her.   For all that was lost, for all that was changed.

Now, let me hit the pause button a moment, because we are at a disadvantage here.  We know what comes next and knowing that makes it hard to really appreciate how shocking it all was, how shocking it all is.

I got some very small insight into what that unexpected revelation of Jesus’ resurrection might have felt like for Mary, just the other day.  I was about to enter the front door of an establishment where I was meeting one of you for lunch.  I had my hand on the door when a jogger who had just passed me on the sidewalk suddenly stopped and called to me.  “Hi” he said with a big wide smile.  I looked at him and politely nodded hello, perfectly convinced that he had mistaken me for someone else.  I turned to make my way through the door when he called out to me again.  “Stacy, it me.”  I turned to him in confusion, “how could he know me when I did know him?”   Then taking a step forward he said “It’s me, Jonathan.”  And then in an instant of course it was Jonathan.  There he was in plain sight.  I was so happy to see him.  How could I not have recognized him just moments before?   How could I have not have known him?

I think my not knowing had everything to do with the context and my expectation.    I did not expect to see Jonathan at that time or in that place, and so I didn’t.  I did not see him even though he was right in front of me.

And so it was with Mary.  Mary never expected to see the living Christ at that time or in that place and so she did not see him…  She did not find him.    The context she was now living in was one without Jesus.  The cross had changed all of it.  Jesus was dead. Gone.  His words no more.  The cross had changed hope into despair.   Promise into fear.  The cross took Jesus away.  So how could he be right in front of her?  He could not be right in front of her?  No wonder she did not recognize him.

So she turned to go but he calls to her.  “Mary!”  He says.  She turns back to him and with her name hanging there in the space between them she sees him.  She sees Jesus.  Her friend and teacher, her Lord is right there in front of her.  Though he died on the cross, though the power filled did everything they could to change the trajectory of Jesus’ presence in the world they could not do it.  He was before her again just like used to be.  He was talking to her, helping her understand, and telling her what she must do next, just as he used to do.

In that moment, a bolder of despair rolled off her heart, and hope flooded in.  Fear fled as joy dawned.  All that he had told them, — that the kingdom of God was at hand.  That the reign of love and justice was breaking into the world and recreating all that is right now.  All of it was still to be theirs.   The cross did not change that.  The cross could not change that.

And because the cross was supposed to change everything and it couldn’t, well then, suddenly everything changed.

“Go to them” he tells her and she does. She ran!  She ran from that place with the good news on her lips.   And I imagine her feet barely touched the ground.  And now she is not weeping but laughing.  She bursts through the door where the rest are gathered and with her face aglow with the rising son, Mary tells them “I have seen the Lord.”  And with those five words hanging a future reopened for them that they thought had been closed forever.  They saw that not even all that Jesus suffered, not even all that they had suffered could separate them from the love of God made present to them in Jesus.  That ultimately fear and despair, violence and suffering could not cannot put an end to the enduring presence of God’s love in their lives.

The good news of Easter’s message to us is this.  Though there is much hardship and suffering.  Though the hand of violence and fear is on our world.  Though despair threatens to entomb us still, and though there may be times when we too come looking for God and find only absence, despite all of this, we can trust Mary’s witness.  God has not gone from the face of the earth.  God has not left us alone.  The love of God is moving in the world still and is ready to call our name and startle us into see in every moment.

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. said it this way:  “

“When our days become dreary with low hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”

“I have seen the Lord!”  She cried.  The cross changed nothing and with that everything for them that day, everything for us this day, has changed.   “I have seen the Lord!”  Alleluia, Amen.

Rev. Stacy Swain

Mark 11: 1-11

Will you pray with me: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our rock and our redeemer, Amen.

Have you ever lain awake at 3:00 in the morning?  Have you lain there staring at the ceiling — your head full of churning thoughts — your heart pounding?

Do you know what it is to be lost in the darkness of that hour? To have the silence fill with worry?

“I’ve got to find work fast, but where?”

“How are we going to pay for college tuition and still have enough to           live on?”

“How can she be dying?  She is my best friend.

“How am I going to keep my son from being cut down like Trayvon?”

“I know he treats me wrong, but I have nowhere to go”

“I cannot afford to get this lump checked out but can I afford not  to?”

In that darkness, we may try to remember what we were told about faith, how it frees and transforms.  But feeling that divine love that is supposedly loose in the world is hard when we feel so alone, so pinned down with worry.  When we so deep in the darkness of the night.

It’s 3, then 4 and then 5.   The sun is not up but we might as well be.  So we stand, wrap ourselves in the fear and anxiety that has been our bedfellow for most the night, and we resign ourselves to just make the best of it.  What other Way is there?

And so we head out into our days where we wander among others who most likely have been staring at the ceiling since 3:00 in the morning. But we dare not ask them of this and we do not speak of this to them.     We stay silent.   And so to borrow some words from Henry David Thoreau we press on in our lives of quiet desperation.  Our resignation nothing more than confirmed desperation.” (P. 24.)

It was 1963 when one came who refused to be shackled by silence.  When one looked full into the face of resignation and said “enough,” who looked full into the heart of desperation and said “no longer.”  Did you hear his words, did you hear him say “We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; he said, for years now I have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never.”  “Justice too long delayed is justice denied.”  Did you hear him say: “we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality; a single garment of destiny.  Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” Did something move in you when you heard these words?

With his words ringing in their ears, and his vision illuminating the darkest night, they came together and dreamed and marched.  Through Martin Luther King Jr. s silence was broken.  Hope was incarnate in that man and people who had lived with their back up against the wall[1] were moved by it.  Moved out of their aloneness and desperation, moved to come together singing and marching, waving that hopes in the air,  and those that went ahead and those who followed were shouting for the more that they knew now was theirs.

~~~~~

          It was 1977, fear and the unspeakable violence had terrorized the people of El Salvador.   Years of war had sown suspicion and fear tore communities and families apart.  Death was everywhere.  When he looked into the face of his dead friend Jesuit Priest Rutilio Grande, gunned down by death squads, he could not be silent anymore.  He into the faces of the thousands who lived in fear and he said “Enough!”.  He looked into the heart of their desperation and said “no longer!”  Can you hear his words even now? Did they move something in you?

“THE CHURCH, has to denounce what has rightly been called ‘structural sin:’ those social, economic, cultural, and political structures that effectively drive the majority of our people onto the margins of society. When the church hears the cry of the oppressed it cannot but denounce the social structures that give rise to and perpetuate the misery from which the cry arises.”

Hope was incarnate in Archbishop Oscar Romero and people who had lived with their back up against the wall were moved by it.  Moved out of their aloneness and desperation, moved to come together singing and marching, waving that hopes in the air,  and those that went ahead and those who followed were shouting for the more that they knew now was theirs.

This wave of hope, this breaking of silence, this looking full the face of desperation and saying no more, began so long ago.  There in slavery to Pharaoh and then again, there under the ruthless rule Rome.  The people were living lives of quiet desperation.  Their resignation nothing more than confirmed desperation.   Living if you could call it that was about scrapping by, keeping your head down and keeping out of Rome’s way.  They were a people whose backs were up against the way, who lived in fear.

And then there came the One who set hope, and freedom and transformation in motion.  The ripple of which flowed into King and then out into the people.  The ripple of which followed into Archbishop Oscar Romero and then out into the people.   Jesus refused silence, and the isolation silence brings.  Jesus looked full in the face of resignation and said enough, he looked full in the heart of desperation and said no longer.  “Did you hear it?

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven”

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

Blessed are the merciful for they will receive mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the Children of God.

Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:3-10).

And through his words and the example of his living, Jesus broke through the silence and isolation and fear and an people who had lived with their back up against the wall, came together, shouting on this day, Hosana.  They  waved palms, and they stripped the cloak of fear and anxiety from around their shoulders and laid it down on the ground before him, this hoped for Messiah.

And so today we join them, we join them all.  We join all the people of the ages who have known fear and worry and in isolation have been shackled to silence.  Today we say no more to all of that.  We wave our Palms in the air, and  unwrap cloaks of  anxiety and fear and lay them down.

Today we join with those who have come before us who have walked through the gates of resignation and desperation to something new and we are invited to imagine what deliverance and freedom, hope and “something more” could look like for us in 2012.   Let Hosanna be our cry.  Amen

“The days are surely coming’

Jeremiah 31:31-39

Will you pray with me:  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God our rock and our redeemer Amen.

I don’t think there is anything that parents of young children dread  more, than hearing from the back seat, on a long car ride the words — “Are we there yet?”

“Are we there yet?” means that the kids are getting tired, bored, uncomfortable.

“Are we there yet?” means pretty soon they are going to start picking a fight with each other just to have something to do.

“Are we there yet?” meant for Mark and I, that Mark would hold the steering wheel steady while I climbed over front seat, wedged myself between the two car seats and I reached  into the toy bag hoping for something to distract or entertain.

“Are we there yet?”  Why aren’t we there yet? This is the cry of the Hebrew people in the book of Jeremiah as they traversed their long and arduous journey of faith.  Jeremiah speaks his words to a people who are beaten down and world weary from the Babylonia conquest and exile.  They are beaten down and world weary out not only by the enemy that is upon them but for what they believe to be the enemy within.  For they understood the loss and destruction of Jerusalem and hardship they now face to be the consequence of their transgressions.  God had given them the law that day long ago when Moses went up to Mt. Sinai and was given those holy tablets to instruct and govern how we are to walk in the way of righteousness.

But the human heart proved defiant, difficult, prone to picking fights.  Call it human will, call it sin, call it whatever you want but there is something within that cannot seem to help but to act out.  The Apostle Paul puts it this way “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.  For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.”

Given this propensity of the human heart,  if God’s grace was measured out to only those who proved themselves worthy to receive it, then the storehouses of heaven would be overflowing for there would be no one on earth who could ever deserve what it is that God is ready to give.

But despite this. Despite the reality of the world and the state of the human heart, Jeremiah turns to the tired and world weary people and says.  “The day is surely coming”  “The days are surely coming” he says and he reaches down into the faith not to distract or entertain but to inspire for what he finds there is promise. A promise rising out of the covenant that God has made with the people.  A covenantal promise that pledged God’s care to the people.  The eternal God of the cosmos pledged to be with them in the struggles and joys of their lives and to work in and through history for the healing and salvation of all the world.

The day is surely coming says Jeremiah when God will forgive all our failures to live up to the lives God asks of us. When God will forgive our iniquities and remember our sin no more.  And when this time comes, God will write God’s love on our hearts.  It will become a part of who we are, part of the very organ that circulates our blood, that organ that keeps us alive. God’s love will be there.  God’s love with be our life force.

And in that time, it will no longer be necessary for some to teach

others about who God is, for all of us will know God.  All of us will know what it is to have God’s hand upon us, molding us, shaping us, leading us.  We will no longer have to wonder and worry, we will know.

This is the promise  Jeremiah finds in his faith. That all of creation all of us together may move towards a time when Eden will be restored, when all will be right again. This God of ours is in it for the long haul, says Jeremiah.  This is the promise that Jeremiah lifted up to those world weary people that day”

Now all of this is well and good, but does it answer the question rising up out of the back seat, the question of when?  When are we going to get there?

~~~~~

          When I answered my kid’s question, “Are we there yet?” with “Almost”  or “soon” — it never worked.  They just pressed me further.  When?  “By the time I count to ten?” they’d ask?  “By the time I close my eyes and open them again?” they’d demand?

We may very well feel like this too in this faith journey that we walk.  Our teachings and preaching are full of assurance of God’s love for us and the life of abundance that God promises.  But when?  Are we there yet? We look out the window and things do not look so good out there. The world is broken and we are a broken people. Innocent children are shot, we are putting away snow shovels away and putting on shorts in March, that cannot be right.  We may have hope that the day is surely coming but it surely is not now.

Or is it?

That’s were hope comes in. In this covenantal relationship we have with God we too have a role to place.  And our role has everything to do with hope.  For hope is not about airy optimism, it is not about wishful thinking, or passive wondering about  something that one has no power to affect.  As if to say “I hope but I don’t really know.” That is not our hope.

No, our hope has muscle.  Our hope is generative.  Our hope has the power to birth into the present reality the promised future for which hope longs.  Because we have hope in a future that is promised by God, the way that we live now changes.  Instead of living in fear, we live in faith. Instead of living cautiously, we live boldly. Instead of living to protect what is ours we live to share what we have.  And in living this life based on the hope of the future that is promised, we actually partner with God to transform the reality that is now, bringing that future promise into our now.

It is this kind of hope that is at the very heart of Gospel living.  This is what Jesus has been talking about in his ministry with us as he speaks of the kingdom of God being at hand,  of the kingdom of God drawing near.  Instead of being frozen in fear that there would not be enough, Jesus tells the disciples to gather the five fish and two loaves and together they transform that reality, feeding all five thousand that were gathered.  Instead of leaving blind Bartimaeus along side the road, hushing him into silence, Jesus tells the disciples to go to him and bring him up among them.  It is in their midst that Bartimaues is healed, that his life is transformed.   Living in a hope that enfleshes God’s promise now is what following Jesus was and is all about.

We may not be there yet.  The world may be broken and we may be a broken people, but hope is ours.  And when we live in hope the insistence and relevance of the question “Are we there yet?” falls away and in its place arises another.  Another question that has the power to transform what will come.  And that is “How will we live in hope now? The days are surely coming, the day most surely is now.  Amen.

Rev. Stacy Swain

“True to the purpose for which we are made”

John 2:13-22

Let us pray

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our heart be acceptable to you, O God our rock and redeemer.  Amen.

Where were you that day?  Were you a disciples?  Jesus was already up when the rest of us emerged from our night’s sleep.  He seemed on edge.  We did not really have a clue why, but he said he wanted to head up to the Temple straight away.  And so we went.  It was early, but already the narrow streets were packed with the day’s pilgrims.  It was Passover.  Thousands were going up to the Temple.   But Jesus set out through it all like Moses parting the Red Sea.  We followed in  his wake as best we could.

He passed through the outer gate and then took the steps two at a time.  It took us a moment to catch up with him.  When we emerged onto the courtyard there was already quite a commotion.  At first we didn’t even recognize him.  He looked more like one of the fiery prophets of old.  He had fashioned some sort of whip out of cords and was driving out the cattle and the sheep,  pouring out the money and overturning their tables and all the while shouting “Take these things out of here!  Stop making my Father’s House a marketplace!”    We were dumbfounded.  I remember thinking “What in God’s name is he doing? What in God’s name are we to do?”

~~

 Where were you that day?  Were you a money changers or sellers of cattle?  We knew it would be a busy day for it was Passover and thousands were making their way through the gate and up the steps.  So we got there in that outer court yard of the temple early.  We set up our tables.  Made ready the animals. We knew how it is done for we have been doing this for years.  It’s a good job.  The pilgrims come with their Roman coins, coins with the face of Caesar upon them, and because no Roman coin can be used in the temple to pay the temple tax.  So we set up our tables to exchange the Roman coins for one without any graven image. One OK’d by the temple priests. And of course there is a charge for the transaction, but that’s OK, it how it is done.

And if the pilgrim wants to give a gift to God, wants to sacrifice an animal, Holy law says the animal must be unblemished. How could anyone expect an animal brought from far away to make the journey unblemished and so it makes sense for the doves and cattle and sheep to be there.  And of course there is a charge for the transaction, but that’s OK, it how it is done.

We were all just about ready for the day when in he stormed in.   He crossed the space between us in two strides.  I thought at first Jeremiah has risen from the dead.  He had that look of a wild prophet about him. With a whip in one hand, he grabbed my table with the other and hurled it to the floor, coins went rolling in all directions.  Mayham set in as the cattle start to stampeed and the doves took to the air.  And all the while he was shouting  like he owned the place: “Take these things out of here!  Stop making my Father’s House a marketplace!”  We were alarmed.  I remember thinking “What in God’s name was he doing? What in God’s name will I do now?”

~~~

 Where were you that day?  Were you a priest of the temple, maybe even Caiaphas the High Priest?   We were in prayer in the silence of the innermost court yards, the place just outside the holies of holy, that privileged place where only we are allow when we heard the noise.  It sounded like a riot was breaking out and so we made our way back out to the outer most court yard as fast as we could.  We emerged to see that man called Jesus, upturning in seconds what we have worked so hard to secure.  Who did he think he was turning all this on end, all of this that has given us so much and that has given Rome no reason to worry?  We were infuriated. I remember thinking “What in God’s name is he doing?”  What right does he have in this place?”

~~~~

 What in God’s name is he doing?  It may be hard from our vantage point in these pews today to grasp how provocative and evocative Jesus’ actions were that day.  For the repercussions from those tables hitting the stone floor of that great court yard echoed through the halls of power all the way to Rome and set in motion a wave of retaliation that would carry Jesus to the cross.

So what in God’s name was he doing?

Let us be clear about one thing.  Jesus is not overturning the temple because he thinks it no longer matters.  Just the opposite is true.  Jesus loved the temple, he loved it fiercely.  He loved it from that first time when he was twelve years old and his parents had taken him up to Jerusalem for the Passover feast.  That time when he had sat himself down in the temple courtyard and was so riveted by the teachings and so riveting to those who were teaching that he did not notice that Mary and Joseph and the others had long left.  He loved the temple so much that three days later when his frantic parents retraced their steps and finally found him in the temple he said “ Why were you searching for me?  Did you not know that I must b e in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:49).

For Jesus, the temple was home.  There was no other place on the earth where he felt more himself.   For there in the innermost holy of holies the presence the one he called Abba, the presence of God’s glory resided.  The temple was the meeting place of heaven and earth and as such the it was the epicenter of what it meant to be Jewish. To go up to the temple was to go home.  To return to the touchstone of faith.  And at Passover, to go up to the temple was to come home to the truth of who the people were.  It was to come home to the foundational story of the Exodus of how God delivered God’s people from bondage, of how God claimed God’s people as God’s own, of how God was leading them even now into God’s promised future.

One went up to the temple burdened by the loss of a job, worried about what was coming next, consumed by self doubt, but there in the presence of God, all of that was lifted off his shoulders, disappearing like the smoke from the offerings up into the air.  Going up to the temple he was burdened but coming down he was delivered; delivered  into the value of who he is and whose he is and the future promise that is yet to unfold.

One went up to the temple burdened by loss, grieving a relationship that will be no more, consumed by shame but there in the presence of God all of that was lifted off her shoulders, disappearing like the smoke from the offering up into the air.  Going up to the temple she was burdened but coming down he was delivered; delivered into the value of who she is and whose she is and the future promise is yet to unfold.

One may have been poor but one was beloved, one may have been under the thumb of Rome but one lived in the palm of God’s hand, one’s life may have been hard but one’s future was secure.

That was what it meant to go up to the temple.

The only problem was the temple had ceased to be that place.  It had ceased to be true to the purpose for which it was made.  Instead of being a the means through which the people experienced the deliverance of God in their lives, the temple had become a part the problem, part of the system that enslaved the people. Instead of being a means to God’s end the temple had become an end in itself.

The temple was to be a place apart, but it had become a place within the economic, political and social ruling realities of the day.  The temple priests, particularly the High Priest who himself was appointed by Rome, cooperated with Roman rule, working to assure that the Jewish people complied with roman requirements; making sure that the uneasy peace and often unseemly was maintained. Temple practice had become a kind of business onto itself rather than a place to encounter a God who was in the business of transformation and liberation.   And so like those great prophets of old who loved the people too much to let them turn away from the God that loved them, Jesus set about sweeping out the clutter, over turning misconception, up ending that which enslaves.

~~~

 It is no wonder that we read this passage during Lent. For Lent is to be for us a crucible time of winnowing, clarifying and purifying a time to return our true selves and our home with God.

And so I ask us to really take time and consider.  Where are we this day?  Is there something of the disciple in us?  Are we  ready to do our best to follow in the wake of Jesus liberating presence even if that liberation brings with it disruption and challenge?  Perhaps there something of the money changer in us.  Are we so busy with the busyness of the day that we do not have the time or energy to come home to the God that is ready to give us more than we could ever earn?  Perhaps there is even something of the High Priest in us?  Is there something that understands full well the cost to others of the prosperity and privilege that is ours, but because we are so well served,  we are willing to ignore that cost preferring things just the way they are?

Where are we?  I wonder.  But one thing is clear.  We know where Jesus is.  Jesus is coming through that doorway of our life together and Jesus is coming through the doorway of our hearts. He is over turning upending, scattering all that is keeping us from being true to the purpose for which we are made.  All that is keeping us from doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with our God (Micah 6:8).  Why?  Because he loves us too much to let us turn away from God’s love.   So let the repercussions from those tables hitting the stone flour of that great court yard echo all the way through the halls of this place and through the walls of our hearts setting in motion a wave of love that is even now delivering us into the truth of who we are and whose we are and into the promise of a future that is to unfold..  Thanks be to God.  Amen.

Psalm 63

Mark 8:31-38
“The Myth of Mastery” by Rev. Stacy Swain

One of the things that David, one of our trip leaders, told us over and over again in the months leading up to our time in Nicaragua was that when we were there, we would need to be flexible.  We would need to be willing and ready to set down all of our expectations about how we thought things should  be in order to experience what was.

And he was right.  On more than one occasion, we came expecting one thing but finding something quite different.   Whether it was showing up at the community baseball clinic expecting to be meet a local partner  only to realize that we were on our own and would have to figure it out ourselves, to arriving at a work site gloves on and ready to go only to discover that the materials needed to do the work were nowhere in sight.  At first when this happened we were a bit frustrated and perplexed asking each other “what in the world is going on,  This wasn’t the plan.”  But as the trip unfolded we saw over and over again how things had a tendency to come together, different than what we had thought but that they worked all the same and often times for the better.

I think that this experience of having our best laid plans turned upside down is a large part of what makes traveling outside of our comfort zone, whether to Nicaragua or Zambia or Dorchester so valuable.  For those of us who are used to being in control — used to having clear expectations and seeing those expectations play out according to our plan, it is tremendously formative to have an experience of being out of our element and having to try out new ways of being and interacting with what is unfolding around us.

But being flexible, being ready to set down one’s expectations and take up a new reality all together can be difficult.  Just ask Peter. This talk of Jesus suffering, this talk of picking up our cross was the last thing in the world that Peter expected.  Peter was expecting that the redemption Jesus would bring for the people would be one won with the sword.  A military and political victory, the tumbling of Roman rule to finally take back the kingdom of Israel.   Peter thought they were all headed down that road, and then Jesus said,” no if you are going to follow me you must walk in this new way.” The way defined not by the powers of the world, but by God.

So if we are to follow Jesus and step off into this way of God, if we are going to set down the sword and take up the cross, what exactly does that look like?  What new ways of being and acting does taking up one’s cross and following Jesus require?

In his book, Lighten our Darkness, Canadian theologian Douglas John Hall sees the way of the cross requiring three movements.  The movement from mastering to serving, from grasping to receiving, from independence to interdependence.  (183

Now when I read Halls work this week, I was particularly struck because these three movements characterized much of what we experienced in our week in Nicaragua.

The first, the movement from mastery to service is that of setting down a way of being that sees competition not collaboration at the heart of human interaction.  We are conditioned to a culture of rivalry where we have to look out for number one and think strategically about how to best advance our own interest; how to get ahead.  Moving from such a mind set of mastery to one of service requires thinking as much of others and of our selves. Of seeing the benefit to ourselves not of guarding our own but of freely giving of ourselves in service to others.

Nicaragua gave us that experience.  There on the worksite we were equals, shoulder to shoulder with our new friends learning how to use a matchete to cut bark off trees for ceiling rafters; learning how to mix a manure into a compost rich enough to sustain newly planted fruit trees through the dry season.   Having no investment in what we were going to get out of the project but only in what we were able to give.

The second movement that Douglas John Hall sees in the way of the cross is a movement from grasping to receiving.  Another way of saying this may be the movement from fear of scarcity to confidence of abundance.  Much of our consumer culture here in the states, I believe, is driven by a fear of scarcity.  We get the message that there is not enough for everyone so you better go out there and get what you need before someone else takes it from you.

But remember the example of Jesus that day with the five fish and the two loaves of bread, how not only was everyone satisfied but that there were leftovers that filled twelve baskets?  Transforming scarcity into abundance.

We had our own fish and bread moment in Nicaragua.  We had brought lots and lots of school supplies down with us.  Suitcases and suitcases of supplies, but after seeing the need in the schools I was suddenly afraid that it was not nearly enough. On the day we were to give out the supplies at the Azul y Blanco school, I was particularly nervous.  There were lots and lots of kids and the pile of notebooks just looked far too small.  What if there wasn’t enough for everyone.  What if the kids all started piling over each other trying to grab a notebook before they ran out.  But before I could do a thing or think of an alternative plan, the kids in our group had begun handing out the notebooks to the school children as they filed out of the classroom.

There was not havoc, no one piled over each other to grab what was theirs.  Instead it seemed akin to communion as our kids and the kids of the school gave and received together.  When the last child turned to go back into their classroom, I was shocked to see that there was a stack of notebooks remaining.   More than enough for even those who had not made it to school that day.

The third movement writes Hall in the walk of the cross is from independence to interdependence.  It strikes me that if the purpose of Jesus’ ministry was solely about salvation, solely about repairing the breach in the relationship between God and humanity with the forgiveness of sin, solely about the mystery of what happened between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, than there would have been no need for Jesus to have spent three years creating a community of disciples and followers.  Jesus could have done it all on his own.  For me, following Jesus is also about repairing the breach in the relationships we have with one another.  Learning to see each other not as rivals but as companions, to realize our interdependence with each other and creation.  Learning that all are to get gathered together in love and fellowship around the communion table where new community is forged.

Though I could go on and on I will share one final example from our trip.  It was the last day.  We would be getting on a plane in the morning.  We were at the work site in San Antonio de Baston.  We were going to make some pressed earth blocks for the walls of the new outdoor kitchen and eating area of the school.  Jennifer and Darling, two women from the town who had been with us all week were working with us.  I’d shovel in the dirt mix into the mold, Jennifer would set the press, David would pull down on the long metal lever that squeezed the water from the mix and formed the block, Joanie would carefully carry the newly formed block over to a drying area in the sun.  We were making what would soon be a new comedor but we were also making new connections with each other, breaking down division of culture, language, class and experience and coming together not as independent isolated individuals but as new friends depending on and sharing with each other, working together to live into being a new community.

I do not think I would be overstating it to say that something redemptive happened for us all during that time in Nicaragua.  I think in one way or another, each of us caught a glimpse of a way of being for and with each other that had the glow of the kingdom of God upon it.

Now it may be that walking in a new way with Jesus and with each other is easier in a place like Nicaragua where everything is already so different.  But in many ways this season of Lent is itself a journey through a new land.  It is a time when we are invited to a new flexibility in our walk with each other and Jesus,  invited to set down expectation of how things should be and engage in new ways what is.  So in the weeks to come, I invite us into these three movements from mastery to service; from grasping to receiving; from independence to interdependence and into most of all into the unexpected joys that following Jesus brings.  AMEN

“Leaning on the Everlasting Arms” by Heidi Ward

Psalm 25:1-10

Genesis 9:8-17

Many of you know that when I am not here with all of you, I share my life with my fiancé in Southern Vermont.   It is a beautiful area of God’s creation, full of trees, rivers, and crisp mountain air.   Some of you know it well.  It has become a wonderful place to call home.

This summer our little Green Mountain State was suddenly rocked to its core by a once in a century event.  It was the end of August of 2011.  A particularly gorgeous summer was in full effect.   The weather reports had started to come in.   Hurricane Irene was in full swing and heading toward New England.  Like many of you, we watched the reports with a careful eye and they all had the same overarching message.   The coastal areas were in danger of a bad storm, but we were too far inland to be worried.   There was no need to be afraid.   As the storm grew closer, just to be safe, many of the churches in our area canceled Sunday services.

Thanks be to God that they did, because the weather reports were wrong.  As I opened the front door that Sunday morning, the river in our front yard had almost crested its banks at 8 AM.   By late morning, we had lost power, and surrounding towns had lost running water.  The calls came fast and furious from friends and neighbors across the county throughout the day, surrounding towns were literally underwater.

The mountain that we live on was impassable.  Buildings and roads were literally washing away.   There were already reports that it would be weeks before direct roads on and off the mountain would be passable.  The destruction came fast and furious, sparing no one and nothing in its path.   We had heard Wilmington, the next town over was one of the worst hit in the state.

The night of the storm, we attempted to go to Wilmington.  After an agonizing drive, we finally were able to get close enough to walk into the village.

I wish I could tell you that we walked into town that night to breathe a sigh of relief that the reports of damage were vastly exaggerated.  They weren’t.   It looked like a war zone.  Our mouths hung open in disbelief.  We stood in the center of town clasping hands with people we knew and even those we didn’t, tears streaming down all of our faces, crying out to God silently and aloud.   How could this have happened to our little town?  What would we do now?  Where was God?

I immediately empathized with the people of the Ancient Near East ias I read this morning’s Scripture passage.  This section of the book of Genesis can be dated near the time of the post-Babylonian exile around 530 B.C.E.  The post-exilic people would have been looking for a sign of covenant with God and God’s presence.  Their society and life as they knew it was in turmoil.   They had already experienced the demise of their government, and upheaval of their religious life.  Life was in chaos, and God was fed up.

Heart broken over humanity’s hard heartedness and lack of care of one another and creation, God has had enough.  And so, the creator of heaven and earth, the one who moved across the deep and breathed everything into creation, has returned the world to nothingness through a once in a lifetime flood.  In the Ancient Near Eastern world, water (particularly such violent, turbulent water) was the symbol of ultimate chaos.

And yet in the wake of chaos, this is where the story really gets good.  The text tells us that God sets God’s bow in the clouds.  In ancient civilization, the rainbow was imagined as God’s weapon (or literal bow) from which his arrows were shot.  God literally lays down God’s proverbial weapon against humankind in the sky as a sign of covenant and peace.  The Holy One turns away from vindication, and toward forgiveness, patience and love, even knowing that the human heart will always be imperfect.   We will continue to battle against God, creation, and one another, but God covenants with us never to destroy the earth again.  God has begun a new creation with those that were on the ark.

In this covenant is something truly remarkable.  Humankind is not bound to any kind of behavior, norms, or even standards.  Think about that with me for a minute.  We have to do absolutely nothing at all, and yet God pledges to love us, and deliver us always. Our God covenants to hold God’s self to the highest standards of love and care, even when we do not do the same in return.  Our God is one who remembers us, even and especially in the midst of the greatest chaos.

I know that I am not the only one who is familiar with the feeling of chaos.  We see it all around us.  We see chaos in war, the breakdown in civil and political discourse, and natural disasters, to name a few.  But, hurricanes and natural disasters are far from the only way that chaos comes into our own lives.  We see it individually as well.  There is breakdown in relationship.  There is the pain and deep ache of grief, or loss.  There are the demons of addiction.   Indeed beloved, chaos can lead us to some dark nights of the soul.

But while this passage from Genesis begins with chaos, it does not leave us there.   Chaos is not the end of the story for the Israelites.  Nor is it the end of the story for us.  In the moments that we believe we will never feel joy again, that there is no hope for us, this Scripture tells us that a rainbow is coming (even if we cannot see it). Just as the exiled people came to know God as the “one who remembered” them despite the chaos, so too does God remember us.   God’s covenant promises that God will never leave us alone.

This Sunday marks the first Sunday of our Lenten journey into the wilderness with Jesus, and with one another.  I don’t know about you, but growing up Lent was a time of giving up my favorite things.  It became a contest ever year to see how long I could go without chocolate, ice cream, or some other 40-day forbidden treat.   Of course, as I got older, I began to understand more about the theology of why people gave something up.  I saw it as part of their walk with Jesus through the wilderness.

And yet, as I reflect on the passage this morning, I want to invite us to a deeper, or perhaps new understanding of Lent.  Jesus does not call us to suffer simply for suffering’s sake.  It is not about giving something up, simply because it is what we are supposed to do.  Setting down chocolate, or lattes for 40 days will not automatically bring us closer to the Divine.  It is about making room in our lives for God.  About letting go of things that have been taking up unnecessary space, perhaps creating chaos, and allowing God to fill that space.

True closeness with God requires trust.  It requires leaning into God’s everlasting arms, and trusting God enough to do the hard work we cannot do on our own.  As we walk through the Lenten wilderness, I think all of us are called to examine the places of chaos in our own lives and hearts. Where is our own heartedness, lack of care of one another or God’s creation keeping us from living fully into God’s promise for us?   What are the hard choices this Lenten season may be calling us to make to live more fully into relationship with God and one another?  Where in our own lives are we so lost in the chaos or wilderness that we cannot see God’s rainbow shining in front of us, calling us to new life?

Often in Sunday School, we hold forth the story of Noah’s Ark and God’s rainbow covenant as an overarching message of God’s Grace, promise, and love for our children.  We paint rainbows on the walls of our Sunday school classrooms, or give them as gifts for things like Baptism.  And yet, they are no less a powerful reminder for us whether we are four, or ninety-four.  I often wonder what it might be like to paint rainbows on the walls of our sanctuaries, offices, or favorite room in our homes to remind us of this holy promise, and the things it calls us to.

About 48 hours after Hurricane Irene blew through Wilmington, the bright summer sun has returned to the sky.  The sky was blue, and storm clouds were nowhere to be found.  As the dust blew heavily through the air, and the clean-up efforts began, a rainbow just as bright as the one I imagine God gave to the Israelites that day spread across the Vermont sky.

In the midst of our chaos, there came a reminder of God’s promise that chaos would not have the last word.  God’s covenant was made new again.  So too can it be for us.

This is the good news this morning beloved.   There is chaos in the world, and in our lives.  There are indeed hurricanes and dark nights of the soul.  But there is calm after the storm.  There are rainbows of hope and promise, if only we will make room in our hearts and our lives for them.  One of my favorite preachers, Rev. Dr. Susan Smith says it like this:  Joy comes in the morning, the psalmist tells us.  And thanks be to God, morning always comes.   May we trust enough to uncover the chaotic places in our lives and in ourselves this Lenten season, knowing that God’s covenant dawns new each morning.  Amen.

“Why I am a Christion” by Rev. Judy Brain

Luke 15:11-32

Today’s sermon was first written for a pulpit exchange with a UU church Lexington.  Many of the people who had found their way to that particular Unitarian Universalist meeting were folks who had been wounded by the Christian Church.  They had been made to feel worthless and guilty by excessively judgmental theology; they had been demonized because they were gay; or they felt intellectually stifled by dogmatism.  For them, these negative expressions of our faith became emblematic of all Christianity.

Because of this undercurrent, there was a strong anti-Christian sentiment in the church.  UUs are all about open-mindedness.  One of their guiding principles is to respect and find value in many different religious traditions.  They embraced the teachings of Buddhism, Judaism, Hinduism, Native American spirituality.  But Christianity … not so much.

Christianity met with resistance—intolerance even—bordering on prejudice.  And to give them credit, they wanted to face this issue.  So they invited me to come and, in a sense, defend my faith.

While it seems like such a given, I realized that after more than 20 years in ministry, I’d never preached a sermon that specifically talked about why I am a Christian, so I met the challenge with enthusiasm.  But first, I needed to define my terms.  I like Jesus’ terminology—”I am the vine, you are the branches.”  I imagine Christianity as a vine or tree.

The roots are Jesus’ own Jewish tradition, the trunk, Jesus himself and the early “people of the Way,” then the ever-dividing branches.  Orthodoxy and Catholicism divide off the trunk, the Protestant Reformation sprouts off the Catholic limb, and from that Protestant branch, multiple outgrowths.  You couldn’t even name how many denominations and movements.

And here I sit on my particular twig—a liberal, progressive, UCC Christian; still connected to that trunk, but pretty distinct from all the other leaves and twigs in that enormous canopy.  If anyone claims to speak for all of Christianity, just roll your eyes and move on.

I didn’t really represent the Christianity most of those UUs rejected; we actually had a lot in common.  You probably know that old joke that UCC stands for Unitarians Considering Christ.

CHRISTIAN BY INHERITANCE

But, to answer the question, “Why are you a Christian?”  I would have to say that the bottom line is, I was born that way.  My parents were nominal Christians and sent me to church.  This was the only religion I knew.  Of course, that’s a wimpy motive.  I needed to do better.  Why would I continue to choose to be a Christian?  Many people in that UU congregation had turned their back on the faith of their childhood.

WHY DO I STAY IN THE CHURCH?

Why do I stay in the church?  Oh yes, I know that the church has a shameful history.  Great evils were perpetrated in the name of Christianity, but any institution can be exploited for corrupt ends.  Great harm has been done in the name of democracy, but we don’t abandon it; we keep trying to perfect it.

People have experienced cruelty within the shelter of a family, but we do not say, “Let’s do away with families!”  In spite of how unscrupulous people have distorted the teachings of Jesus, the church has much to offer, and to me, it is worth it.  I took from Christianity what I loved and what sustained me and left the rest.  And part of the goal of my ministry is to apologize for and correct those aspects that were oppressive and exclusionary.

So, what is it about this progressive Christian faith that I value so highly?  Here is my top 7 list.

#7           CHRISTIANITY is my spiritual path.

It is the means by which I approach the divine.  I love the music, the corporate worship, the stories that connect me to the past and give me guidance in the present.  The practices of Christianity lead me into prayerfulness.  When the Dalai Lama was asked by a pilgrim how to become enlightened, he replied, “Go deep into your own tradition.”

#6           IT PROVIDES ORDER AND MEANING

I love the shape that the Christian faith brings to life.  I thrive on its patterns of celebration and repentance, reflection and action.

I like Lent where we set aside time to look inward. Good Friday where we intentionally expose ourselves to suffering and death—a practice much avoided in our culture.

I love the idea of sabbath—rest, time out, renewal.  And not just a couple of weeks in the summer but a whole 24 hours every 7 days!  I like the way Christianity honors the whole of life: work and leisure, relationships and solitude, sorrow and pleasure.  Every bit of it is sacred.

#5            IT IS PSYCHOLOGICALLY HEALTHY

The starting place for my brand of Christianity is acceptance. Jesus teaches that we are loved no matter who we are or what we’ve done.

This does not mean we are not held accountable.  It means we are not cursed; we are not forever trapped in our sins.  There is always the potential to start over.  One of our most valuable beliefs is the doctrine of forgiveness.  We can be set free.

Christianity also provides a supportive community.  Isolation is a contributing factor in depression; we all need a helping hand now and then.  And we need to offer a hand to our neighbors.  Getting mixed up in a church can promote a balanced lifestyle.  There are studies that show it is even physically healthy to be a church-going Christian.  (I’m not sure about the cause and effect at play there; but I think there could be a health benefit from being part of a supportive faith community where you are cared for and extend care to others.)

#4           CHRISTIANITY GIVES PURPOSE TO MY LIFE

The Bible claims that everybody has been created in God’s image and called to be reflections of the divine.  Whoever you are, whatever you do, you have the high calling to be God-like in your actions—loving your self, your neighbor, and even your enemies.  What greater purpose could there be?  You are a part of something more profound than you are—something that calls you to become your best self.  And everyone is important and beloved. The CEO of a multimillion dollar hotel empire is no more valued than the woman who cleans toilets in his rooms.

The scripture’s emphasis on justice forms the way I live—how I spend my money, what I do with my time, my attitude toward the environment, the causes I support, the values I pass on to my children and grandchildren, whose interest I have in mind when I vote.  Jesus calls me to be in solidarity with those women who clean hotel toilets.

#3           THE LIFE OF JESUS MOVES ME

Who can remain unaffected by the story of “the man for others” as Albert Schweitzer called him?  Jesus, the spellbinding teacher who caught the imagination of simple peasants and rich folks alike and welcomed them all into his circle; the powerful healer who reached out to the most feared outcasts; the wily rabbi who confounded the wise; the radical reformer who died because he loved his people and believed in his mission to set them free.

#2           THE STORIES OF JESUS ARE PROFOUND AND COMPELLING

Today, instead of beginning with scripture as I usually do, I’m going to end with it and tell you my favorite of all Jesus’ parables.  A story that captures the essence of Jesus’ message about God’s grace. It embodies the core concepts of our faith—grace, forgiveness, and redemption.  And it also hints at the cost.  The story of the loving father who forgives his wayward son.

#1         INHERENT IN THIS STORY IS MY NUMBER ONE REASON FOR BEING A CHRISTIAN:  IT’S ALL ABOUT GRACE

I have a friend who ran a mission school in Pakistan.  She said that until she lived in a Middle Eastern country, she did not have an appreciation for the radical message of this story.  In that culture, the society that formed Jesus, what happens in this parable would have been beyond anyone’s imagination.

A son who behaved like the one in this story would have been cut off with no questions asked.  Children owe so much deference to their parents, especially the family patriarch, that it would be unthinkable for a child to treat his father with such disrespect and even more absurd for the father to take the initiative in forgiving him and accepting him back into the family with a celebration instead of punishment.  The father would have been ridiculed and shunned, condemned for being weak and ineffectual.  In this shocking parable, Jesus tells us this is what God is like.  I’m not going to comment further, let’s just allow this beautiful story speak to us. 

The Parable of the loving parent Luke 15:11-32

Once upon a time there was father who had two sons.  The younger came to him and said, “Father, give me my inheritance so I can seek my fortune.  And so he did.

And the young man traveled to a far country where he wasted his inheritance on hedonistic and dissolute living.  When everything was gone, he found himself in need and he went into the country and hired himself out to a farmer who gave him a job no self-respecting Jew could imagine—feeding the pigs.

He grew so hungry that he would have gladly eaten the pods the pigs were eating.  And no one gave him anything.

But then he came to himself and thought, “How many of my father’s hired hands have enough to eat and more, while here I am starving.  I will go to him and say, “Father, I am no longer worthy to be called your son.  Just take me in as one of your servants.”

But while he was trudging down the road to his parent’s farm, his father saw him while he was still a far way off and was filled with compassion.  And the father ran to his wayward son and kissed him and put a robe on his back and a ring on his finger and called to his servants, “Hurry, kill the fatted calf, prepare a feast!  And let’s celebrate. This son of mine was dead is alive again.  He was lost but now is found.”

Observing Lent: Lent began February 22, and leads us on a six-week journey to Easter on April 8. The Christian Education program offers a number of ways for families to enter into the season. Download this  Lenten Calendar  to help kids mark the 6 weeks and 6 Sundays of Lent.  Use the spaces on the calendar to mark off the days, or write in prayers or good deeds done. Also available, the  pamphlet Lenten Disciplines for Family Life  which has many suggestions for observing Lent. 

On Wednesdays throughout Lent, the Sanctuary will be open and the Labyrinth set up  for a time of prayer and reflection from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m.  Following this, Heidi Ward will be leading an Adult Education program,  “Spiritual Practices”  from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m. in the Reception Room.

 The More Than Words Book Drive continues. Donations may be left in the boxes in the side chapel.

Follow the Nicaragua trip on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Union-Church-In-Waban/140438821719

 and on the blog http://ucw-nicaragua.blogspot.com/.

Stacy is traveling in Nicaragua  and returns February 28. For pastoral needs, contact Deacon of the Month, Wanda Getchell (617-529-5001).

 Prayer Group meets Monday mornings at7:30 in the side chapel. While Stacy is in Nicaragua, Heidi Ward will lead on February 27.

 Strategy will meet on Thursday evening, March 1st at6:00 p.m.

 Can you help out in Sunday School on March 4?  One volunteer is needed to assist Kathy with a One Room Church School on this day.  No preparation is required.  Just show up and assist.  Let Kathy know if you can help.

Traveling Light by Max Lucado is the next book for Book Group. The next meeting will be Tuesday, March 13 at 7:30 p.m.

The Sunday School observes “Shrove Tuesday” on Sunday  with a pancake breakfast.  Kids should bring their cooking enthusiasm and their appetites.  All kids will gather together for the event in the Vestry following the Time for Children.

The More Than Words Book Drive continues. Donations may be left in the boxes in the side chapel.

Follow the Nicaragua trip on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Union-Church-In-Waban/140438821719  and on the blog http://ucw-nicaragua.blogspot.com/.

Stacy is traveling in Nicaragua as well and returns February 28. For pastoral needs, contact Deacon of the Month, Wanda Getchell (617-529-5001).

Prayer Group meets Monday mornings at 7:30 in the side chapel. While Stacy is in Nicaragua, Sandra DaDalt will lead on February 20, and Heidi Ward on February 27.

Bible Study will not meet on February 19, but will resume on February 26  and will be led on that day by Heidi Ward.

Can you help out in Sunday School on March 4?  One volunteer is needed to assist Kathy with a One Room Church School on this day.  No preparation is required.  Just show up and assist.  Let Kathy know if you can help.

“If you choose” by Rev. Stacy Swain

Psalm 30
Mark 1:40-45

It is early in Jesus’ ministry but already he is causing quite a sensation.  He is creating quite a stir.  People are streaming in from the surrounding villages to see Jesus, some full of expectation, others full of skepticism.  Some come with a bone deep need to be touched and healed, so painful is their alienation; but most come to take in the “show.”

New Testament scholar, Fred Craddock says that the crowd that surges around Jesus at this early stage of Jesus’ ministry is more of an audience than a congregation, more of a collection of the curious to be entertained than to disciples ready to participate in the mission of Jesus’ ministry.[1]

And then as if on cue, a leper shows up. This leper is nameless, for this man’s identity has been erased by his illness.  Leprosy is who he is. This bacterial skin disease that progresses slowly moving through the central nervous system and the skin tissue, twisting and distorting the body and face until, in its most extreme case, the person becomes unrecognizable.  People in ancient times were terrified of leprosy not just for the physical suffering it caused, but because leprosy was also seen as an outward manifestation of a spiritual disease, the spreading corruption of sin.[2]

I am reminded of how people with AIDS were seen in the early eighties.  I was working at the Pine Street Inn, one of Boston’s largest shelters at the time when the first diagnoses of AIDS was made in the homeless community.  We saw this sore covered, emaciated and twisted frame of the man and saw AIDS. And it scared us.  I remember how we feared him.  Not just the other homeless men and women staying at the shelter but us staff as well.  I will never forget the image of him sitting by himself in the overly crowded lobby eating a plate of scrambled eggs at a table where no one else dared to sit.

We have come a long way in our understanding of HIV and for the most part our society has become more embracing of people with the disease — but not entirely.   And I wonder who else are the lepers of today?  Are they the depressed, the addicted, the poor, the homeless – those who we define not for who they are but for the condition they suffer.  Or maybe they are the ones tucked out of sight at the Waban Health and Rehabilitation Center?  I wonder.

But in the reading today, it is the leper, the one branded as “a corpse haunting the edges of the community he could no longer enter”[3] comes to Jesus and says “If you choose, you can make me clean” (Mark 1:40).

Now, what happens next is really interesting and unexpected, but is also easily lost in the translation of the text that we have.  Our translation says that Jesus was “moved with pity,” but a textual note tells us that other ancient texts use the word anger, not pity here.  “Jesus was moved with anger.”

Throughout Jesus ministry he will encounter people in need and will be moved with compassion, but this is clearly not such an encounter.  Here the leper’s statement “If you choose, you can make me clean” engenders not compassion but anger. Why?  And then after Jesus does heal the man, the text says he sternly warned him and sent him away.  These phrases, scholarship tells us, are more like ones Jesus uses when speaking to demons not newly healed converts.

What is going on here?

Well one thing, I hear in this encounter is a set up.  Jesus is being set up, tempted to perform, to demonstrate his power.  For the words of the leper are strikingly similar to those Satan spoke to Jesus just a few weeks ago during Jesus’ time of temptation in the wilderness.

Satan tempts by trying to get Jesus to prove himself, to use the grace that God has given him as a proof of his own power and importance.  “Show us how great you really are Jesus by doing these remarkable things, like turning this stone into bread. “ “If you really are the Son of God it will be easy for you.  Come on let’s see it,” this is the temptation the Satan speaks.

Have you ever felt the whisper of this tempter in you as well?  Have you ever found yourself wanting and perhaps even needing, for so great is your suffering, to put Jesus to the test? Have you found yourself asking Jesus to prove that he is who we hope he will be?  As if to say, “If you are the Son of God, than take this suffering from me.”  Is there something in us that demands that our experience of Jesus be the testing ground for the authenticity of who he really is, a proofing ground for his Holy power?

I know this is a very fine line, because God does want to hear what is on our hearts.  In just a few minutes we will offer up heart-felt prayers for ourselves and others that is good.  But it is crucial to remember that the starting place of prayer is an honest offering up of what is on our hearts.  Prayer is not a challenge to God to prove to us something of God’s self or will.  A heart-felt prayer for healing is very different than a testing prayer that says, “if you are really a good and loving God then heal me or this person.”

So, faced with this temptation that Jesus walked away from in the wilderness, why does he engage it now? Why does he heal this leper?

I think it is because there is not just a temptation there but a human being -  a human being that is suffering not just from physical pain but also from and perhaps even more troubling to Jesus, is his social isolation and alienation.  Here is a human being, a child of God who others have deemed unclean and therefore cast out from community.

And so Jesus says “I do choose.  Be made clean.”  It was not really a choice after all, for the choice had already been made.   It had been made in the beginning when the breath of God moved across the face of the deep and all that is was called into being, and blessed as good. And it was already made again when on that night the word became flesh and Jesus was born in that manger.

The crowd may be spectators to miracle, the significance they do not understand, the leper so angry and hurting for all he has suffered that he tempts Jesus, but all of that really does not matters.

What matters in this messy mix, is that Jesus is not distracted, sidelined or discouraged from who God has asked him of him.  He is to be about helping people, as individuals and as community, to come to wholeness, and even more than that to undo the boundaries that keep some out in order to protect and maintain those that are on the inside.

For no doubt about it, individual lives are transformed by Jesus but I believe that what is at the heart of Jesus’ Messianic mission, at the heart of his life, death and resurrection is the transformation, the re- forming of how we are to be with each other and with God.  Jesus is about corporate (as in all of us together) regeneration, not just personal healing.

For this reason, after Jesus heals the man Jesus sends him to the priests –  for the priests were the ones who were charged with guarding the boundaries of community.   With the swirl of chaos that living in Roman occupation brought,  the priests were the ones that were charged to interpret and apply the holiness codes from the sacred texts of Leviticus that informed and governed the way that people were to live in order to keep chaos at bay and in order to preserve the sanctity of the people’s encounter with the holy.  It was the holiness codes that stipulated that one with leprosy was to be put out for the chaos of his physical and spiritual condition was a threat to the balance and sanctity of the community.[4]

We think of holiness codes as so outdated.  Something interesting and to be thoughtfully considered, but surely not something that informs our lives now.

But I wonder.  I wonder if this fear of chaos does not influence us still.  For how comfortable are we with our own and each other’s suffering?  Isn’t it hard it is to share our pain with each other?  I wonder if there is still some of that residual thinking that somehow suffering it is a sign that we are flawed in some way. That there is something wrong with us.  That we are unclean.

And so, to protect ourselves from the fear of being judged or excluded in some way, we keep silent.  And in our silence we alienate ourselves all the more.  And on the other side, how many of may know that another is hurting but we really don’t want to go there.  For their pain scares us.  We don’t really know what to say or what to do.  And maybe we even have the sense that if we let ourselves get too close, their suffering will infect or contaminate us somehow.   And so we keep our distance.  Perhaps, a part of us thinks it really would be best if that person ate their scrambled eggs over there, at that table alone?

You know we read these ancient texts and after two thousand odd years of trying to live into the example of Jesus together, perhaps we have learned a thing or two, but in many ways the temptations and dangers remain.

It is easy to gather around Jesus because we think that maybe something spectacular will happen.  Maybe all that these texts are saying is true and we show up because we may catch a glimpse of it for ourselves. And this is not the worst thing in the world really, God can work with this.

But what if we showed up not as spectators to miracles but because we were convinced that through God’s grace we could become miracles ourselves?  What if we sat down at that table with the one who sat alone?  What if we were the means through which those who felt isolated because of their pain and suffering where welcomed back into community? What if we were not audiences to what God is doing but a congregation (a coming together of people) through which God is enacting healing and wholeness and the reformation of God’s blessed creation?  What would that feel like? What would that feel like?

Well,  it may be like twenty or so of us traveling to Nicaragua so that we may give of ourselves and receive from others so that the boundaries of “us” and “them” may be blurred and we may discover our God given purpose for us all.

It may look like the face of Bret, as tears streamed down his face on Friday at the Waban Health and rehabilitation Center all of  us shared in the bread and the cup, the communion of the love of God.

It may look like the meeting I had with you this week where we took time to think about how we can do what we want to do while at the same time making sure that our needs do not come at the expense of others.

I am so inspired and moved by you.  For you seek not to be spectators but participants.  Not an audience but a congregation, committed to engaging in the transformation not just of us alone, but of us together. This is why Jesus came.  This is why he walk among us still,  AMEN.

The More Than Words Book Drive continues.

Donations may be left in the boxes in the side chapel.

Xenia Barahona from The Center for Global Education will speak to us about Nicaragua Sunday on the stage.  Join the Nica travelers for this informative event.

The Nicaragua trip departs on February 17th. Follow their journey on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Union-Church-In-Waban/140438821719 and on their blog http://ucw-nicaragua.blogspot.com/.

 Stacy will be traveling to Nicaragua as well and will be gone from February 17 to February 28.  For pastoral needs, contact Deacon of the Month, Wanda Getchell.

 If anyone has any used or new baseball gloves they would like to donate for the youth of Nicargua, please contact David Spertner.

 Youth Group meets this Sunday from4:00-5:30 p.m.  We will use our bake sale money to go shopping for supplies for the trip to Nicaragua.  Kids need to come with a permission slip for the shopping trip. If you have a large capacity vehicle you can lend Kathy for this shopping excursion, please let her know.

Prayer Group meets Monday mornings at7:30 in the side chapel. While Stacy is in Nicaragua, Sandra DaDalt will lead on February 20, and Heidi Ward on February 27.

The Mission and CE Committees are looking for a group of adults and kids to deliver Valentine gifts to the residents of the Waban Health Center at their Valentine party on Valentine’s Day afternoon, Tuesday, February 14. We will be taking soaps (made by our kids) and paperwhites (planted by our kids).  If you can go, let Kathy Malone know.

Bible Study will not meet on February 19, but will resume on February 26

 and will be led on that day by Heidi Ward.

One time helpers are needed for the Sunday School on February 26 and March 4.  We have one room church schools on these days.  No preparation is necessary.  Just show up and assist.  Let Kathy know if you can help.

Mark 1: 29-39

“Making Grace Visible” by Rev. Stacy Swain

I love words.  I really do.  I delight in a well turned phrase and appreciative thoughtful, articulate, speech.  I remember what a joy it was to listen to one of my professors in seminary who spoke with such crystalline clarity that hearing his words was akin to gazing at a Vermeer painting.

Words wash over us here each Sunday morning as we read and pray and preach together.  And maybe, once in a while there is a well turned phrase that gives us pause or if we are lucky maybe even a moment of crystalline clarity.

But words have limits.  They can take us just so far.  We can talk about grace and forgiveness, and love, but grace, forgiveness and love will remain an abstraction for us until what is spoken is experienced.  Until we feel grace and forgiveness, and love for ourselves, until these words becomes embodied — in our flesh and blood experience.

Words can go just so far. That’s why, God gave us Jesus.  Jesus — the word made flesh.   Jesus, because people needed not just to hear about God but people needed to experience the sacred holiness of God for themselves.  Jesus – because people did not just need to hear about grace and forgiveness and love; they needed to feel the hand of grace, and forgiveness and love upon them lifting them up and being changed by that touch.

In the passage from the Gospel of Mark we see this happening.  Jesus has been in the synagogue teaching and I am sure he spoke beautifully – I am sure there were many well turned phrase, and many many moments crystalline clarity.

But words can go just so far.   So Jesus leaves the synagogue and enters the home of Simon and after hearing that Simon’s mother in law is in bed with a fever, he goes over to her and without saying a word, he takes her by the hand and lifts her up.

It is said, that the church, all of us together in this place and all of us across the world together are the body of Christ.  As church, we are to embody Jesus in this time.  Certainly we are to speak and teach of what we know. But if we are the body of Christ in the world, we are also to go to the bedside of the one with fever and take her by the hand and lift her up.  In the way we look upon each other, in the way we touch each other, in the way we walk through the world with each other, we are to make God’s grace visible, something seen and experienced.

But can we be the body of Christ, embodying grace, forgiveness and love, if we have not ourselves experienced grace, forgiveness and love for ourselves?  How can we be Jesus in the world if we have not experienced him?

Thankfully, like that bumper sticker so succinctly puts it, “Grace Happens.”  Grace happens all around us all the time, sweeping us up in moments of unexpected joy.  Ordinary moments that open out into encounters with something extraordinary.  You can name these moments can’t you?  Moments in our live together in this place, moments of your lives out in the world?  It happened to me yesterday when I was visiting a dear friend who had just had a knee replacement.  We were chatting in her hospital room when all at once the room was filled with such an extraordinary presence of love and care that I could feel it physically washing over us both, healing her wounded body and calming my concern.  I am sure that what we experienced was the touch of the sacred upon us, lifting us up.

And thankfully, we have these sacraments of baptism and communion.  In them a window to the divine is thrown open, the Holy Spirit rushes down upon us.  The hand of Jesus is on us and we are lifted up again, raised into life in Christ, fortified again as his body in the word.

Did you feel it just now?    When the water streamed from Graham’s forehead, could you feel that blessing flowing over you as well?  I know many of you came in here world weary but as you turned to welcome Graham as I brought him to you and as Suzie’s voice soared over us, did you see how your faces glowed?  Did you see it in the face of the one across from you how beautiful it was? Did you see in that face grace, and blessing and love?  Did you see it?  Did you feel it?

And in a few moments we sit gather at the communion table with Jesus.  We will take the bread that is broken for us and the wine that is poured out for us into our bodies, and as we do so the forgiveness and love of God will enter us again, Jesus will be become again part of who we are and in doing so we will be changed into and fortified as the body of Christ, again.

Here as the church, the body of Christ in the world, we do not just talk about grace, and forgiveness and love, we live it. We live it for Graham, we live it for each other and we live it for the one who is with fever, the one with pain, the one who is lonely, the one who is hungry, the one out in the world right now experiencing violence and hopelessness.  We are the Body of Christ in the world.   Thanks be to God, for a faith that is embodied.  AMEN.

The More Than Words Book Drive continues.
Donations may be left in the boxes in the side chapel.

Xenia Barahona from The Center for Global Education will speak to us about Nicaragua on Sunday, February 12 at 11:30 a.m. on the stage.
Join the Nica travelers for this informative event.

Bible study is reading through the Book of Luke and meets each Sunday morning
from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.

Living Waters Prayer Group will meet on Monday, February 6 at 7:30 a.m.

The Mission and CE Committees are looking for a group of adults and kids to deliver Valentine gifts to the residents of the Waban Health Center at their Valentine party on Valentine’s Day afternoon, Tuesday, February 14. We will be taking soaps (made by our kids) and paperwhites (planted by our kids). If you can go, let Kathy Malone know.

The Nicaragua trip departs on February 17. Follow the journey on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Union-Church-In-Waban/140438821719

and on the blog http://ucw-nicaragua.blogspot.com/.

Stacy will be traveling to Nicaragua as well and will be gone from February 17 to February 28.
For pastoral needs, contact Deacon of the Month, Wanda Getchell.

One time helpers are needed for the Sunday School on February 26 and March 4. We have one room church schools on these days. No preparation is necessary. Just show up and assist. Let Kathy know if you can help.

Sermon, January 29, 2012

“What am I doing here!?” offered by Rev. Stacy Swain

1 Corinthians 8:1-13
Mark 1:21-28

You know it’s really rather astonishing that week after week you come into this place.

You greet each other with a warm embrace, or words of care.  There is often laughter; sometimes tears and, if we are lucky, there is even a baby’s cry.

Some of you are here early, while others pile through those doors, long after the processional hymn has faded.  You come in tucking in shirts and wiping breakfast from faces and yet in you come.

You slide into well worn pews, whispering cues to your kids, underlining with your finger where we are in the bulletin or in the hymn so they can join in.

Others of you settle back yawning off a week’s fatigue of running too fast and having too little.

And as the peace of this place settles around you, a few of you nod off for a moment or longer, catching up on some much needed sleep.

In you come.  Week after week.

It’s astonishing.  Here we are in this post modern world, and yet are engaged in a millennia-old practice of worship.  Here we are with a QR code in our bulletin and yet are contemplating what it is to have Galilean dust on our sandals.

What are we doing?

Let us listen to what the Gospel of Mark has to say.

But first let us pray:  May the words of my mouth and the mediations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you O God, our rock and our redeemer, Amen

It is the Sabbath.  The work of the week is over.  As the last light fades, and the candles are lit, the people gather to study Torah.

An itinerant teacher named Jesus is in town so the people ask if he’d be willing to open scripture for them. And he does.  Though it is the same scroll that is reverently unrolled every week, it sounds somehow different when Jesus reads it.  And when he looks up and begins to teach, the people feel as if their hearts are aflame in their breasts.  They are astonished. “Listen to how he speaks.” They say.  “It is with an authority that we have not heard before.   (Luke 1:22)  What is this kind of authority?”

The question of the source of Jesus’ authority will swirl around Jesus throughout his ministry and ultimately it will be what gets him killed.

But, while everyone else may wonder at this authority that Jesus has, Jesus himself does not.  Jesus is perfectly clear that his authority comes   not because he knows better, or because he is smarter or more important.   And even through crowds are beginning to follow him and reports of him are reaching every place in the region, he is also perfectly clear that this authority of his is not conferred upon him by those that follow him.

Jesus knows that what the people find so compelling has nothing really to do with him at all, but has everything to do with the God who called him beloved as the waters of the Jordan streamed from his face.  For what the people find so compelling is that through him they are see something of God.  When they hear his words, as their heart burns within them, they are reawakening to Eden.  They feel  God’s primordial blessing upon them and they sit up a bit straighter, they lean in a bit closer, they listen a bit more deeply because there is a blessing being spoken that they remember, and long for and are experiencing again.

And then when Jesus words are hanging there in the candlelit air and the people are wondering about how these words speak to their lives right there in the midst of Roman occupation, and poverty, and fear, and hurt, there is a commotion in the back of the synagogue.  Everyone turns around as someone from the back shouts out “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth.”

The people turn to Jesus with the question the unclean spirit in their mouths as well.  “What does any of this have to do with us?” “How is anything of this going to change anything?”  “When I leave this place, I will still owe more than I can pay.  When I leave this place, I will be as fearful for my future as when I came in. What does all this talk have to do with anything?”  And though there was one man in the back with the unclean spirit upon him, Jesus looked out over all of them and sees the burden of demons upon them all.

And with a heart wide open, he walked over to that man in the back who dared to speak his pain and said “Be silent, come out of him!”   And looking deep into the man’s eyes I hear Jesus saying,  “You are a beloved child of God.  With you God is well pleased.”  In that candlelit moment, I am certain that more than one unclean spirit fled into the darkness.

Isn’t that is why we come?  Isn’t that is why we let the coffee get cold on the counter and leave the dog still begging for her morning walk?   Jesus isn’t just a compelling teacher. His words are not just interesting.  No, they are, he is, life changing.  We come here each Sunday, like those of old to open the scriptures and to learn from them about what God is doing in the world and how we are to be a part of it.  But we also come here with demons on our backs. There is something that has a grip on us, that is keeping us out of Eden.  Something that is doing all it can to keep us from living into the wholeness God envisions for us.

Don’t be ashamed of that.  It does not mean you have failed or are less than or somehow screwed up.  It is simply a part of what it is to be a part of the human condition.  What is so radically, counter cultural and incredibly freeing about church is that here we do not have to pretend that we do not need anyone or anything.

We get to come into this place and say. Yes, I have the demon of fear upon me.  Yes, I have the demon of shame upon me.  Yes, I have the demon of bitterness and anger and hate upon me.  We get to come into this place not just with ourselves but all that is upon us.

So what came with you today?  What clings to your back?  Is it fear for your future?  Is it frustration at how self centered and demanding our adolescent children can be?  Is it anger and frustration at an aging body that keeps you from living the life you want?   Is it outrage at the unfairness of a life drowning in difficulty?  Is it enslavement to an addiction of one kind or another?  Is it a buried rage at a wrong that cannot be righted?  Is there a sadness that cannot be spoken?  A shame that cannot be faced?  What is it for you this day?  What is it that you need to be freed from so that you too can taste Eden?

The book group this month has been reading a remarkable book entitled Unbroken.  It is a true story written by Laura Hillenbrand, the author of “Sea Biscuit”, Louie Zamperini, an Olympic athlete who joins the air force in WWII.  It is the story of how Louis’ plane is shot down over the Pacific and of how he survive 47 days on a life raft.  It is the story of how He is picked up by the Japanese and taken first to secrete interrogation camps and then to POW camp.  The book is a powerful testimony to the tenacity of the human spirit and it is a disturbing exploration of what we do to each other — of how violence, deprivation and abuse can strip degrade and dehumanize us.   It is a story of the human condition of how we put demons on each other’s backs.  It speaks not to just then, but the now I hear in reports from Doctors without Borders that speaks of torture occurring right now, right now, in Libyan detention centers.

Louie survives his tormenters.  His POW camp is liberated by allied forces, but nightmares haunt him.  He begins drinking too much and is overcome by bouts of uncontrollable rage. He is clearly not of his right mind. His spirit is unclean. He is in the hands of a demon.

Until one night, when he wandered into a tent rival in LA. Billy Graham was up front telling the crowd about Jesus but all Louis felt was anger and rage.  Like that man in the synagogue so long ago, Louis stand up ready to bolt, screaming in his heart “What have you to do with any of what I have experienced of the pain that I feel.” But in that moment, Louis finally feels all of his rage and pain, the unclean spirit that was choking the life out of him leave.  He was free.   Never again does Louis have nightmares of his tormenter. Never again does he drown his rage in drink.

Hillenbrand writes of Louie’s reflections as he thinks back on that night:  “When he thought of his history, what resonated with him now was not all that he had suffered but the divine love that he believed had intervened to save him.  He was not the worthless, broken, forsaken man that the Bird (his chief tormentor) had striven to make of him.  In a single, silent moment, his rage, his fear, his humiliation and hopelessness had fallen away.  He believed he was a new creation and for that he wept.”[1]

But being reclaimed by God, being made free of the unclean spirit that has its grip on us is not the only reason why we stumble into this sanctuary every Sunday. There is more.

A couple of weeks ago, one of you told of how your teenaged daughter raked you over the coals when soon after getting to church she discovered that no other of her young friends had made it that morning.  Completely put out, she demanded “What am I doing here?!”  As if to say, what is the point of me being here if my friends are not!

We come into this place week after week not only because we have a need to be liberated us from that which diminishes us, but also because we know that life lived in its fullest is life lived together.  Let me repeat that,  life lived in its fullest is life lived together.

H. Richard Niebuhr, the 20^th century theologian writes compellingly of this need to respond to each other in his book The Responsible Self.[2]  Niebuhr claims that the ethos or way of living that enables us to be most fully alive is not that of striving to achieve some goal, or of following some prescribed rules for living. The ethos that enables us to be most fully alive is living a responsive life.   Listening and responding to the words and actions of those around us and having them listen and respond to our words and actions that is what we do, who we are.

But what the key is that we listen and respond not out of our own authority based on self interest, but out the kind of authority Jesus lived, out of God love. When we do that for and with each other, a new way of being in the world and with each other is born.  A new creation unfolds.  Eden is again.

Jesus is doing this all the time.  Starting here in the synagogue.  Jesus calls the unclean spirit out of the man not to demonstrate his own power, but in order that this once sidelined man can step into the embrace of the community.  Jesus will go through his entire ministry doing this. He will heal the hemorrhaging woman calling her daughter, reinstating her back into her community. He will redefine belonging not based on whose household you were born into but as a shared kinship as brothers and sisters, as children of God.

This is at the heart of Paul’s teaching to the community in Corinth that Stu read for us today.  A dispute has arisen about eating meat.  Not just any meat though.  Corinth was a cosmopolitan town where many people from any religions lived.  The town was full of shrines and temples to a pantheon of gods.  It was the custom to sacrifice animals. Some of the meat after sacrifice  sold in the market place.  So those followers of Jesus argues that it surely can do no harm to eat this eat since they know that there is no other god but God.  None of this other god worship or temple meat has any meaning and therefore cannot be of harm.

Paul says yes that is true, but if there are some in your community who are new converts. Who are shaky in their faith, who may be confused by seeing you eat meat sacrificed to other gods, then why would you do it? Don’t gloat in knowing you are right.  Love of your fellow Christian is more important than whether you do or do not eat meat.

Knowing you are right just puffs up, he says. But it is love that builds up.  And we are in the business of building up. That is also why we come.

One final thought.  Did you know we have a facebook page?  We study Scripture that is more than two thousand years old but also we a have an online presence that ought to be always new and changing. But when I sit down in front of my computer to update our status, I always pause.  I know the whole point of updating our status is convey to others all that is happening here and to invite them to be a part of it.  But I always end up wanting to type the same thing “experiencing God’s love and learning to love each other in the same way.”  Or perhaps “Growing in love of God and of each other.”  And then “ Yep, still at it, we are growing in love.”

Not too catchy I know, but it is true.  Whether our youth are raising over $500 dollars in a bake sale for Nicaragua; or whether the women in the church are gathered for good soup and heart-felt conversation; or whether the stewardship committee is thinking deeply about how best to manage our investments, our status is about loving God and loving each other.  It is a message as old as the Galilean dust on our sandals and as new as the deliverance that is ours this today.  Thanks be to this loving and timeless God of ours and thanks be to this community through which we come to experience that love.  AMEN

Jonah 3:1-5, 10

Mark 1:14-

Jonah, the “reluctant prophet” who God has to call two times before he begrudgingly does what God asks of him.

Jonah, the rebellious prophet who when he first hears God’s call to Nineveh goes in the exact opposite direction, jumping on a boat and fleeing for Spain.

Jonah, who gets himself tossed overboard to calm a tremendous storm, who is swallowed by a whale, who ends up spending three days in the belly of that whale before being vomited out onto dry land.

Jonah, who finally goes off to Nineveh to deliver God’s message but is so bitter about having to do so that afterwards he marches off in a huff to a bluff outside the city, to pout and fume.

Jonah, who gets so angry when God makes a bush to spring up to give him shade only then to be devoured by a worm the next day, that he rants “why not just kill me now!”

This book of Jonah seems like it ought to be prophetic after all it is set in the Bible in right next to the greats as Isaiah, Jeremiah, Micah and Amos.  And his call seems authentic for it begins with the prophetic announcement “Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah.”

But with all the odd and rather comical twists and turns of this narrative, one has to wonder what the prophetic message of the book really is.  Is its prophetic message the words that Jonah reluctantly speaks to the people of Nineveh?  The words that were read to us today? Or is there more going on here? [1]

Before we dive into that question.  Let us pray.

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you O God, our rock and our redeemer.  Amen.

             Jonah is often referred to as the reluctant prophet as if reluctance is that which distinguishes him from all the other prophets of the Bible. But in fact, reluctance is not atypical for prophets.  When a human being hears the word of God telling him or her to go out and say something bold, something that often runs against the grain of the status quo, the dominant culture, the prevailing myth of the time, reluctance — if not outright protestation — is most often how the “would be” prophet responds.

We have a tendency these days, especially in my profession, to glamorize or romanticize the prophets.  If someone says “O, he has a prophetic voice,” or that “she has a prophetic ministry,” we all sit up a bit straighter and nod knowingly (trying to hide just a shade of envy perhaps) for who wouldn’t want to have the hand of God upon them, who wouldn’t want to have the words of God in one’s own mouth?

Who wouldn’t?  Well a true prophet of course.  The role of a prophet is a hard and dangerous one.  The prophet is called when there is a rift in the relationship between God and the people.  The role of the prophet is to mediate between God and God’s people when things are not going well.

Remember Moses, the great prophet of the Exodus, when he goes up Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments and then comes back down only to find that the “stiff necked people” have turned from their faith in God to bow down to a golden calf, an idol of their own making.  Remember how angry God gets and how God threatens to destroy them all?  But then Moses steps into the breach, into the broken relationship between God and God’s people and talks God down from destruction.  Moses asks God to remember God’s love for the people, to forgive them — and God does.

Or do you remember, how the prophet Micah speaks truth to power, chastising the wealthy and privileged for their excesses, naming the injustice of an economic system that privileges and protects the prosperity of a few while consigning the rest to poverty and branding them as less than and not deserving.

Standing in the breach and speaking God’s vision is difficult and dangerous work.  Not something taken on lightly.  Remember the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, and Archbishop Oscar Romero.

But as high as the cost is of doing the job of a prophet, not doing it is even higher.   For salvation is at stake.   The deliverance of a people hangs in the balance.  Deliverance from misguided, unjust, sinful ways of being in the world that rob them and others from experiencing the full, glorious humanity that God has entrusted to them and envisions for all is at hand.

What a responsibility.  No wonder Moses, when standing face to face with the burning bush and hearing the message that God asked him to speak to the great and powerful Pharaoh, was reluctant.  He stammers “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?”  Or Isaiah, when the word of the Lord comes to  him and he is to speak to Jerusalem of how they have strayed from equity and justice of God’s vision, Isaiah protests “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips!”

So it is not the reluctance of a prophet that distinguishes Jonah.  Reluctance is a natural response when faced with one’s own limitations and the enormity of the task at hand.

What distinguishes Jonah is that his reluctant stems not because he fears he is not capable of what is being asked of him or even because he fears for his own safety, after all Nineveh is the capital of the Assyrian empire, arch enemies of the Hebrew people; but because he thinks that the people to whom God has asked him to speak do not deserve it.  For Jonah, it is not he who is lacking; it is the people of Nineveh.  The scripture tells us that Jonah flees from God when God first asks him to deliver the message because Jonah knows that God is “a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and relenting from disaster.” (Jonah4:2).  Given what Jonah knows of God, Jonah fears that God may very well extend God’s grace to the Ninevites; that God may well deliver them into new life and in Jonah’s mind that would be just about the worst thing possible.  In fact, Jonah would rather die than deliver the life changing message that God wants Jonah to speak.

That is why Jonah runs away to sea.  That is why Jonah pouts on the hillside.  That is why Jonah rants, “Just kill me now God.”

The prophetic message of the book lies not in the words that Jonah speaks but in the person and actions of Jonah himself.  The book in its entirety is a carefully crafted farce or parody that uses hyperbole to bring into relief the tight fisted, greedy, self serving mind of Jonah that he himself is blind to. The book of Jonah is a prophetic utterance warning of the choice we have to make between greed and grace.

For grace is happening all around.  The sea and sailors, the whale and worm, the very lowest of low, the people of Nineveh and even the animals are all aware of it. They are all participants in this flood of grace of forgiveness and second chances and new beginnings.  And then there is Jonah, so entrenched in his world view that he is missing out on it all.  What was it about Jonah? Exclusive and self centered, he thinks he knows better than God. That he knows what should and should not be. The only one that looses out in this story is Jonah.  His refusal, his inability to engage grace ultimately leaves him sidelined.

The book of Jonah, it is believe was written in the post exilic time when the Hebrew people were struggling to make sense of what just happened to them.  When they were prying their fingers open to release their understanding of God as just their own tribal God concerned with only their well being to a wider and wilder understanding of God as moving in the world in ways they could not understand but that ultimately they were called not just to trust but to participate in.  This tension between wanting to hold onto God for ourselves and the expansiveness of God’s grace is reflected in beautiful and lyrical passages that pepper the prophetic literature about the Hebrew people being the ones through whom all the nations will come to know God.  Listen to these words that speak the vision of reconciliation.

It shall come to pass in the latter days
that the mountain of the house of the LORD
shall be established as the highest of the mountains,
and shall be lifted up above the hills;
and all the nations shall flow to it,

The grace of God is not just for one people but for all.

And so the book of Jonah is a powerful indictment of our tendency toward self absorption.  Our own tendency to clutch onto our way of seeing things.  Our own sense of entitlement.  Our own tendency to determine who we think is worthy and who is not.

So I wonder what the book of Jonah in its prophetic indictment of greed and exclusivity in the face of grace, may help us to see about ourselves or about the social, economic and political landscape of our time?  Do we think there are some outside of God’s grace? Some who are undeserving and better left out?

If Jonah is a teaching of warning, the gospel passage today is a teaching of inspiration. While Jonah focuses on himself the Disciples are being draw into the time that has come.    “Follow me,” Jesus says, and they do.  When God calls we are to trust that what God asks of us is what is needed not only for ourselves but for the greater good.  The time is now.  We are no longer waiting.  “The kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the Good News.” The God of love and forgiveness, of second chances and new beginnings is at work in the world.  The seas and the whale, the bush and the worm, even the rulers and animals of Nineveh see it, participate in it, rejoice in it.  Will we?  Let us be informed and warned by the book of Jonah.  Let us never hold too tightly what we believe is ours.  Let our hands and hearts be open so that like Simon and Andrew, James and John we may be led into the future God envisions.  Amen

 The Youth Group Bake Sale takes place Sunday from 9:30-11:30 a.m.outside Starbucks.  Stop by for a goodie. The Youth will use the money raised to buy school supplies for next month’s mission trip to Nicaragua.

 Ice Cream Party This year our Noah’s Ark and Faithful Friends classes have been working on skills that build community.  To celebrate having filled their marble jars
of good behavior, they will have an ice cream party at the end of class on Sunday.
 

Living Waters Prayer Group will meet on Monday, January 23 at 7:30 a.m.

 The NICA Committee will meet Sunday after worship.

 Youth Group Ski Trip January 27-29. Ski at Stratton Mountain. Stay at Buz and Karen’s condo in Bondville, VT.  RSVP to Kathy.

Book Group The next meeting is Tuesday, January 31 at 7:30 p.m. in the Reception Room.  We are reading Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand.

Guest Speaker on Nicaragua

 Please join the Nicaraguan travelers on the stage on Sunday, January 29 at 11:30  as we hear from Xenia Barahona from the Center for Global Education.   Xenia will speak to us about the history of Nicaragua and the current social, political and economic landscape of the country. Xenia was born and raised in Nicaragua, where her family lives, and came to Boston six years ago where she now resides with her husband.  Throughout her life she has worked in cross-cultural education, bringing awareness around issues of social justice.  She is passionate about experiential education as a tool for personal and societal transformation. Xenia has worked organizing and leading short-term travel seminars to Central America with organizations such as The Council of Protestants Churches in Nicaragua (CEPAD), the Center for Global Education/Augsburg College,  and the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC).  Currently she works as a medical interpreter at Shriners Hospital for Children in Boston.  She has a B.A. in Translation from the Central American University in Managua and a M.A. in Urban and Environmental Policy from Tufts University.

  Bring your curiosity and questions! This will be an interesting and informative discussion.

“Being Called”

Second Epiphany 2012-1 Samuel 3:1-10, John 1:43-51

I was in the sixth grade the first time I really understood the idea of what it meant to be “called”.  It was my first year of middle school full of all of the things a first year in middle school is often ripe with:  anxiety, a new wing of the building, my first locker, a particularly unfortunate haircut…you get the drift.

After months of struggling through my adolescent angst, I read a flier about auditions for the upcoming school musical.  I had always loved to sing, and had been in the school chorus for as long as I could remember.  But I had never auditioned for a musical.  I couldn’t get up in front of all of those people and perform by myself!

Well, as mothers often do, mine begged to differ.  Insisting it was an excellent idea, she cheered me along the road to try outs.  After a couple of brush-ups with a voice coach, and as much confidence as I could muster, I went to the auditions.

I have to say that it wasn’t the awful experience I feared it would be.  I sang my solo, I sat down in my chair, no one laughed, and I am here today to tell you that I landed a part in the chorus.  But landing the part wasn’t the pinnacle of that experience for me.

It was watching with rapt attention over the coming months as the woman who became my drama director turned our band of middle and high school misfits into a cast fit for the professional stage.  She cheered, coached, and drove us to bring our absolute best to the stage every time.  She polished and molded each of us into individual performers richer than we knew we could be.

I remember asking her about halfway through rehearsals, how do you do it?  How do you make everything work so well?  She responded simply, it is what I was called to do.  While it would be a few years before I could truly appreciate what that meant, I was struck by the idea of being “called” to a profession.

Scripture is rich with examples of people answering God’s call.  In this week’s text, we hear the story of God’s call to Samuel.  This story is written in a time when the people of Israel were longing for leadership, for a king.   While it later chronicles Israel’s monarchy, we begin this text with the story of a prophet, Samuel.  He is a most unlikely messenger, a young, adolescent boy.

The story of Samuel’s call by God is one of words and hearing.  Unlike Kings that came after him, Samuel did not have an ornate palace to try and prove his call from God.  Moreover, he did not even want to be a King!  He had only ears to listen and a mouth to share God’s message.  And although he did not want to be a King, this prophet did become a king-maker.  He set moral authority in Israel that lay the groundwork for rulers to come.  Surely Israel would not have been the same without him.

Tomorrow is Martin Luther King, Jr. day.    The day we have set aside to honor his legacy of justice, peace, service, and faithfulness.  I am sure that many of you know pieces of his story.  Frank shared some with us during children’s time this morning.  Dr. King’s March on Washington and “I Have a Dream” speech are defining pieces of our lives and culture today.

There is however a piece of his story that hits close to home which some of you may not know.  In 1951, Dr. King came to Boston University to pursue a Doctorate in Systematic Theology.  It was at Boston University that he first met Coretta Scott King who later became his wife and partner in life, ministry, and the pursuit of justice.

As Boston’s Baptist community grew riveted with King’s preaching and dynamic style, his reputation grew.  A former roommate recalls that friends and visitors came to their Dorchester apartment from far and wide.  They would join in the conversations about civil rights.   Memoirs on King’s life talk about how he reveled in this time.  Never before had he been in a place where he had felt so free and equal.  The possibilities seemed endless.  It was during this time at Boston University that Dr. King’s first reflections on how to end segregation and ease racial tensions in the South began in earnest.

And it was in these reflections that he came to realize that he could not stay in this northern “safe haven” he had developed.  His passion for justice and equality for all was calling him back to his home in the deep South.   There was much work to be done, and they needed a person of his gifts, skill and talent.  He said, here I am, Lord, send me.  And God did.

And so in 1953, he went home.  He married Coretta, and in the coming years came the Montgomery Bus Boycotts, the foundation of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the passage of the Civil Rights Act.

Now, I am certain that staying in Boston was probably pretty appealing to Dr. King.  There was a safety and security, a level of comfort in his life here.  He could have easily pastored a church, preached a good word on Sunday mornings, and left the hard fought battles of the civil rights movement to someone else.  But instead, he took a risk.  He said no to the comfortable and familiar, and yes to God.

And so did the people who became part of his movement.  Like Samuel, this preacher’s kid from Atlanta, Georgia was an unlikely messenger who bravely listened and answered God’s call.  And like Samuel, he was a leader in his own right, setting the tone for our nation through his rich oratory and community organizing.  Surely we would not be the same without him.

I am reminded of Dr. King as I reflect on this week’s text from the Gospel of John as well.  Jesus travels to Galilee where he finds Philip.  He asks Philip to become a disciple.  Now, I don’t know about you, but I can only imagine Philip’s emotions were running high.  He has been asked by the messiah to follow him!  And of course, he runs to find his friend Nathaniel to share in this news.

Upon finding Nathaniel, he tells him that he has found the one about whom Moses and the Prophets have written.  He has found Jesus of Nazareth!  Nathaniel replies:  Can anything good come from Nazareth?  You see, Nathaniel has heard of Nazareth’s reputation.  A reputation that it was a place of depravity, and well, certainly not somewhere a MESSIAH should come from.  How on earth could God be sending a messenger from a place like that?

Yet, I found myself exclaiming out loud as I read the text:  OF COURSE something good can come from Nazareth.  Because God has a long history of choosing messengers from the most unlikely places to bring us the things we need to hear most.

I wonder how many of you have experienced something like Samuel, or Dr. King?  You have felt the unmistakable tug of God’s call, pulling your life in a new and perhaps unseen direction.  Maybe at first you resisted, pushing aside the tug on your heart or encouraging words of others to pursue a new vocation, or project?  Maybe you stood alone in a room having a strongly worded conversation with God about how God MUST mean someone other than you.  Because you are just not equipped to do this thing that you are being called to do.

This week’s scriptures challenge us to listen to God’s call in our lives.  To hear the places where we are being called out of our comfort zones, to speak truth to power, to work for justice for the oppressed, to make a change in our own lives even if we are not sure where the road is leading.  For God’s call did not stop with Samuel, or Dr. King.  God is still speaking to us today, calling us to share God’s very heart with bold audacity into a world that so desperately needs it.

I’m sure that Dr. King did not always see the road ahead of him with clarity.  But he moved forward knowing that this is who he was called to be.  I’m sure there were nights that my drama director sat in our auditorium at 8 PM, watching us run the same scene for the 10^th time, wondering if she could keep going.  But she did, secure in the knowledge that this was where God called her to be.  I’m sure that there were moments that Samuel was sure that God must have meant someone else, but could not escape the tug on his heart that this was God’s call.

Be bold brothers and sisters.  Do not be afraid.  What is it that is tugging on your hearts this morning?  However unlikely a messenger, or ill-equipped you may think that you are, know this:  God does not call the equipped.  God equips the called.  Stand strong in the arms of this community, for we will be here to cheer you on.   Beloved ones, we cannot always see the road ahead, but if we step out in faith, God will not leave us alone.

In a few moments, I will invite you to stand for our responsive hymn: Here I Am Lord.  And as we sing, I encourage you to throw open the doors of your hearts.  Listen for God’s voice calling to you this morning.  And then sing with all of your conviction:  I will go, Lord, if you lead me, I will hold your people in my heart.   For in the words of Dr. King:  Faith is taking the first step, even when we cannot see the whole staircase.  May we have the courage to take the first step.  Amen.

Eliot W. Hill

Newton Highlands. Eliot W. Hill died suddenly at home

on December 9, 2011. He was 53 years old, the beloved

son of Geraldine Hill Elion and the late Walter D. Hill.

He is survived by a sister Alexis D. Hill of Westboro, and

a brother Theodore G. Hill of Brooklyn NY, and several

cousins, nieces, and nephews.

Eliot graduated from Newton South High School and received

a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Massa-

chusetts at Amherst. He did advanced studies at the University

of Arizona at Tucson, and the University of Wisconsin.

He worked in the building trades in Arizona and Oregon,

returning to Newton in 2007. He was an avid outdoorsman

and supporter of the ecology movement.

A memorial gathering will be held on January 21st, 2012, at

11 am at the Union Church in Waban.

In lieu of flowers, please support your preferred animal welfare

organization.

Living Waters Prayer Group will meet on Monday, January 16 at 7:30 a.m.

Donations of baked goods are needed for the Youth Group Bake Sale to benefit Nicaragua. If you can help, please let Kathy know. Donations are
needed by Saturday, January 21st at 10 a.m.

Join the women of Union Church for the first meeting of the Wellspring Women’s Group on Wednesday evening, January 18 from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m.

The January meeting of Java Gents will be Friday, January 20 at 7:00 a.m.

The NICA Committee will meet January 22 after worship.

Youth Group Ski Trip January 27-29. Ski at Stratton Mountain. Stay at Buz and Karen’s condo in Bondville, VT. RSVP to Kathy.

Book Group. Many of you may have participated in a book group in the past or maybe do so now. But have you had the experience of reflecting on literature through the lens of faith with your fellow church friends? Please consider joining us for these particularly rich conversations. The next meeting is Tuesday, January 31 at 7:30 p.m. in the Reception Room. We are reading Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand.

“The face of the deep”

Genesis 1:1-5, Mark 1:4-11

It was well over a mile wide, a grey swath cutting through the green arctic tundra.  It was the Denali National Park in Alaska.  Two hours of hiking had brought us down onto the great gravely expanse of the river bed.

The river we were to cross was a braided river called such because instead of one big stream of water, it consisted of several smaller interwoven ones.  Braided rivers are typical for glacial run off and often change course surging and diminishing with the changing melt from the glacier above.

We had been instructed at the ranger station, before setting off, on how we were to cross this river bed before us.  We were to make a chain with interlocking arms, one person before and one behind, and to walk in single file facing up stream in order to keep an eye out for a sudden surge of water.

We were about half way across, when it happened. When suddenly I was lifted up as if grabbed by the collar of my jacket and tossed backwards into the icy water.  A section of the stream above had changed course and great gush had hit me square on while leaving the person on my right and on my left untouched. But I was tumbled downstream. I thrashed from side to side, trying to find a footing, trying to wrestle my arms out of my water logged back pack, but I couldn’t.  It was too cold  –  the current too strong – the water too tumultuous.  I could do nothing.

I am certain that I am not the only person in this sanctuary who knows what it is to be swept away.  [1]  At one time or another, and for many of us right now, we are hit square on.  We lose our footing and tumble backwards into churning chaos.  Illness strikes and someone we love is suddenly gone.  The words we dreaded are spoken and our job is swept from us.  A relationship that has grounded and defined us for years, crumbles tossing us to waves of sadness and loss.  And even if our life circumstances are fairly stable right now, there are places in our hearts that we keep well guarded.  Places of regret, or shame or pain that we seal off for fear that if we face them their angry energy will surge up and overwhelm us.  And let’s not even mention the chaos of the nation’s and world headlines.

“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, ” (Genesis 1:1)

In the beginning… back before language, back in the shadowy dawn of pre-memory, back in the beginning.  At a then so long ago, a then lost to us now, a wind from God swept over the face of the formless void, swept over the waters of chaos and God created….

We hear these words now as an echo of what was so long ago.  But theologian Catherine Keller wonders if the “in the beginning” that was, is not the God that is.  What if God is the beginning, what if God is that which moves over chaos, enters the formless void to deliver us from it, creating something beautiful, a new creation, on the other side of it?

Did you know that here are  two creation stories in the Bible.  There is this first one where God calls all that is into existence.  And then there is the second one with Adam and Eve in the garden, and the serpent that tempts them to eat what God has forbidden.  This second story was remembered when the Israelites were at their strongest. When theirs was a unified Kingdom under one Monarch.  It is a story of beginning that warns about the arrogance of thinking too much of ourselves and too little of God.

But this first creation story was remembered centuries later when that powerful kingdom had been toppled by the Babylonians and the people swept far away into exile.  It was written later but placed first in the cannon of the bible not as a warning against arrogance but as a hymn of hope.  Out of chaos, out of the churning of the formless void, out of the dislocation and despair of exile, the breath of God moves across the face of the deep and God creates.

As the waters closed over him, as he sank backwards into the cold and muddy waters of the Jordan he saw it all.  In one achingly pure moment he saw their pain.  He saw how lost they were.  He saw their fear.  He saw how they were swept away by chaos unsure of their footing, unable to make their way.  As he felt himself drowning with the sorrow of it all, his cousin John’s strong arm reach underneath him and lift him up, up.  And as his face broke through the water, as the warmth of the sun was upon him the heaven was torn apart and the Spirit descended like a dove upon him and a voice from heaven said.  “You are my Son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased.”

Jesus, the one Paul will call the new creation. Steps out of the river Jordan, water streaming from him, baptized in glory he will walk forward now into his ministry for us.  He will be the strong arm that lifts the lame to walk.  He will be the kind hand that touches ones no one else dare touch.  He will calm the stormy sea and fills the fishing nets until they strain.  The new creation,  in the beginning  — is now.

All was fading from me, until a strong arm reached underneath me and lifted me up.  As my faced broke the waters I was startled by the son.  Where was I?  What was this, what this new beginning now?

In this beginning, God creates.

In the beauty of song, in the candle lit softness of the sanctuary, in the sweet singing voice of a camel, in the twirling dance of a rogue sheep, the strong arm of the one who was born to us in a manger lifts us up.  As our faces break the waters are we are warmed by the son and stunned by the beauty that we are part of the new creation that is unfolding around us.

People of God, the good news for us and all the world is that “in the beginning” is ours not just then but Now!  Thanks be to God. Amen.

The Christian Education Committee is looking for classroom assistants and hall monitors for the winter weeks. Look for Kathy after worship and at reception to sign up.

Bible study is reading through the book of Luke and meets each Sunday morning from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.

Living Waters Prayer Group will meet on Monday, January 9 at 7:30 a.m.

Mission will meet Monday evening January 9, at 7:30 p.m.

Lunch Bunch meets Tuesday, January 10 at noon.

The Teaching Parish Committee meets Wednesday, January 11 at 7:00 p.m.

Join the women of Union Church for the first meeting of the Wellspring Women’s Group on Wednesday evening, January 18 from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m.

Book Group. Many of you may have participated in a book group in the past or maybe do so now. But have you had the experience of reflecting on literature through the lens of faith with your fellow church friends? Please consider joining us for these particularly rich conversations. The next meeting is Tuesday, January 31 at 7:30 p.m. in the Reception Room. We are reading Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand.

There will be no Sunday School on Sunday. Infant and toddler care is available.

 Sunday School resumes January 8.

Bible study will resume on January 8 from8:00 to9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study. 

Living Waters Prayer Group will resume on Monday, January 9 at7:30 a.m.

Epiphany Service.  Did you know that the early church did not celebrate Christmas?  Instead, early Christians celebrated the season of epiphany when they remembered and rejoiced at the manifestation of God on earth in the person of Jesus. 

This year, we too will celebrate Epiphany on Friday, January 6th at6:00 p.m. 

  We will begin with a potluck meal in the vestry. 

 We will then process the light of God throughout the church ending up

 in the sanctuary for the culmination of the service. 

 This intergenerational service will appeal to all ages.

Book Group.   Many of you may have participated in a book group in the past or maybe do so now.  But have you had the experience of reflecting on literature through the lens of faith with your fellow church friends?  Please consider joining us for these particularly rich conversations.  The book group will not meet in December but please mark Tuesday, January 31 at 7:30 p.m. in the Reception Room.  We are reading Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption

John 1:6-8, 19-28
Luke 1:46-55

Earlier this week, I attended the rededication of the African meeting house, there on Beacon Hill, just off Joy Street.

Build in 1804, this meeting house was the first place in the United States created by and built for African Americans.  Within its walls, African American children were educated, people gathered to hear speakers debate the most pressing issues of the day and on Sunday people gathered for worship.  At the rededication of this meeting house, speaker after speaker told how this simple but elegant structure had born witness to a people as they threw off the chains of slavery and laid claim to freedom and a full dignity of self.  In fact, I learned that it was the African meeting house that first opened its doors to the organizing effort of the abolitionist movement when no other public building in Boston; when no other church would do so.   And it was the African meeting house, there on Beacon hill, just off Joy street, that would go on to be an important stop of rest and rejuvenation on the underground railroad.

The underground railroad, the way that Slaves, having escaped from the plantations of the south would make their way north to freedom.  These men and women traveled in the deep darkness of the night through fear and hunger, forging rivers that threatened to swallow them, crossing fields that threatened to expose them.  Traveling through the night, moving from enslavement to freedom, from fear to hope, from pain to promise, from death to new life.

And in that last bit of night just before dawn, these weary travelers would look for a place to rest.  Peering out through the darkness they would look for the flicker of a candle’s flame.  Deep in the shadows they would look for the light shining out in the darkness.  They would look for a candle alit in a particular window or there on the front stoop of a doorway. For a lit candle signals that that the house was safe.  The light of the candle led these weary travelers in from the night, from the dark and the cold and the fear and the threat and the hunger and to a place where they could find rest.  The light was a sign of hope, peace and even joy on this difficult way to freedom.

The days of the underground railroad may be but a stirring memory now, but people all over the world, in our back yard and we ourselves, continue to walk in deep darkness.  There is much that enslaves us, much that we are afraid of, much that we hunger for.  The tents of Occupy Boston have been taken down but economic disparity persists sucking more and more lives into the gap.  Our stores are alit with bright lights and cheerful carols yet so many can hear only the echo of pain and loss of love ones who have died, relationships that have broken, illness or economic uncertainty that befall them.

And yet, we dare to light the candles of hope, peace and yes, even joy.  We dare to gather around their flame, because we are on the walk to freedom.    We are on the Way to new life.  You see, Jesus came into this world, the creator heaven and earth took on flesh and walked among us so that we may know what it is not to be enslaved any more but to be free to be fully alive.  To wake up to the truth that God is present to us right now.   The love of God, made manifest in Jesus is the light that is shining out in our darkness.  It is the light that is leading us.

But it does not stop there.  It can’t.  For having seen that flicker of light, having followed that light, having been delivered from the deep darkness of night and having been gathered around that light of new life,  we are to take up that light and carry it ourselves into places of deep darkness, places where people continue to be imprisoned, fearful or hungry.

We listen to the scripture of Mary and John the Baptizer and marvel at their courage and faith; their clear-sightedness and their passion.  But we are called to do more than marvel.  We are called to be the Marys and the John the Baptizers of our time.  We are to be Light bearers like Mary, birthing God’s peace into the world. We are to be like John, Baptistizers calling out in places of wilderness preparing the way for God’s light to come into the world, a light of justice, peace and hope.  This is the two fold movement of advent, to prepare to receive but also to wake up to the truth that we have received the light and that we are compelled now to be that light for others.

Friday morning, several of us went over to the Waban Health and Rehabilitation Center for our monthly worship service with the residents.  Only Friday was to be a bit different.  I had received a call from Joanna the activities director earlier in the week letting me know that Katherine, one of the residents who worshiped with us had died.  And Joanna asked me if we would be willing to make space in the worship service for the residents, staff of Waban Health and for Katherine’s son and sister to remember Katherine and to grieve her passing.  As we worshiped together a remarkable thing began to happen.  There in that room, in the dingy basement of that nursing home, with the din of the kitchen in the background, a light first dim and then growing ever brighter began to shine.  As it shined out and as it did the residents began to emerge from the silence of grief and the fear of their own future and began to share memories and yes even their joy at having known Katherine.  It shined out and grew ever brighter, as the staff with eyes streaming laid down their weariness at having to say goodbye to another one that they had grown to love.  It shined out and grew ever righter as Katherine’s son and sister thanked  the residents, broken in body and confused in mind though they may be, for so bravely and compassionately walking with Katherine as she tried so hard to find her way.

People of God, let us light a candle and set it burning out there on the front stoop of this church.  Let us light a candle and set it burning in the window in this church so that those who are wandering in deep darkness may see in this place, in this people, a safe house, a place where they can come in from the darkness, from the fear and the hunger. Come into a place where they can be freed from that which persecutes them, a place where others will walk with them on the Way to freedom and new life.

People of God, let us live the advent stories – let us follow the example the so many people who have walked the road of freedom and let us prepare the road for those who have yet to walk it.  And in all of this, may Jesus be our light.   Amen

 Many thanks go to all of the cast members of Sunday’s pageant, and to the many people who made the cast’s participation possible: parents, the CE Committee,  and our director Kent Wittler.

To celebrate the pageant and to remember our sisters and brothers in Nicaragua, the kids are invited to party Nicaraguan-style with pinatas in the Vestry following worship.

Children are invited to join in worship on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.  Sunday School resumes on January 8.

Children who would like to take part in the Christmas Eve tableau should plan to arrive at church by6:45 p.m. on Christmas Eve.  Parents should accompany their kids to the Littlehale Room to claim a part and a costume.  Participants will sit with their parents during the service and will be cued to come forward for their part in the  tableau during the appropriate hymn.

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, December 19 from7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome.

Advent Booklet.  If you have not already done so, please be sure to pick up a copy of the advent devotional booklet available on the table in the side chapel today. The booklet is a resource of scripture, prayer and meditations written by UCW members to help guide your preparation and reflection during this season.  The reflections from fellow members are particularly moving.  You will not want to miss them.

Blue Christmas Service.  The Christmas season is certainly full of joy and anticipation  but it can also be full of stress from the busyness and rush of it all.   This year we will gather for a new service on Wednesday, December 21 at7:00 p.m.  where we will take time to rest in the peace and calm of the sanctuary.  With song, prayer, candle lighting and reflections, we will have a chance to set down whatever burdens we carry (whether that be strain from financial difficulties, sadness at the loss of loved ones, struggles with illness, or just the fatigue of the season) and take up the love and peace of God giving us the strength we need to move through these days.

Epiphany Service.  Did you know that the early church did not celebrate Christmas?  Instead, early Christians celebrated the season of epiphany when they remembered and rejoiced at the manifestation of God on earth in the person of Jesus.  This year, we too will celebrate epiphany on Friday, January 6th.   We will begin with a potluck meal in the vestry.  We will then process the light of God throughout the church ending up  in the sanctuary for the culmination of the service.  This intergenerational service will appeal to all ages.

Book Group.   Many of you may have participated in a book group in the past or maybe do so now.  But have you had the experience of reflecting on literature through the lens of faith with your fellow church friends?  Please consider joining us for these particularly rich conversations.  The book group will not meet in December but please mark Tuesday, January 31 at 7:30 p.m. in the reception room.  We are reading Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand.

 Photo/Video permission. In order to share the good news of the ministries of  The Union Church in Waban, we sometimes take photos and videos at worship and other events in the life of the church.  We, however, do not want to use these photos/videos without your permission to do so.  As such, the Council approved at its December meeting an updated photo/video permission policy. The entire policy is available at our web site, and on the office door, but the essence is that for adults we ask that you let us know if you DO NOT give us permission to use photo/video images of you, but for children, parents must explicitly GIVE US permission to do so.   Please take a moment to review the policy and communicate with the office as needed.

"It’s time to wake up"  Rev. Stacy Swain

Isaiah 64: 1-5

Mark 13:24-37

           It had gotten later than we usually liked it to be when we traveled that so called road back from the city of Chalatenango to our little village.  It was inky dark out, no moon, and, of course, no street lights.  We were going slowly, rolling like a boat on rough seas, through the pot holes, ditches and ridges in the road.  It had been a long day at a training we had had with other health promoters in the region.  I was tired.  Mark was driving.  As the truck rolled along, my eyes got heavier and heavier. 

           And then, we rounded a bend and came upon something that jolted me awake, — that made Mark hit the brakes.  Right before us, the heavens were opening and the stars were falling from the sky. 

           It took a moment for our eyes to adjust and our astonishment to abate just enough to make out that what we were seeing was a several acre field absolutely chocked full of fireflies.  There must have been thousands and thousands of them.   The entire field was lit up as if someone had laid miles of Christmas lights in the grasses.

            But because the moonless night was so inky black and so full of stars, it was impossible to tell where the sky ended and where the field began.  It was as heaven and earth had merged in one vast expanse of dancing lights.  We sat there for I don’t know how long awed by heaven and earth’s embrace.  

~~~

          Jesus tells us in Gospel of Mark from today to “Beware, keep alert.”  These are some of Jesus’ final words to the disciples before heaven and earth come together in the events of Holy week.  It’s striking to me that the teaching of “Keeping awake” is what Jesus chooses to  underscore for the disciples at the end of his time with them.

          Perhaps that is because Jesus knows it is what the disciples need to hear.  Perhaps it is because he knows their propensity to be plagued by drowsiness.

           Remember that passage in the Gospels called the Transfiguration when Jesus takes Peter, James and John to the top of a high mountain?  Remember how the disciples almost missed the whole thing?  They were just nodding off when it happened. When  Jesus’ face changed and his clothes became dazzling white; when Moses and Elijah appeared and all were surrounded by the glory.  The disciples almost missed it; this embrace of heaven and earth.

           And then these same disciples,  did not do nearly as well in the Garden of Gethsemane it turns out, that night.  When Jesus again took Peter, James and John with him and told them to keep awake as Jesus withdrew a bit further to pray.  When he returned he found them sleeping.  He woke them then up and said  “your spirit is willing but your flesh is weak.”  And he went off two more times to pray only to return again and again to find the disciples sleeping for their eyes were very heavy? (Mark 14:32-42). 

           What is it about this tendency of the disciples to doze off?  Why is it that Jesus warns us about it so explicitly against it?

           The early church mothers and fathers, those holy people who settled in the sands of Egypt recognized this tendency in themselves and their community.  They saw this tendency to “fall asleep” as a kind of creeping lethargy that sapped the vitality and energy not only of their individual selves but of their community as well.  So clear were they about its presence that they gave it a name, the noonday demon. For it was at that hour that distraction and disinterest most often came creeping doing its best to convince the monk that the life of devotion to God was a ridiculous pursuit full of nothing but tedium.  This noonday demon is life sapping, and leads lethargy, to a kind of a paralysis of the soul. (from Kathleen Norris, Acedia and Me)

           This noon day demon does its best to convince us that living a life of faith really takes too much work and it really is not worth the effort.  Things are really not going to change.  Prayer does nothing.  The problems of the world are far too vast for us to do much about them and after all what it is point?  You were up to late last night, you should have skipped church.  You are too tired, no need to get up for prayer group.  What’s the point, of making such an effort?    

           And this tendency to doze off, this pull towards lethargy has affected our life as a nation as well.  Pastoral Theologian and Professor Sharon Thornton believes that we are suffering from pervasive issues of dislocation from our true selves and from our common life.  As the ties that bind us together as families, communities and as a nation begin to unravel we struggle to find meaning and purpose in our days.  In our dislocation and increasing isolation we turn in upon ourselves filling up the ache on our hearts with the latest quick fix, shopping, working, eating or drinking too much. 

           But then just as we feel our eyes closing, Jesus grabs us by the shoulders on Advent and says Wake up!  Beware, Stay alert! 

           Now being one, as Mark will attest, that chafes at being told what to do, I for want for one want to know why it matters if I am awake for not.  Is it really that important for me to be paying attention?  And if so, Why?

           God came to us in the person of Jesus to not just to show us the way of right living, but I believe that in some in the person of Jesus all flesh, all creation was re-infused, reconnected with that life force of the universe that was laid down on the dawn of creation.  We when we awake from our stupor we awake to the reality that ourselves and everything around us is filled with the light and love of God and through our hands and feet we participate in this light and love is brought into the world.  To succumb to the whisper of the noonday demon is turn over, give up our connection with the light and love of God.  It is to relinquish that creative, life giving power that has been extended to us through Jesus.  That’s why the stakes are so high.   

          You see waking is up not just something we do for ourselves. It is not just something that makes our own lives much more meaningful and fulfilling to live.  But waking up and staying awake is really something we do for each other and for the world.  When we wake up to the deep and powerful way that we are connected to God and through God to all things, then we can become instruments of God’s grace in the world.  Through who we are, what we do and how we love, we join in blurring that line between heaven and earth.  Through who we are and how we love we can send some of those stars tumbling down from heaven.

           It was imperative to Jesus that the disciples be awake because Jesus’ earthly presence was about to end. He needed the disciples to fully understand that it was this presence they were soon to inherit.  He would be with them.  He would give them through the Holy Spirit the power and presence that they would need to continue the regeneration of life on earth as God would have it.  But they soon would be his hands and feet, his eyes and mouth in the world.  This is why they needed to wake up.  This is why we need to wake up!

           So how do we do it? How do we wake up?  How do we stay alert?  How do we set our advent alarm clock?

           Turns out that once very effective way waking up and staying awake is through the power of structure and routine.  The noonday demon turns out hates a disciplined life.  That is why religious communities through out the ages have organized their lives in very intentional ways.  Each day there is time set aside to pray, and to work,  at time to meditate on God and a time to serve those around them.  It turns out this kind of integrated living creates a kind of mindfulness where one is more able to see where God is moving in the world and more will to participate in that movement. 

           What if we try it for these next four weeks?  I know it seems like a lot, but what if every day for the next four weeks we were to aside 30 minutes for God in whatever form that works best for you, but that we stick with it.  Praying in the morning, walking at noontime, journaling before bed of a review of your day looking for what you are grateful for and what you wish had gone differently.  Whatever it is what if you were to practice that every day for the next four weeks?  And then in the balance of our days, what if we committed ourselves to looking for God.  What if we held in our minds the question “Where is God in this?”  What if we walked through our days really connected to this power of life and goodness that is coursing through the world?  How would that change what we do? Who we are?  How would that chance our experience of being alive? 

           All around us there are examples of people waking up to the needs of our time. From Occupy Boston that, regardless of its politics or future agenda, has made us aware of the life sapping income disparity in our nation.  To City mission society in its partnership with the Boston Public Schools that is waking us up to the life sapping disparity in our public education system where disadvantaged children, are shunted to disadvantaged schools.  There is much to wake up to. There is much to be done. .

            Wake up!  Jesus says.  Stay alert.  Not just for yourself but for the world.   For things are happening.  Around the next bend the stars are falling from the heavens, and earth caught up in heaven’s embrace.  Around the next bend is a babe in a lying in a manger. Around the next bend, light is shining in the darkness, shining forth a love and peace and hope.   It is time to wake up.  AMEN     

November 20, 2011

“Standing at the Foot of the Throne” by Rev. Stacy Swain

Ezekiel 34: 11-16, 20-24

Matthew 25:31-46

            The first time I remember meeting God was when I was four years old.  My family was living outside of the Twin Cities in Minnesota.  We lived in an old farm house, with a bright red barn out back and several acres of pasture stretching out all around it.  I remember my dad had an old tractor that he would use to mow the meadows and I loved nothing more than to stand on the back hitch and hold onto his shoulders as we made long sweeping circles around the fields.

             It was there in the back field, the one that stretched in a gentle slope up to a rise and then down again to the forest beyond,  where I met God.

             My sister and I were laying on our bellies with elbows propped up chin in hands waiting silently in the tall grasses.  We had hauled a large block salt lick up from the barn and placed it on top of the rise in the field.  We placed it there in the late afternoon sun knowing that that was the time that the shy deer made their way out of the forest and into the pasture to graze.   We lay hidden in the lush green grasses warmed by the sun full of fragrance of late summer. 

             Now as vivid as this memory is, the strange thing is I do not remember if a deer ever did come meet us that day.  But what I do remember so clearly, what has held my heart all of these years, is how completely at peace I felt.  There by my sister’s side, warmed by the afternoon sun I felt so safe, so deeply contented, watched over somehow, protected by the universe. Lying there in the grass, I felt the care of God.     

~~

Will you pray with me?  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God our Rock and our Redeemer.  AMEN.

                In the sweep of the yearly cycle of worship, this Sunday is known as Christ the King Sunday.  This is the Sunday when we are reminded that at the end of all things, we will pass under the judgment of Christ who is seated on a throne of glory, Matthew tells us.  Our ancestors of faith, who built this church wanted to remind us of this as well.  Now we may have thwarted their intention a bit exiting the sanctuary as we do through the side chapel for reception.  But it is no accident that there on the back wall is enshrined Christ the King in the stained glass.  Christ the King is there so that every Sunday, we will be reminded that when we leave, whether it be this time of worship, or this liturgical year, or this earthly life, all of us leave passing under the judgment of Christ the King.

            Judgment day, this time of reckoning when the people are called to the foot of the throne and separated out one from another, sheep from goat, the righteous from the condemned has gotten a lot of play in Christian tradition.  I remember visiting a beautiful little church on one of the islands off Venice in Italy.  It was over a thousand years old and as I entered the peace of the place was palpable.  But after sitting for a while in the stillness I turned to go and was shocked and horrified by the grizzly scene of judgment on the back wall.  There was Christ seated on the throne of glory, the righteous looking smug on his right and those on his left, well let’s say, the scene made my blood run cold.  The message could not have been clearer.  Be afraid.  Be very afraid, for you never know where you will land.

             So every year when we come to this last Sunday in the worship year, this last Sunday before we start again next week with the first Sunday in Advent, I turn to the biblical text with a certain degree of trepidation. 

             I read the criteria for being among the righteous;  one must have fed the hungry, given the thirsty something to drink, welcomed the stranger, clothed the naked, cared for the sick and visited the one in prison and I don’t know about you but I immediately start running through my “own how to get to heaven” check list.   Feed the hungry?  Check, we are collecting food for the Newton food pantry.  Clothe those in need?  Check, we are collecting coats for cradles to crayons.  Welcome the stranger, Check, we had our community thanksgiving dinner.  Visit the one in prison? Check, we visited prayers upon the inmates through the Kairos ministry. Ok, so I may get by this year…   Maybe…

             But there is a rub for me at least.  Is uncertainty and fear really the emotion we are to feel at the end of it all?  After all we have experienced this year as we followed Jesus from the manger to the cross, and through the cross to the empty tomb, is fear and uncertainty really the emotion we are to feel as we live into Christ’s example?

              I think not.  Not only has time and time again, Jesus told us “Do not be afraid” but listen again to the scripture from today!  Jesus is speaking these words to the disciples on the day before he is betrayed. He knows that his earthly end is coming to a close and that the disciples are going to go through some really tough times and that they most likely will be really afraid.  He tells them, that at the end of it all, Jesus the Christ will be there on the throne of glory, but he will not be as a stern judge the text tells us.  He will be as a shepherd, separating the people as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

             Now I am sure that there was a collective sigh of relief from the disciples that day, those gathered around Jesus when they heard these words, for they knew what they meant.  They knew how a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.  It is not by score card.  It is not by tallying it all up and seeing if one is good enough. 

             It’s by calling that special call, whistling that special whistle, when hearing that the sheep’s ear’s perk up for they know the one that calls them.  So the separation of goats from sheep is something that the goats and the sheep do themselves.  It is not based on some divine score card, but on a deep seated response of the sheep to their shepherd.  When the shepherd calls they leave the common water spring where all have come to drink and they gather at the side of their shepherd.  They come because they know what it is be under the care and protection of the shepherd.  They know what it is to be hungry and then to be fed;  what it is to be thirsty and be led to fresh water, to be afraid and then to be comforted; to lay down on their bellies in the grass and to know that they are watched over, protected, to be contented and at peace.

             This is the promise Ezekiel speaks.  Can’t you just feel it?  To lie down in good grazing land and be fed on rich pasture.  To be found when we are lost. To be binded up when we are injured.  To be strengthened when we are weak.   

             At our Thanksgiving Dinner yesterday, after we had eaten together, and laughed together, and told stories together, as we were cleaning up and getting ready to go, an elderly guest from the community came up to me. She took my hand and with tears brimming in her blue eye she said, “You know, when you get old, it is easy to feel like you don’t matter really.  But I really felt at home here today. And I thank you!”

             As I hugged her goodbye, I felt that same peace that I felt that day as I lay on my belly in the fragrant pasture with my sister at my side, so long ago.  For that moment, in the vestry yesterday, I caught a glimpse of the deep contentment of which Ezekiel speaks.  I felt that deep peace of being held in the care of God.        

             Why do we collect food for the Newton food pantry and the food pantry at Andover Newton Theological School?  Because we know what it is to be fed not just in body, but even more in spirit and we want others to know that as well.  Why do we welcome the stranger at our Community Thanksgiving Dinner?  Because we know what it is to be welcomed not just into this community but into the embrace of God and we want others to know that as well.  Why do collect coats for Cradles to Crayons? Because we have known what it is to feel the warmth being cared for by others and by God when we are cold and exposed and we want others to know that as well.    

             In the days and weeks ahead, May the kindness and care that we extend to those around us be our heart felt response to the kindness and care that has already been extended to us through Jesus.And when we gather at the throne of our King, may be do so not with fear but with faith knowing that we will be judged not on whether we are good enough, but on whether we have heard the call of our shepherd and followed the example of the one who leads us all to good pasture and deep peace.

  Amen.

All third, fourth and fifth graders will be receiving a gift Bible as part of a special presentation during the Time for Children during Sunday's worship service.

In Sunday School, Grant Gund leads the Faith Seekers in the second of a three part exploration of money.  He’ll be wondering what class members did for the homework assigned last week by Buz. Ask your Faith Seeker what he or she did with the dollar in the envelope! Cindy Spertner teaches Noah’s Ark, while Alex & Chris Kiritsy teach the Disciples Class. Both classes will be talking about Jesus’ call to help the least of these.

The NICA Travelers will meet Sunday after worship at 11:30 a.m.

 
Youth Group meets Sunday evening from 4:00-5:30 p.m.  Bring a rake!

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, November 21 from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome.

New Young Adults Small Group is starting. If you are between the ages of 18 and 35 and would like to join in food, fun, and fellowship with other young adults at Union Church, then join Stacy and Heidi for our first meeting on November 27th at 11:30 a.m.

Mission is planning an Alternative Advent Fair for the Sunday December 4. This will coincide with the C.E.’s Advent wreath-making, and will be an opportunity to purchase beaded bags made by M’Tendere women, handcrafts, photo note cards, and other gifts.

A Membership Exploration Gathering is planned for December 1st at 7:00 p.m. in the Reception Room, and December 11th at 11:30 a.m. in Stacy’s office.

We will share faith journeys, learn the history of the church and where we are now,

 discuss what membership means in this faith community, and hear your needs, hopes, and dreams for church life. You need only attend one session.

Our Holiday Greens Sale is here!

Our Holiday Greens Sale supports all Nicaraguan initiatives, including our trip project in February, scholarships, and other efforts in Newton’s sister city

of San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua.

Beautiful wreaths, greens, and Christmas trees will be sold on

 Saturdays in December from 10 to 2, Sundays from 11 to 1,

and Tuesdays from noon to 1:30. Donate some greens to decorate the church!

Order forms are available at the church.

Announcements from the Mission Committee

Cradles to Crayons Coat Drive

Cradles to Crayons (C2C) strives to provide children up to age 12 living in homeless and low-income situations with the essentials they need to feel safe, warm, ready to learn, and valued. A surprise snowstorm in October should generate excitement for kids in Massachusetts, but many local families struggling in the midst of an unforgiving economy find buying a winter coat for their child to be a  challenge. There is no joy in a snow day for a child who faces the cold without the essentials.

Cradles to Crayons expects to receive requests for 15,000 winter coats, and the Union Church in Waban would like to help them get there. Starting in November, the Mission Committee is organizing a Winter Coat Drive for children sizes 0-12. Look in your closets and basements! Pick up one at a garage sale or Costco! The coats must be stain-free and have working zippers.

Newton Food Pantry

Last year, the Union Church in Waban deepened its relationship with the Newton Food Pantry, and we want to continue that connection this year. Located in the basement of the Waban Library, the NFP provides a three day supply of food, one time a month, for eligible Newton residents. The apples picked by UCW kids were donated there a couple of weeks ago. In the month of November, we would like to help the NFP in two ways — with the Thanksgiving Collection and a non-perishable food drive. Please give generously so that we can deliver a big, fat check and multiple mini-vans of food! Meals in a can and peanut butter are usually high on the request list. 

Heidi Ward

“Putting on the Armor of God”

November 13, 2011

 I was taking a Saturday drive recently down a busy highway.  It was a beautiful, sunny day.  I might have been singing along a bit too loudly to the song on the radio.   I came around a bend in the road and a billboard yelled out to me:  “Jesus is coming!  Are you ready?”   I had a familiar moment of pause.  I wondered aloud to myself, and the person in the car with me:  I don’t know, am I? 

 You see, from a very young age, I worried about being “left behind.”  While the church of my youth didn’t focus much on the second coming of Christ, many of my friend’s churches did.  I worried that I would come home from school one day to find the water running in the sink, the dish towel that often resided on my mother’s shoulder on the floor, and I would know she had been raptured.  More importantly, I would know that I hadn’t.

 My experience is not a unique one.  The at times intense focus in contemporary Christianity on Christ’s return is not a new struggle for the church.  Paul wrote his letter to the Thessalonians in a time when they too were struggling with questions about what they believed to be the “end of days”, and what that meant for their faith. 

 Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians is likely the oldest book we have in the New Testament.  Scholars believe that Paul was writing from Corinth to the people in Thessalonica.  He had stayed with them for only a short time before he moved on.  But his impact was lasting.  Their lives had been so radically changed by his message that they had founded a new church community in a time of a great persecution and external pressure.  But the Thessalonians were afraid.  They had misinterpreted Paul’s teaching on the second coming of Christ, and they were terrified. 

 Maybe you too have had your own “billboard moment.”  You stopped at a red light and the bumper sticker on the car ahead of you proclaimed:  Jesus is coming, look busy!  You paused for a moment.  Your stomach dropped a little.  Maybe you even wondered aloud to yourself if you were ready? 

 I don’t know when Christ will return brothers and sisters.  I have some idea of what I think it might look like when He does, but that is a sermon for another day.  And neither did Paul know when Christ would return.  Like many in Christianity today, the Thessalonians believed that Christ’s return was imminent, but Paul was among the first to say that we cannot predict when it will come.  He was not instructing he followers what to believe, but how to live in the present moment.

 So hear now the good news of Paul’s words brothers and sisters, while Christ has not yet returned, God is already here.  Already known to us.  God has already come to us through our faith.  In Christ’s death and Resurrection, we are awakened daily to that faith.  It is in Christ’s saving love and Grace that we can engage in lives of love and service. 

 You know a little something about living lives of love and service Union Church.   You do it every day.  You do it in your mission work in Zambia and Nicaragua.  You do it in your commitment to make our church a welcoming and accessible place for all who worship here.  You do it in the ways you care for one another with casseroles, cards, and phone calls.  You live daily into the privilege of being called out people in the light that Paul talks about.

 But being called out children of the light is tiring work!  It is not easy to get up on Sunday mornings, or give up your weeknights for yet another meeting.  It is not easy to see the headlines in the newspaper, or the evening news that seem filled with hunger, poverty, breakdowns in civil discourse and so much pain.  It is easy to feel as though the work we are doing will just never be enough.  You may wonder to yourself how or why you should keep going.  Like the Thessalonians, you may be growing weary and need a message of hope. 

 When Paul realized the Thessalonians were struggling, and in need of hope, he sent Timothy back to check on them.  Timothy found that while they were doing okay, they needed bolstering from their leader.  And so, Paul sent them a letter. 

 As you all know, Stacy and I wear a clergy robe to worship each Sunday.  My robe is special to me.  It was given to me by a Rabbi I have done interfaith social justice work with in the last year.  And it is filled with blessings from people I have not yet met. 

 Before she sent it to me, she asked scores of people I had never met to shower it with their prayers and blessings for my journey.  And so, they did.  Their prayers and blessings are like my letter from Paul.  When the journey is long, and my armor feels like it is cracking, I can put on this robe, and be reminded that God has given me all I need for this journey.

 Much like I can put on my robe, when we are battle fatigued from doing God’s work in the world, we can return to this place.  You see our letter from Paul is the reminder that we are not alone.  We are part of a community of faith, this community of faith.   We can return to this place to pause for a moment from our busy lives to be reminded to “Be still and know that I am God.”  We can return to this place to put on the armor of God’s promises-for they will never fail us.   

 Paul writes: put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.  The best evidence of God’s faith, love, and salvation we have is one another.   We come into this place on Sunday mornings to set down the heavy armor the world has laid upon us, and take up the armor of God.  To lay down the armor of self-doubt, fear, anger and pain the world has given us to carry, and to put on the armor of love, faith, grace and the helmet of blessed assurance that God has given to us instead through Christ and one another.

 Now, I am the first to admit the word armor can be a little jarring, but the armor we put on through this community is not the kind of heavy, war torn armor you may think of.  For God’s armor is not the world’s armor.   God’s armor is light, life giving, and sustaining.  When we wear it out of these church doors, it has the possibility to create new life instead of destruction in its path.   God’s light cannot help but shine from us.

 Paul wrote his letter to the Thessalonians as a source of encouragement.  In verse 11, he writes: Therefore encourage one another, and build up each other, as indeed you are doing.  The term he uses for “building up” is one he also uses in the book of Corinthians to describe how the individual is responsible for the larger community.  Many scholars say that Paul sees Christianity as a temple, and while the builder is God, we can assist in its building.  We put on our life-giving armor so that we may build things up, not tear them down.  We wear it to carry forth a message of hope and encouragement to those in our lives who need it most.

Friends, I don’t know when Jesus is coming back.  Neither did Paul.  But I do know that if we daily put on the armor of God and encourage one another along the journey, we will be one step closer to the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.   That if we reach out to those in our lives whose armor is cracking, and help to patch and polish their holes, we will be a living example of the encouragement Paul gave to the Thessalonians.  That there are many weary travelers on the journey who need you to help secure their breastplates and straighten their helmets, so that God’s light can shine more fully into a broken world.  Brothers and sisters put on the armor of God. Then: Go.  Be.  Love.  The world needs you.  May it be so this week.  Amen

There will be a brief Council meeting at 11:30 on Sunday to discuss the snow cancellation policy.

Bible study continues each Sunday from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.  We are currently reading through the Gospel of Luke. All are welcome. No previous theological study or Biblical literacy is needed.  Just come with an open heart and curious mind. 

Coffee and tea are provided.

Last week the kids received coin boxes to collect money to support our church's partnership in Nicaragua. Coin boxes left behind last week, as well as extra coin boxes for those who did not get one, are available in the Crocker Chapel on your way out of worship.

Saint puppets processed by the Noah's Ark class are lined up in the
Crocker Chapel. Be sure to take your child's home.

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, November 14 from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome.

New Young Adults Small Group is starting. If you are between the ages of 18 and 35 and would like to join in food, fun, and fellowship with other young adults at Union Church, then join Stacy and Heidi for our first meeting on November 27th at 11:30 a.m.

A Membership Exploration Gathering is planned for December 1st at 7:00 p.m. in the Reception Room, and December 11th at 11:30 a.m. in Stacy’s office.

We will share faith journeys, learn the history of the church and where we are now,

 discuss what membership means in this faith community, and hear your needs, hopes, and dreams for church life. You need only attend one session.

Our Holiday Greens Sale is here!

Our Holiday Greens Sale supports all Nicaraguan initiatives, including our trip project in February, scholarships, and other efforts in Newton’s sister city

of San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua.

Beautiful wreaths, greens, and Christmas trees will be sold on

 Saturdays in December from 10 to 2, Sundays from 11 to 1,

and Tuesdays from noon to 1:30. Donate some greens to decorate the church!

Order forms are available at the church.

Announcements from the Mission Committee

Cradles to Crayons Coat Drive

Cradles to Crayons (C2C) strives to provide children up to age 12 living in homeless and low-income situations with the essentials they need to feel safe, warm, ready to learn, and valued. A surprise snowstorm in October should generate excitement for kids in Massachusetts, but many local families struggling in the midst of an unforgiving economy find buying a winter coat for their child to be a  challenge. There is no joy in a snow day for a child who faces the cold without the essentials.

Cradles to Crayons expects to receive requests for 15,000 winter coats, and the Union Church in Waban would like to help them get there. Starting in November, the Mission Committee is organizing a Winter Coat Drive for children sizes 0-12. Look in your closets and basements! Pick up one at a garage sale or Costco! The coats must be stain-free and have working zippers.

Newton Food Pantry

Last year, the Union Church in Waban deepened its relationship with the Newton Food Pantry, and we want to continue that connection this year. Located in the basement of the Waban Library, the NFP provides a three day supply of food, one time a month, for eligible Newton residents. The apples picked by UCW kids were donated there a couple of weeks ago. In the month of November, we would like to help the NFP in two ways — with the Thanksgiving Collection and a non-perishable food drive. Please give generously so that we can deliver a big, fat check and multiple mini-vans of food! Meals in a can and peanut butter are usually high on the request list. 

Community Thanksgiving Dinner, Saturday, November 19, 2011

For the third year in a row, UCW will be hosting a Thanksgiving dinner for local families. In the spirit of “Widening our Welcome,” we encourage members of the congregation to invite anyone they know that could use a delicious Thanksgiving meal and some lively conversation to join us from 2:00 to 4:00 on November 19th. There are hard-copy invitations in the office as well. It’s a unique experience because volunteers and guests sit down together to enjoy the meal and the company. If anyone is interested in helping organize the event with Alicia Collins, please let her know. We will need a lot of UCW volunteers this year, so if you are willing to help with anything from shopping, to setting up, to transporting the guests, to organizing kids’ activities, to carving the turkeys, then we’ve got a job for you! We want to make sure we have enough food on hand, so if you could also help us keep track of who is planning on coming, that would be great! Questions, contact Alicia at 617.965.1696 or aliciamaureencollins@gmail.com. Thanks! 

 Rev. Stacy Swain

Ezekiel 37:1-14

Matthew 23:1-12 

           I have taken lately to wandering the Museum of Fine Arts.  Sometimes as I wander, I recognize right away the hand of the master artist that crafted the piece before me.  I recognize in the thick passionate brush, the touch of Vincent Van Gogh. Or the sensibilities of Monet in a canvass full of afternoon light.

           At other times it is not clear to me though, who made the work in front of me.   And so I draw close to read and wonder at the name printed there beside the work.  And I wonder at the artist, “Who is this that crafted such beauty?” “How extraordinary she must be!” 

           At oftentimes, at some point in my wanderings, I come upon something so breathtakingly beautiful that I can actually feel my heart swell as I stand there absolutely awash in beauty’s inspiration.

          But, there is little beauty in the valley of dry bones.   It is desolate.  There is loss and sadness.  Life drained away.   Nothing, but bones, bleached and brittle.

           Ezekiel speaks to a people who know this valley.  They have wandered there.  It is Jerusalem after its destruction.  It is life going out of the Hebrew people as many died and many more are marched off to exile.  It is their despair in a foreign land, despair of a future without hope, life without promise.

           We too know this valley of dry bones.  It is there in our national landscape in the dehumanizing oppression of our prison system, in the life sapping disparity between those that have so much and those that do not have enough, it is there in our young people who despair of a future without hope, of life without promise.

             And this valley is our internal landscape as well. It is those parched times when life has gone flat and dry.  Times of loss, (a marriage crumbles, a loved one dies) times of illness (can this cancer be true? What does life look like now?) Times of depression, (do I have the strength to face another day?).  These are the times when we ask ourselves “Can these bones live?”

            But perhaps the biggest loss and greatest sadness of the Hebrew People of Ezekiel’s time was that they not only lost their homeland, not only were they cast into exile, but they also lost their God.  For the temple was the meeting place with God.  The temple was where heaven and earth drew near.  The destruction of the temple was not just the destruction of a magnificent structure, but it was also the destruction of the place of encounter with God.  If the temple was gone so too was the meeting place.  Where was God now?  Certainly not there in Babylon, not in that strange and foreign land, where strange and foreign gods resided.  

            But then, right there in the middle of the people’s despair and dislocation,  is Ezekiel.   Ezekiel who once was a temple priest in Jerusalem, well he starts having the strangest things happen to him.  Ezekiel much I am sure to his surprise, he begins to have visions, and hears words, he begins to encounters God right there by the River Chebar in Babylon

           For in the passage before the one we read today, we overhear God and Ezekiel in conversation and God says something extraordinary to Ezekiel.  God says that through the house of Israel God is going to display God’s holiness.  God says Not only will the Israel be God’s people and, God will be their God but so close will God dwell with them, so intimate will be their relationship that it will be possible to look upon the people and see something of God through them.

            And this is exactly what happens with Ezekiel.  For what makes the words of Ezekiel’s vision so compelling is that through them those exiled and despairing people begin to see something of God.  The temple in Jerusalem may be destroyed and far away, but God’s presence is very near.  In God’s promise for the people, shining out through the vision that Ezekiel speaks, the people see something so beautiful that it makes their hearts swell within them as they stand awash in its inspiration.  In God’s promise for the people, shining out through the vision that Ezekiel speaks, the people feel strength returning to their bodies, flesh coming again to give them strength, sinews binding them together to carry them forward.  Through the words Ezekiel speaks, the people encounter God.  

           Now I want to pause here for just a moment because what is going on here is really quite remarkable and rather alarming.   We often say and are quite comfortable with the idea that God is present in the world.  We look at a beautiful sunset, or the brilliance of a fiery maple and a word of praise easily comes to our lips.  And we often say and are quite comfortable with the idea that God is in us, that there is a spark of the divine residing in our souls.  But this idea that God is displayed through us pushes us a bit out of our comfort zone. 

           For this is to suggest that by looking at you, I am to see something of God?  And that you will find something of God on display through me? 

           This pushes us to the edge of our comfort zone for a couple of reasons.  First, it’s a lot of responsibility.  It is much easier to be a nobody without much importance to God than it is to be a canvas through which the artistry of  God can be know. 

           And second, and this the much more weightier one, this kind of thinking can easily get one in lots of trouble.  For how do we really know if what we say and do, how we are in the world is actually God through us or just our own doings.  How can we know if God is displayed through us or if what we display is just our own ego and desire?  After all few of us are lucky enough to have such candid conversations with God in the way that Ezekiel did, few of us hear such direct instructions like he did.  We can get our selves into a lot of trouble if we get too overly certain and confident that something of God is seen through us.  

           After all look at the Gospel reading from Matthew this morning.  The Pharisees have ceased to be in a way that enables God to be on display through them.  All that they display is their own ego and sense of self importance.  Jesus has a bone to pick with the Elders because of the way they are using religion not in service to God but in service to themselves.     Jesus warns the crowd that “all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.”

           What keeps us, therefore, out of the danger zone of thinking more of ourselves than God, of displaying more of our own ego than God’s glory, is humility.  Humility is the check to arrogance.  Humility keeps us from moving down that path of the Pharisees, keeps us from becoming so full of ourselves that there is no room left for God.  

           Let’s be clear, humility is not humiliation. It is not a weak and submissive posture.  Humility is about balance, it is about not thinking too much or too little of ourselves.  It is about fully accepting who we are while never loosing site that there is always room for improvement. 

           It is not surprising then that humility is that which all the great saints that we remember and celebrate today, all of those great men and women who have gone before us and those who are among us still, share.   For what makes these people saints is not that they are so amazing in and of themselves, but that through them we are able to see something amazing of God. Unlike the Pharisees wrapped in ego and pride, God is able to shines out through these people, through the work of their hands, the words of their mouths, the meditations of their hearts.  Look at this artistry on display through them.   At: 

Desmond Tutu

Nelson Mandela

Oscar Romero

Dorothy Day

Cesar Chavez

Rosa Parks

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Mother Teresa

 What a gallery of God!  What works of the master artist’s hand!

           What a gallery of God.  What works of the master artist’s hand.  For we too are called to be Ezekiels, to be ones to shine forth the promise and hope of God to a despairing people, a people who are lost in a valley of dry bones.  We too are called to be saints, canvasses of the artist’s hand.  It is a great responsibility and privilege that we receive with the deepest humility, this extraordinary word that God wants to be known through us.  That through what we say and do, how we love, and forgive, how we serve and care, through who we are, people around us may see something of God that makes their hearts swell and that  stirs new life in them.

           May we not turn from this responsibility, but with all humility accept the gift of the master’s artists hand upon our lives.  May we become works reflecting God’s grace so purely that even those who wander by, those who do not yet know the love and goodness of God in their lives may be inspired to draw near and to inquire “Who is this artist that crafted such a beautiful work?  How extraordinary this God must surely be.”

           So in the days and weeks to come I invite you will all humility to consider what of God is on display through you?  Is it compassion?  Is it a passion for justice.  Is it the care of creation?  Is it seeing the Thou in yourself and in all people?  What a gallery of God.  What works of the master artist hand!   AMEN

Youth Group meets Sunday afternoon at 4:00 p.m.

The Wellsprings Women’s Group, an opportunity for spiritual companionship
among UCW women and their friends, will start up in January.  Kathy Malone
and Stacy Swain would like to hear from women who are interested.

Bible study continues each Sunday from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.  We are currently reading through the Gospel of Luke. All are welcome. No previous theological study or Biblical literacy is needed.  Just come with an open heart and curious mind. 

Coffee and tea are provided.

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, November 7 from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome to join in this time of silence, prayer, and reflection.

The November meeting of Lunch Bunch will be on Tuesday, November 8 at noon.

There will be a meeting of the Teaching Parish Committee on Wednesday evening, November 9 at 7:00 p.m.

Youth Group Lock-in on November 10 to November 11. The Youth Group is looking for someone to provide us with breakfast the morning after our Lock-in at the church. You can come cook breakfast for us or just donate some food for us to make our own.  Let Kathy know if you’re interested.

Help out the Union Church at our clean-up day, Saturday, November 12, from 9:00 a.m. to noon. Whether you have an hour to spare, or the whole morning,  please come, your help is needed.

On Sunday, November 13th, there will be a Men's Choir (women get the day off). Please come and rehearse with us on Thursday the 10th at 7:30 pm. We will learn a few easy and enjoyable songs to sing at the Sunday service. No musical training or sight reading ability is needed. Come and join us—you'll have a good time!

Union Church will hold its Community Thanksgiving Dinner on Saturday, November 19 at 2:00 p.m. in the Vestry.

New Young Adults Small Group is starting. If you are between the ages of 18 and 35 and would like to join in food, fun, and fellowship with other young adults at Union Church, then join Stacy and Heidi for our first meeting on November 27th at 11:30 a.m.

Looking ahead to the annual Holiday Greens Sale!

Our Holiday Greens Sale will support all Nicaraguan initiatives, including our trip project in February, scholarships, and other efforts in Newton’s sister city of San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua. Beautiful wreaths, greens, and Christmas trees will be sold on Saturdays in December

from 10 to 2, Sundays from 11 to 1, and Tuesdays from noon to 1:30.

CALLING ALL KIDS!  Worship begins this week with a celebratory procession for All Saint's. All children and youth are invited to participate. Plan to arrive 10 minutes early to prepare.

   A special thank you to all who participated in last week’s special Zambia service. Peter Smith of Communities Without Borders presented us with the Advocacy Award for our congregation’s advocacy and significant contributions to supporting the education of AIDS orphans and vulnerable children in Zambia. Thank you to all for the generous amount raised by the the Pumpkin Patch and the special offering, which was matched by an anonymous donor.

Nicaragua: service and a dream. The time to make decisions about traveling to Nicaragua is now. Do you really want to experience this time of mission work but cannot quite figure how to make it work for you financially?  If so, please see Tom Vawter or David Spertner as soon as possible.  The NICA taskforce would like to see if there is a way to make it possible for all who want to join the trip this February to do so.

The Wellsprings Women’s Group, an opportunity for spiritual companionship among UCW women and their friends, will start up in January.  Kathy Malone
and Stacy Swain are interested in hearing from folk who are interested.

Bible study continues each Sunday from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.  We are currently reading through the Gospel of Luke. All are welcome. No previous theological study or Biblical literacy is needed.  Just come with an open heart and curious mind. Coffee and tea are provided.

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, October 31 from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome to join in this time of silence, prayer, and reflection.

There will be a Deacons’ meeting on Tuesday, November 1st at 6:00 p.m.

Bowling on Thursday:Thursday, November 3, is an early release day for the Newton Elementary schools.  Join us after school for some candlepin bowling at
the Needham Bowlaway.  $10/person. A snack will be provided.  Rsvp to Kathy or Cindy.  Let us know if your (child)ren need transportation.

Council will meet on Sunday, November 6 after worship.

Youth Group will meet on Sunday, November 6 at 4:00 p.m.

The November meeting of Lunch Bunch will be on Tuesday, November 8 at noon.

There will be a meeting of the Teaching Parish Committee on Wednesday evening, November 9 at 7:00 p.m.

Youth Group Lock-in on Veteran’s Day Eve (November 10 to November 11).

This Sunday, after church, join the conversation on A Local Mission Initiative on supporting people with disabilities. We will discuss how we, as a church, can inform ourselves on issues facing children and adults with disabilities and how we can support them as valuable members of the community. We will meet on the stage.

The NICA Task Force will meet today at 11:30 a.m.

Youth Group meets from 4:00 to 5:30 p.m. this afternoon. All

6th through 12th graders and friends are invited.

Nicaragua Trip Deadline Fast Approaching: Arrangements are being made shortly to purchase airline tickets, so if you are still considering going in February, please make sure to get in touch with David Spertner ASAP. dspertner@gmail.com

For the month of October, look for the Waban Pumpkin Patch on our lawn where every Sunday from 11:30 to 12:30 and every Tuesday from 12:30  to 1:30 we will sell pumpkins large and small, and much, much more. Proceeds will support a project to feed and educate AIDS orphans in Zambia.

Bible study continues each Sunday from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.  We are currently reading through the Gospel of Luke.  All are welcome.  No previous theological study or Biblical literacy is needed.  Just come with an open heart and curious mind. 

Coffee and tea are provided.

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, October 24 from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome to join in this time of silence, prayer, and reflection.

The Lunch Bunch trip to Blue Hills has been re-scheduled for October 25th . We will be able to drive up to the top for beautiful views and a picnic lunch. Please rsvp to Stacy.

Book Club meets again on Tuesday evening, October 25 at 7:30 p.m. This month’s book is The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.

The Strategy Committee will meet on Wednesday evening, October 26, at 6:00 p.m.

Communities Without Borders will meet Wednesday evening, October 26, at 7:00 p.m.

There will be a meeting of the Stewardship Committee on

Thursday morning, October 27, at 8:00 a.m.

The Local Mission Initiative will meet at Brita Gill-Austern’s home on Thursday evening, October 27, at 7:00 p.m.

Join the Union Church family for a fun evening at Game Night on October 28 at 6:30 pm.

Youth Group Lock-in on Veteran’s Day Eve (November 10 to November 11).

Reverend Stacy Swain

October 16, 2011

Matthew 22:15-22

Exodus 33:12-23

 

          I was listening to a piece on the radio this week.  In it, an interviewer spoke with a scientist who had made an amazing discovery.  The scientist discovered that piranhas, you know the fish with the sharp teeth and an attitude to match, well they communicate.  By submerging a microphone in a tank of piranhas, the scientist was able to hear and decipher three distinct sounds that he believed were purposeful language.  

·       The first sound was a barking noise, and that by watching the posture of the fish, the scientist interpreted to mean “You are anoying, get out of my way.”

·        The second sound was a thumping noise that again by observing the fish’s body language, the scientist interpreted to mean “You are really annoying me now and I am thinking of eating you.”

·        And the third sound was a clicking noise the fish made with its teeth right before attacking that clearly said “That’s it, you’re dead!”  

What was amazing about all of this is that by discovering that the fish were speaking to one another in the tank, the scientist learned that these fish understood themselves not as just a random collection of individuals, but instead as being in relation to each other in some meaningful, purposeful ways.  Language it turns out, is a sign of social relationship.   One does not develop the use of “words”, unless one has the desire and need to speak them to another.

          But before we explore how piranhas have anything to do with the Scripture texts or our lives this morning, let us pray.  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you O God, our Rock and our Redeemer.  AMEN.  

~~~~~

             The acquisition of language is one of those huge milestones in human growth and development.   A child first learns to language by making the connection between an object and the word that represents that object.  We point to the fuzzy creature with the long tail purring on the bed and say “cat.”  We point to the wooden panel that opens to the back yard and say “door.”  Words in their most basic sense are signs that represent tangible reality. Stand-ins that conjure up in the mind the reality they represent. I will never forget the first word my son spoke.  We were living in El Salvador and one night when the moon was big and round, I pointed to it and asked “Donde esta la luna, Mateo?”.  And  he without hesitation pointed his little finger up into sky and said “alla!!  What thrilling moment!

          Language in this first and most basic usage is tied to a tangible referent and is bound by the temporal world.  We speak with confidence about what is, because we can point to and see that of which we speak.   

          Now all of this is fine and good, and there is nothing wrong with this representational level of language.  But danger creeps in if we begin to think that what we can point to and name is all that there is —  that our experience of reality defines what reality is.   Thinking that if I find you annoying than you are annoying.  It I find you problematic than you are a problem. 

          But the truth is, words can do much more than merely label and define what is.  Words are also revelatory and have the power to create, to crack open the moment and open it up to what can be. .

          It is this contrast between representational language and revelatory language that we see in the Gospel text this morning.  The Pharisees are so sure they see all that there is to see.  They believe that what they know and understand defines what there is to know and understand. And so this young Rabbi from the back waters of Galilee must be nothing more than a young Rabbi from the back waters of Galilee.  They are so sure that they are right that it follows then that Jesus must be wrong.  In their closed certainty, language becomes a weapon used to defend what is perceived to be what is real.  Language becomes a tool of control.

          And so they ask him, “Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?" not so because they are sincerely interested in his opinion on the matter but in order to ensnare him, in order to trip him up. 

~~~

          These days, it seems that much of our public discourse is offered up in the same way.  It is a bit like listening in on the piranha tank.  Language has become a tool that we like the Pharisees use against each other, like a weapon in a verbal sparring match of who gets to define what is.  Have you listened to the pundits on TV. Points are scored for blows to the other not for insight.  I even heard one say at the end of an interview how much he appreciated his opponent not for what he said but “for staying in the fight” as he put it.  Is that what our civil discourse has become?  A fight?

          Have we forgotten that language can be used not to shut others down but as a way to open more fully to what is possible – to the moreness that lies within each moment?

          For this is exactly what Jesus does.  He sees clearly the bait that the Pharisees have put out there for him, but he side steps it completely.  He shifts the tenor of the discourse to revelatory language saying  "Show me the coin used for the tax." So they bring him a denarius. Then he said to them, "Whose head is this, and whose title?"  They answered, "The emperor's." Then he said to them, "Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor's, and to God the things that are God's."   Jesus’ words disarm the Pharisees for through them he breaks open an either /or power struggle with the Pharisees and reveals  new possibilities and wonderings.  The people are left wondering  “If the coin caries the imprint of the Emperor, what is it that carries the imprint of God?”  “If taxes are the way we give the emperor what is his, how is it that we give to God what is God’s?”  Jesus’ words open thing up, through his use of language the moment holds more than what it had before. 

~~~~

          The text from Exodus takes this revelatory power of language even further.  The context of the conversation is that Moses and God are at odds.  Moses is upset with God because God has decided that the people should go on alone with just an angel as their guide not with the presence of God’s self.  God is angry with the people because they made an idol, the golden calf to worship.  So when the text begins today, Moses is mad at God and God is mad at Moses.  But unlike the Pharisees, Moses honestly engages God.  God and Moses are willing to be open to hearing the other and they work it out.  They reach a place of understanding but that is not the really remarkable thing.  What is remarkable is that Moses leans into this moment and asks that God make it more.  Asks that God show Moses more of God’s glory than he has seen before.  And God does!  Not only is the conflict between God and Moses resolved but through it Moses deepens his relationship with God and is privileged to an intimate encounter with God unlike any he had ever experienced.

~~~~

          Where do you find yourself in these stories this morning?  How do you speak and how do the words that you use affect what you experience and how you relate to those around you? Are you like the Pharisees, quick to ensnare in a winner take all power struggle?  Or are you disarming, like Jesus, using words to break open what is to revelation, to new understandings and possibilities?  Do your words lead to a deepening of relationships, to wonderful new levels of intimacy that were previously unknown?

          As we go into our week, let us be mindful of how we use the words we speak.  Let us engage those around us in ways that draw out the fullness of what the moment can hold.  And let us do so especially in those difficult conversations, in times of conflict when we feel the piranha in us begin to stir, let us instead engage the creative revelatory power of language to open ourselves and those we are with, to new insights and the deepening of relationships.    AMEN

Have an hour or two to spare? Come to  clean-up day  at Union Church. October 15th and November 12th! from 9:00 a.m.  to noon. 

Nicaragua Trip Deadline Fast Approaching: Arrangements are being made shortly to purchase airline tickets, so if you are still considering going in February, please make sure to get in touch with David Spertner ASAP. dspertner@gmail.com

Help Zambian children by buying your autumn pumpkins at the Union Church. For the month of October, look for the Waban Pumpkin Patch on our lawn where every Sunday from 11:30 to 12:30 and every Tuesday from 12:30  to 1:30 we will sell pumpkins large and small, and much, much more. Proceeds will support a project to feed and educate AIDS orphans in Zambia.

Please register for Sunday School if you have not already done so. In addition to your child’s latest information, this year’s registration also includes

 a photo release which we need on file.

Bible study continues each Sunday from 8:00 to 9:00 a.m. in Stacy’s study.  We are currently reading through the Gospel of Luke.  All are welcome.  No previous theological study or Biblical literacy is needed.  Just come with an open heart and curious mind. Coffee and tea are provided.

Living Waters Prayer Group continues on Monday, October 17 from 7:30 – 8:15 a.m. in the Nativity Chapel.  All are welcome to join in this time of silence, prayer, and reflection.

The Disciples Bible Class meets this Monday, October 17, from 4:30-6:00 p.m.

The Lunch Bunch trip to Blue Hills has been re-scheduled for October 25th . We will be able to drive up to the top for beautiful views and a picnic lunch. Please rsvp to Stacy.

Book Club meets again on Tuesday evening, October 25 at 7:30 p.m. This month’s book is The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.

Join the Union Church family for a fun evening at Game Night on October 28 at 6:30 pm.

Youth Group Lock-in on Veteran’s Day Eve (November 10 to November 11). Mark your
calendars and stay tuned for more information next week.

Rev. Stacy Swain

Nehemiah 2:11-20

Philippians 4:1-9

This morning, I’d like to tell you a story from ancient times.  Scholar’s believe this story is the first extant autobiographical account that was written by a common person, not a king.  This story is the memoir really of a man named Nehemiah who lived in Persia in the fifth century before the common era.  But before we begin, let us pray. 

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our rock and our redeemer.  AMEN

Let me begin by setting the scene:

It was a time of challenge and upheaval.

It began when the Babylonians led by Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to the great city of Jerusalem.  Its mighty walls were tumbled.  Its gates were burned.   The Babylonians military strategy was not only to destroy the physical city, but also to destroy the way of life of the people that lived there.   And so when the walls of Jerusalem were in ruins, the gates were smoldering ash, the people of Israel were rounded up and marched off to exile in the foreign land, in the land of Babylonia.  Some Israelites were allowed to remain in Jerusalem, but those that were allowed to stay were considered to be rather nobodies, poor, of little threat.

Years passed in the wake of this Babylonian destruction and bit by bit, a tired and dispirited people tried to make their way.  

Then about 50 years later, with the might of the Babylonians weakening, a new superpower emerged.  Persia under the rule of Cyrus the Great rose up, defeated Babylon and became the ruler of what was called “the civilized world.”  But the political and military strategy of King Cyrus the Persian, was different than that of the Babylonians.  King Cyrus believed that a content people, not a displaced people, were easier to rule and so Cyrus issued a decree stating that all conquered people, including the Israelites were free to return to their homelands.  The Jews were free to return to Jerusalem to rebuild their temple and reinstitute their religious practices that framed their way of life.

The exile was over and those that had been displaced made their way back home.   But the Jerusalem they returned to was not the Jerusalem that they once knew.  The Babylonian invasion had broken the city and then years of neglect had ruined it further.  And those that returned met with resistance at best and animosity at worst from those that had remained. There was division among the people.   

 Now Nehemiah’s people were among those who were displaced to Babylon after the fall of Jerusalem, but unlike others, they chose not to return to Jerusalem when the Babylonian reign of terror had ended.  They decided to stay in the east and began to assimilate into the Persian culture. 

This is where our story of today begins.  Nehemiah has become so at home Persia that he has actually found employment in the high court of the Persian King. Nehemiah this Jewish man living in Persia, not only found employment in the high court of the King but was actually the King’s cup bearer.  The cup bearer was the one who was literally in charge of the King's cup since death by poison was a popular form of assassination at the time.   And so to be a cup bearer, one had to be one of the most trusted and highly valued people in the King’s inner circle. 

One day, as Nehemiah was going about his duties in the court, his kinsmen Hanani approached him and told him that a delegation of Jews had come from Jerusalem and spoke of the “great trouble and shame” of the brethren there.   There was division and discord among the people.  And the people felt exposed and threatened by hostile neighboring kingdoms to the south.

When Nehemiah hears all that is going on in Jerusalem he is deeply troubled.  Despite all of the years and the distance, he feels care and concern for the people.  But it is hard for Nehemiah, for he has made a life for himself — a good life.

His people may be living with deep insecurity and want, but he is well off and secure.  His people may be being scorned as nobodies in their own land, but he is well respected and trusted in the court of the Persian King.  Why has this news come to him? 

I can appreciate the mix of emotions with which Nehemiah struggles.  Sometimes I find myself in a place of protective denial, that if I just don’t read the news then I will be freed from the struggle of wondering how I am to respond to it. 

But instead of just shutting this news out and going on with his daily routine, Nehemiah takes his struggle to God.  The text tells us that he prayed and fasted listening for what God would have him do.

I do not think that we individually are called to respond to all of the needs that we hear about.  How could we?  To do so would be to succumb to what Thomas Merton calls the “violence of activism”  where we do so much that we end up being so  frazzled and spent that we are not much use to anyone.   But I do believe that there is a particular call for each of us.  There is a place where the need of the world and our own passion intersects and it is to that place we are called.[1]

There are some in this congregation whose passion intersects with issues of violence and lack of educational opportunity especially for urban youth.  Do you feel that passion?  Will you join them?  There are some in this congregation whose passion intersects with the people with disabilities and the need to be seen not as “other” but as people deserving and seeking full inclusion in our communities.  Do you feel that passion?  Will you join them?  . 

For Nehemiah this place where the worlds’ need and his passion intersected was Jerusalem.  He was moved by the plight of people which whom he discovered he felt kinship even across all this time and distance.  And so Nehemiah goes to the King, and the King sees such sadness on Nehemiah’s face, sadness the King has never before seen. The King asks Nehemiah what is troubling him.  Nehemiah then tells the King about all of the hardships that the people in Jerusalem are suffering.  And the King, saw the suffering in Nehemiah and was moved and so when Nehemiah finished the King asked him, what is it that you would like?

Nehemiah knows.  From his praying and fasting, his going to God, he knows what is the need on his heart.  He feels a deep need to go to Judah and work to rebuild the city. And he goes on to ask that the King send him with letters to the governors of the region to make safe passage for him and for a letter to the keeper of the King's forest giving Nehemiah permission to take timber to make beams for the gates.

And so with the blessing and letters of the King, Nehemiah after years returns to his homeland, returns to a city, he himself had never seen.  

 And now it is night, Nehemiah approaches the once great city. He is on the back of a horse or mule perhaps and he wants to see for himself what has become of Jerusalem. You see he is not “Polly Annaish” about his hopes and dreams.  He is a realist and wants to know the scope of what he faces.   The city is in such ruin that the sure footed mule cannot even find safe footing so he leaves the animal and continues on foot. Picking his way in the half light of the moon.  Running his fingers across the great stones that lie in heaps.  Touching the hinges where the great gates once hung.  It is a silent walk of mourning and a pilgrim’s walk of reimagining.  By the time morning's dawn alights Nehemiah has circumnavigated the city and  his own soul,  he knows well the scope of what must be done and what he and the people are up against. But rekindled in him is also the memory of who the Jewish people are.  God’s beloved.  Called and blessed to be a light to all nations, not scared and crumbling, fighting among themselves and forgetting who and whose they are.  

And when the sun has cleared the hills, he calls the people.  I imagine his face glowing with the same light that shone on Moses' face when Moses came down Mt. Sinai after having received the covenant of God.   There amidst the rubble, Nehemiah calls the people together and says “you see the trouble we are in, Jerusalem lies in ruins with its gates burned. Come let us rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.  For we are not alone, God is with us and we are not without resources.  

Sometimes it takes someone with a vision to reawaken the passion that lies dormant on the people’s heart and realign it with the need that lies before them.  For when those that gathered  heard Nehemiah’s words and felt the warmth of the rising sun on their faces, they replied, “Let us start rebuilding!” and as another translation states, they “committed themselves to the common good.” 

And they did.  It was hard.  They faced the scorn and threat of the War Lords in the surrounding region and more than once they were so scared and tired that they thought about stopping.  But they didn’t.  In fact, once when they learned of a plot to come and destroy all that had been rebuilt, the people themselves stood in the breach in the walls, becoming in their bodies the gate that had not yet been rebuild.  They committed not just their labors but their lives to the preservation and thriving of the vision they held now together. 

 And Jerusalem was rebuilt. And the people re-gathered and the truth of God’s grace was rekindled, and the glory of the LORD shone through them.

 What a story!  A story from so long ago but surely a story for us now.

For we, like Nehemiah, are living in a time where much in our national life together has crumbled and lies in ruin.  The Babylonians are gone but our people still feel under siege by economic, political, social uncertainty.

 And I am convinced that we, like Nehemiah, have a role to play.  Part of the purpose of the church is to call us as individuals to a life of faithful living, but the purpose of being church is also to speak with the voice of the prophets calling the world to faithful living, calling the people, as Nehemiah did to commit ourselves again to the common good.

 I was reminded by one of you this week, that it was out of the Quaker and later Congregational Church that the call for the abolition of slavery first came.  And Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, stood rooted in his faith as he called the country to full civil rights for all people. 

In this our time of challenge and upheaval, I wonder how we like Nehemiah may wander through the rubble learning and seeing for ourselves what the needs really are.

 I wonder what are the breaches in our walls, in the structures that frame, define and support our society, and how may we be called to stand in that breach?

 And I wonder, how not only this church but people of faith across traditions may lead and inspire people to once again work for the common good.

 Hear again, these words from Paul’s letter to the community at Philippi,

           “The Lord is near.  Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer and petition, present your requests to God. And the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds.

          For whatever is right, whatever is admirable – think about such things.  Whatever you have learned or received or heard  put into practice.  And the God of peace will be with you.”

           In this time of upheaval and challenge, may our passion and the world’s needs intersect not just for ourselves but for the common good.  AMEN

“Becoming Given”

Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20.

Matthew 21:33-46

             Over these last few weeks, we have considered that the purpose of our faith journey is not to prove our worth to each other or to God.  Nor is it about earning God’s grace, even though we around here we have the tendency to joke about awarding God points every good deeds, every time we weed the garden or move a couch out of the Sunday school class room,. 

            Instead we have considered that the purpose of our faith journey is to know that we are beloved.  T.S. Eliot has a wonderful line out of his poem Little Giding in the Four Quartets where he says, “ the end of all of our journeying is to arrive at where we started and to know the place for the first time.”   What if the purpose of our journeying is to arrive at where we started on the dawn of creation, to arrive at the truth of our belovedness and to know that belovedness again, for the first time.

            Will you pray with me?  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our Rock and our Redeemer.  AMEN.

             For these past several weeks we have been following the journey of the Israelites from the book of Exodus. We have heard of how God chose them as God’s beloved people and freed them from the bondage of Pharaoh.  We have heard about how these beloved people discovered their own brokenness in the wilderness of the Sinai desert as they turned on Moses and turned from God as they struggled with hunger and thirst.  And we have heard how God has been with them through it all, ministering to them in their needs, coaxing them to uncurl themselves from a closed up posture of self preservation and to open again to trusting in God. We have seen how this journey as been as much a spiritual journey as it has been a physical one.

            Today’s passage from the book Exodus is a familiar one.  The people are gathered around the foot of the mountain. Moses has gone up into the clouds to receive the word of God, the 10 commandments.  We know them well right?  All of those “you shalls”  and “you shall nots”.  Now for most of my life, I have thought of the ten commandments as a kind of holy rule book. Following them would earn one God’s favor.  Disobeying them would earn one God’s wrath.  They were posted on the wall in my Sunday school classroom and I remember thinking that they were like the rules posted by the doorway in my elementary school, rules that were to keep us well behaved insisting that we walk in single file, don’t talk in the hallways, that we do not ever chew gum.  

            But reading the words over and over this week I began to hear something I had not heard before.  I began to hear in these words from the Book of Exodus an echo of the same voice that spoke on the dawn of creation.  I began to hear not rules but the re-creation of God’s people.   

            God speaks from the power and might of the mountain top to a people whose journeying has prepared them for this moment, a people who have opened themselves to be re made as God’s people.  Just as it was in the beginning when God called forth the form and shape of all creation, so too is it now as God’s words from the mountain call forth the form and shape of God’s new people, of how they are to be in the world.  This is a genesis moment.

              To borrow the words of TS Eliot, the people today gathered around the mountain are returning to their starting place and knowing it for the first time.  In the power and might of God’s vision for their life, God is creating them anew.  Returning them to the place before the oppression of  Pharaoh, before the destruction of the flood, back before the rivalry of Cain and Able.  With these words of formation, God is taking the people back to the time when God first took the dust of the ground and formed into the beloved human being, back to the time when God breathed into this beloved human being and gave it live, back to the time when God first spoke God’s word of instruction Adam and Eve about how they were to live in the sweet shalom of the Garden.  And  so is it now as God speaks the 10 commandments to the newly reformed beloved people, God tells them how they are to live in the sweet shalom of this new land they were about to enter. The journey out of slavery and into new life with God is a journey of regeneration, of rebirth.

            Today we gather with the people of the world for our own mountain top experience, our own genesis moment of being once again being formed and shaped as Gods beloved.  Gathered around the glow and power of this communion table and we will take Jesus life and teachings into ourselves as bread and wine and we will be re-newed as God’s people.      

~~~

            Now across many faith traditions and spiritual practices there is a phenomenon that is fairly consistent.  And that is as one draws closer to the that place of resting again in the hands of God, of returning again to the starting place of belovedness, that there arises a powerful desire to give and to be of service.

            Theresa of Avila, a kind of hero of mine who was a Spanish nun living in the 16^th century writes in of her own spiritual formation and says that the end of all her journeying is to arrive at a place of pure communion with God.  Where she is perfectly at peace and full of the same love that animates the entire universe.   And it while resting in this profound place of peace that she experiences an eruption of irrepressible joy and desire to give. It is like a spring, she says that rises up within her any rushes out into the world.  Communion with God and service to the world are two sides of the same coin she says.

            And this of course is Jesus teaching the parable this morning from the Gospel of Matthew.  Jesus indicts the Chief Priests and Pharisees by comparing them to tenants who hoard the bounty of the vineyard for themselves.   To think that we are to receive God’s grace only for our own enrichment and well being is to miss the Gospel message completely.

             So it is no wonder then that Henri Nouwen writes that the final movement in the spiritual journey to being the beloved that we are is to be given.  Jesus took bread and blessed it, he broke it and gave it to them.  Nouwen says our humanity comes to its fullest bloom in giving.[1] He says our deepest human desire is to give ourselves to each other as a source of physical, emotional and spiritual growth. P. 89

            We at the Union Church, whose front lawn is covered with pumpkins to raise money for Zambia, who children gave of themselves on Thursday as they prepared back to school supplies and clothes for children in need.  We at the Union Church know what it is to give not to earn God’s grace but because it is an expression of who we are.  Spiritual formation and mission are two sides of the same coin here at the Union Church.

            I invite you to take the learning up the learning of these last few weeks.  And to think about how you over the course of this coming year will move closer to the truth of your belovedness.  What practices will you engage to help you discover your choseness, to accept your brokenness, to move into that place of communion where the renewal of belovedness can begin.   Will it be prayer?  Bible study?  Worship? Or a gathering of fellowship?

            And how will you share the gift of being beloved with the world around you. How will you become bread for those that hunger to know that their lives matter, that they are chosen by God, forgivine and given by God to also be bread for a hungry world.  How will you become the cup of blessing for those that are thirsty for justice.  How will you address injustice, and labor for the day when all will have enough?

             “Jesus took bread and blessed it, broke it and gave it to them” May our journey of becoming beloved,  and of becoming bread, Christ’s body in the world, begin today.  AMEN

September 25, 2011

Exodus 17: 1-7

Matthew 21:23-32      

            Today we continue our journey towards becoming the beloved that we are.  We continue to walk with Henri Nouwen through his book “Life of the Beloved” and we continue to listen as he speaks to us of how he found the movement of his own spiritual journey in the movement of communion, in the words:  “Jesus took bread and blessed it; he broke it and gave it to them.   

            Last week we talked about the first movement, of being taken and blessed and we explored that it is when we accept that we are chosen by God, when we are able to see that God is invested in who we are and how we are, that our hearts open to seeing that God’s generous grace does not exclude, that God is also invested in who and how the other is.   And we explored how being chosen by God is not a neutral thing — that God chooses us so that we will join God and each other as laborers in the vineyard, working for the day when all will have enough.

            Today we will engage the second movement of this spiritual journeying – becoming broken.   Jesus took bread, blessed it; and then he broke it.

            But first, Let us pray:  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our rock and our redeemer.  AMEN. 

            For our honeymoon, Mark and I took a trip to Alaska.  We brought our tent, sleeping bags, cook stove and back packs and headed into the back country wilderness.  Have any of you been to Alaska?  It is unlike anywhere else.  Sweeping valleys, soaring mountains, dirt roads turning in to dirt paths and then disappearing all together. Awesome beauty, staggering vastness.  

            Now as a child my family did a lot of camping and I am very much at home in the woods. In fact, there is no place I’d rather be than surrounded by birch trees, Norway pines and blue spruce.  

            But being in the wilds of Alaska is an entirely different matter all together.  The first night Mark and I camped, there was a posting on the sign board as we drove into the campground saying that a grizzly bear had been spotted in the area the day before and it warned us to be particularly careful with our storing and cooking of food.

            That night, I do not think Mark and I slept at all.   We lay in our little nylon tent rigid with adrenaline.  With every drop of a pinecone or snap of a twig we sat bolt upright scanning woods around us in the dusty half light of the Alaskan midsummer night.  We were completely unnerved knowing that there was something out there in the wildness of the woods that would not think twice about having us for breakfast.

~~~~

            “From the wilderness,” begins the passage from Exodus this morning.  From the wilderness –  a vast and wild place. 

            The wilderness of the Sinai is unforgiving.  It is hot and dry, with little shelter, and lots of sand and rock.  And the Israelites are feeling the strain of such a harsh landscape. Last week they were hungry, very hungry.  This week they are thirsty, very thirsty.  Journeying from this wilderness is not easy. 

            That sleepless night for Mark and I was certainly taxing. But the threat we faced was purely an external one.  The bear that threatened us was in the woods and not in our souls.  The external landscape was unnerving but internally, our hearts and our spirits were steady and full of joy knowing what our new life with each other was sure to bring.

            But things are different for the Israelites. They face the challenges of not only an exacting external landscape of hunger and thirst, of heat and want.  But they also face an exacting internal landscape full of fear at not knowing what their new life with each other and with God is going to bring.   

            For the text tells us that the people quarreled and complained, that they turned on Moses and most fearsome of all that they tested the Lord saying “Is the Lord among us or not?”  The Israelites are thirsty yes, but more than that they are afraid.  They are afraid that God is no longer with them in their suffering.  They fear that they are alone, exposed.  They know that the life they had before is no longer but they cannot yet imagine what life looks like now and they do not like it one bit.   

            I see some of you nodding your heads.  You know that wilderness don’t you?   At one time or another or perhaps even right now we all have been there.  We have been in a place of vulnerability where we feel exposed and cannot yet imagine what life on the other side of all of this will look like.

·         Some of us know the wilderness of losing some one so dear that we really don’t know how we will even go on breathing. 

·         Some of us know the wilderness of what it is to feel the pain and loss as bit by bit our body wilts under the burden of aging, or disease.

·         Some of us know the wilderness of being seized with a worry that edges on panic as we tuck our children into bed at night fearing for their future, fearing for the world we are leaving them.   

·         Some of us know the wilderness of wandering through an empty house wondering who we are now that our children have left.  

            But as unnerving as all of this can be, there can be an even more fearsome threat.  Nouwen goes so far as to call it a curse.  And this is that we can begin to think that we are all alone in this wilderness of ours.  Hurting and frightened, we have the tendency in these wilderness times to turn in upon ourselves in an instinctive posture of self protectiveness.

            Now I was told that if one does encounter a grizzly bear, one is suppose to fall to the ground, curl up in a fetal position with one hand slung over ones head to protect the vulnerability of the neck and play dead.  In that prone posture, we are told one has the best chance of surviving an attack.

            But, the only problem with this fetal position, of curling in on one’s self, is that it is hard to see.  Our gaze is so deeply within and our heart so tuned to self preservation that we cannot see much around us.  And because of that, it is easy to think that we are on our own, that God is gone, that our friends have fled and that we are left alone to be devoured by that which wounds us.

            And then worst of all, as we lay all curled up, we might even begin to think that we deserve this pain, that somehow we must have brought it on our selves, because we are so deeply flawed.  

·         My marriage failed because I am not loveable.

·         My child is having a hard time because I am a failure as a parent.

·         My career is going nowhere because I don’t have what it takes.  

            Nouwen writes “we see our pain as confirmation of our negative feelings about ourselves.  It is like saying, “I always suspected that I was useless or worthless [or flawed in some deep way] and now I am sure of it because of what is happening to me.”[1]  The fear, isolation and self absorption that over takes us in these wilderness times are signs of our brokenness, not the wilderness itself.  What makes the wilderness in the Exodus account a wilderness of Sin, of brokenness, is not the fact that it was a harsh landscape, that it was hot and the people were thirsty.  What makes this wilderness a wilderness of Sin is that the people turned from God. They turned from the truth that they were God’s beloved, chosen and blessed by God. They turned back into themselves so much so that they no longer could even see God. 

~~~~~

            I find it incredibly moving to know that these Exodus accounts of wilderness and brokenness are the defining, foundational texts of the Jewish people.   These are the sacred texts that the people return to over and over again to deepen their understanding of who they are and how God is with them.  I find it deeply moving that these most beloved foundational texts are the ones that reveal so profoundly the brokenness of the God’s chosen people.   

            These identity forming texts reveal that becoming the beloved means accepting that we will have wilderness times and in their midst we will very likely experience brokenness.  Brokenness within ourselves, brokenness in our relationship with others, and brokenness in our relationship with God.  

            But to read these texts is also to remember that in the midst of this brokenness, God loves us so much that God will not leave us in a place of brokenness.  God is there whether we see it or not, God is there actively leading us from  the wilderness of Brokenness while at the same time dropping bread from heaven and drawing water from rocks.

            And this, of course, is the work of Jesus.  In the passage from the Gospel of Matthew this morning, Jesus is standing in the temple, the epicenter of Jewish religious authority and the religious leaders, those who pride themselves on being models of righteousness, devout followers of the law, are squaring off with Jesus about his authority to do and say what he does and what he says.   

            But Jesus sees right through their robes and vestaments and into their hearts, and into their brokenness that they do not face.  He tells them that tax collectors and prostitutes, those who were considered to be the most sinful, the most broken people of the day, will enter the kingdom before them, these chief priests and elders. For the tax collectors and prostitutes, like the first son in the parable, are not blind to their brokenness.  They see it and in their brokenness they have a change of mind,  which in Greek means metanoia, a turning and opening of mind, body and soul.

It is the tax collectors and prostitutes who have the courage to accept that they are broken people and in doing so to uncurl from a posture of self protection and isolation, and to turn instead to one of openness and receptivity to others and most of all to God.  

            It is changing of our minds that we practice every Sunday morning at the start of our service in our prayer of confession.  We practice accepting our brokenness and we practice uncurling our bodies.  We practice how to turn back to each other and to God.  For the journey out of the wilderness is one that we do together, loving and supporting, helping and carrying each other through the difficult times.   The wilderness may still be scary and hard, and like Mark and me that night we may get little sleep when we are in it, but with each other to lean on and with God to guide us, can find our way through these times of wilderness together and in wholeness, not brokenness.    

            I’d like to close with a story that one of our Sunday school teachers told me last fall after a lesson on how we can count on God when we are going through a hard time. The teacher told me that one of the kids in her class, a first grader at the time, who had just made the transition to the wilderness of elementary school said that yes, she knew what the lesson was all about.  Because the other day when she at recess when it was time to go back into the building, she did not know what to do.  And she was really scared because she could not find her teacher; she did not know what door to go through; what line she was supposed to stand in.  And then she saw a boy who was a few grades older that she knew from church.  And she said she was so happy to see him, because she knew that she did not need to be afraid any more.  She knew that he would help her, that he would show her the way. So she ran right over to him.  And that’s what God is like right? She said. 

May it be so for us and we be so for each other.  AMEN

Exodus 16:2-15

Matthew 20: 1-16

            Last week we began exploring Henri Nouwen’s conviction that we are beloved and that the purpose of our spiritual journeying is to become the beloved who we are.  Last week, I asked that you speak the truth of being the “beloved child of God” to yourself every day and to pay attention to whether you can hear this truth or whether another voice from within begins to condition it for you.  For what you hear, I said, will tell you a lot about the landscape of your spiritual journey. So how did it go?  Could you hear the full truth of being beloved or is there some distance  there for you to travel?

            Today we will step into this journey towards becoming beloved with Nouwen’s book “Life of the Beloved,” as our guide.  Nouwen was asked to write this book by a friend who wanted to know what it is like to live a spirit-filled life.  What it is like to engage and be engaged by the Holy. 

            In the forward of the book, Nouwen, a Catholic priest, says he struggled to try to find a way to speak to his friend.  Then, in celebrating communion one day when speaking the familiar words, “Jesus took bread and blessed it, he broke it and gave it to them,” Nouwen heard something new.  He heard the movements of his own spiritual journey.    

            According to Nouwen, the first movement of the journey to becoming beloved is the movement of being taken and blessed, of being chosen.  Jesus took bread… He placed his hands upon it and blessed it; claiming it for us, claiming us for God’s own.

            But before we begin, let us pray:  May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable to you, O God, our rock and our redeemer.  AMEN

            Now if I were to tell you that you are chosen by God; that we are a chosen people, I bet nearly everyone in this sanctuary would flinch.  This idea of being chosen makes us uneasy.  For being chosen means that others are not, right?  That’s what it means to be chosen after all, to be selected out from among others.  To be special.  And we know where that can lead.  After all, who does not remember recess in elementary school?  Lining up there on the playground as the captains picked the teams for kickball?  Don’t you remember the dread hoping and praying that you would not be the last one, the one not chosen — the one no one wants?

            And if we pan out from the personal to the full scope of human history, how can we not cringe or better yet, throw ourselves on the ground in profound repentance at all the ways that Christian exclusivism, this idea that we are better than all the rest, has been used to rationalize and justify so much violence — used as a bloody sword to wound and to destroy so many of God’s beloved? 

            Who wants to be chosen if being chosen comes at the expense of another?   But is this what being chosen means to God?  I wonder. 

            Let’s look at the teaching of Jesus in the parable from the Gospel of Matthew this morning.

            A landowner went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard.  He finds a whole group of people ready to work and so he hires them and straight away they head into the vineyard feeling pleased I am sure, that they had been chosen.

            But then the oddest thing happens.  Throughout the rest of the day, additional laborers keep showing up at the vineyard.  Turns out the landowner keeps heading back to the market finding more and more people who had not yet been hired. More and more people that were not chosen.

            Why in the world does he do this?  Now I am sure that with all that labor available, the landowner was very able to hire all the hands that he needed when he went to the market first thing in the morning.  He already had all the laborers he needed to get the job done.  So why does he return again and again?  If it is not for his own need then could it be for the need of those who had not yet been hired.  The landowner seems to want to be sure that no one is left unchosen.  The parable seems to suggest that no one is to be excluded, left out from the generous grace of God.

            And for me, that makes a lot of sense.  After all, God chose to create all that is including each and every life that lives and breathes in this beloved creation.  God brought us forth from “all eternity and formed us each as unique, special, precious beings.” [1]  Each and every one of us has the touch of God upon us.  Each one of us is singled out by God, formed and fashioned by God, chosen by God to live our unique life right now.  

            This reminds me of the novel, The Shack by WM Paul Young, where when the name of a person comes up in conversation, the character of God says “Oh, I am especially fond of her.”  And as a reader one cannot help but feel a little envious of that person because the character of God is so appealing and you just want God to be fond of you as well.  But as the book goes on you realize that whenever the name of any person comes up in conversation, God always says with the same joy and enthusiasm “Oh, I am especially fond of him, or her.”  Turns out God is especially fond of everyone!

            Nouwen  goes on to say that it is in accepting that we are the chosen of God that we find we are able to truly open our hearts to seeing those around us as chosen as well.  It is through accepting that God is invested in me and my life, that my heart opens wide enough to also see that God is invested in you and your life.  When we do this, we discover that the other is not our rival, someone to be excluded if we are included, but instead that the other is our companion on this journey of becoming beloved.

            Now our reluctance to accept that we are chosen and blessed by God may be due, not only to aversion at the rivalry and the hurt exclusion has caused, but also perhaps because being chosen and blessed by God is not a neutral thing.  Being chosen is charged because it means that God has expectations of us.  God hired the laborers because there was work to do in the vineyard.  Being chosen means saying yes to what God would have us do and how God would have us be.     

            And sometimes the work God would have us do can be difficult. In the story from Exodus this morning, God’s chosen people are struggling in the wilderness.  The sun is hot, they are tired and more than anything else they are hungry.  Really hungry, so hungry in fact that the people are getting agitated.  An ominous grumbling is stirring against Moses and Aaron.  

            It is easy to hold onto the truth that we are chosen and blessed by God when things are going well but it is a real challenge when we are struggling through our own times of wilderness.  But it is in the crucible of the wilderness that the Israelites experience the identity-defining formation of who and how they are to be as God’s people.

               For four hundred years the Israelites had lived under the reign of Pharaoh and in what Pastor and Hebrew Scripture scholar, Walter Bruggemann calls “a place of great corporate wealth in which the powerful controlled all the public processes, in which the little ones were used up and discarded, in which the weak ones were abused and oppressed, in which the marginal ones were silenced and coerced.”[2]  But now, there in the wilderness the Israelites are learning a new way of being with each other, one based not on exploitation and the fear of scarcity, but on trusting in God’s generous grace and sharing in the radical notion that all are to have enough.  No more, no less than what one needs.  Just enough.   

~~~

            On one particular morning in Zambia, we were in Chawama, another neighborhood, slum really, on the outskirts of Lusaka, participating in a workshop with half a dozen high school-aged kids in the community school.  Dozens of younger children played in the small dusty yard outside. During our break, a older boy took us by the hand over to a younger child who was sitting in the dirt leaning against the wall.  He told us that the child  was hungry.  Very hungry. That he had not eaten for days.  One of us went inside and returned with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that we had made for lunch that day.  We gave the sandwich to the younger child. He took one huge bite and then without hesitating tore the sandwich into pieces to give to the other children crowded around him.  

            Companions not rivals.  Sharing not hording.  Every moment of every day, we too have a choice to make.  We can choose to live into our blessedness as beloved of God or we can choose to return to the reign of Pharaoh.  We can follow God into the vineyard and labor with God and each other for the day when hunger no longer devours any of God’s children, when all have enough – or we can turn away.  There really is no neutral ground.  So this week, I invite you to take time to open your hearts to the truth that God has chosen you.  That you matter and that how you live your life matters.   And I invite you to see the chosenness in others around you.  See them not as rivals but as companions, co-laborers in the vineyard.  And finally, I invite you to reflect on and to practice the learning of the Israelites, the laborers, and the hungry boy in Zambia – that we are to share what we have and gather just what we need so that all will have enough.  AMEN.