Welcome to God-Mart!

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 16th Chapter

Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea

Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” Then he sternly ordered the disciples not to tell anyone that he was the Messiah.

You probably know what it’s like to go shopping at Sam’s Club or Costco.  Staring up at a cliff-face of pallets filled with row after row of toilet paper in 144 roll packs.  In today’s Gospel lesson, Jesus has taken the disciples shopping as well, although the disciples weren’t staring up at a selection of single or double ply.  They were shopping for the One they would follow.  

Jesus had taken the disciples to Ceasera-Philipi which is in the very Northern part of Israel near the headwaters of the Jordan River.  It was a very cosmopolitan town, where Jewish culture met the world and under Roman rule, this town was dedicated to the god Pan and also had a temple to Caesar.  But Pan and Caesar were just the big-volume gods.  In Caesaria-Philipi there were way more to choose from... in this town, it was like going shopping at god-Mart because into the face of the cliff just outside of town, the people had carved niches into which they placed their various gods.  So, looking up at the cliff face with a vast variety of gods looking down on them, Jesus asked the disciples, “Who do you say that I am?”  In other words, as you look out at all the choices in front of you today, which one are you going to put in that shopping cart with the sticky, wobbly, squeeking wheel, and take home?  

It was a good question.  But it wasn’t JUST a question for disciples back then.  It’s a question for us too.  But before you answer, hold on a minute.  You might think Jesus was asking each disciple then... and you and me now... for an INDIVIDUAL decision... a personal choice but the truth is, that’s not what Jesus was asking at all!  When Jesus asked “Who do you say that I am” the “YOU” he used was PLURAL.  Jesus was asking them as a group... as a whole.  “Who do Y’ALL say that I am…together… what have y’all decided…who will y’all follow... together?”  And so, while Peter played the part of the spokes-model for the group, it wasn’t his decision alone... it’s what they chose TOGETHER.  

Again we see that being disciples is not really about... not even mostly about you or me as individuals deciding to follow Jesus... It’s actually WAY more about being part of a community of faith.  Being a Christian is much more a group activity than an individual activity.  I know that rubs against what the loud people often say about faith and while there is a small element of the personal, private and individual in our faith, there is an overwhelmingly larger, more profound and infinitely more meaningful part of our faith that can only be experienced in community.  So as we shop for the One we will follow... we’ve got to shop TOGETHER as a community of faith.  So, grab a shopping cart with a sticky wheel and let’s start shopping... TOGETHER.  

So, welcome to god-Mart!  As you can see, here at god-Mart there are literally endless choices of gods to follow.  As we head down the first aisle, you’ll notice this super shiny god on the end-cap.  It’s the god of prosperity.  It’s super sharp, that’s for sure... and a REALLY popular choice.  This god comes with finely tailored Italian suits, perfectly straight white teeth and AMAZING hair.  With this god comes the message that the reason to give to the church is so you can get MORE in return.  For this god, success and wealth and riches are the ways people are blessed and poverty is a sign of sin.  If you are poor, it simply must be what you deserve.  Like I said, it’s a very popular choice but let’s hold off a minute; there are lots more gods to look at, so let’s shop around a bit before we make our choice. 

Just around the corner is another very appealing god.  It’s the god of comfort.  Choosing that god will make sure things stay small, comfortable and easily under our control... just the way we like it.  It smells like grandma’s house and fresh baked chocolate chip cookies every time you walk in the door.  This god allows you to not see the injustice in the world, doesn’t ask you to speak out on behalf of someone else and never asks you to give up what makes you comfortable so that someone else might be included... plus... there’s cookies!  Cookies are tempting, that’s for sure... But, don’t decide yet!  There are a lot more gods at god-Mart.  There’s an endowment god that keeps things up and going in a church even if it requires life support.  There’s the god who looks like a old, white man with a beard in a cloud and there’s the god that’s anything but a white old man with a beard in a cloud.  There’s the god of music, a god of traditional liturgy, a god of contemporary worship, a god of pipe organs and a god of electrified bands... there’s the god of buildings, the god of youth and family and a denominationally exclusive god that lets you think your people alone have all the right answers... there’s a god with a shockingly colorful vocabulary and another one of the new arrivals... an emerging god with ink and piercings.  Some of these might be tempting... might sound like just what we want or need... but remember, we have to decide together, and we only get to pick one.  So let’s keep shopping… Now, over here, in amongst all these millions of choices there is also the choice of Jesus, the Son of the living God.  That’s the one the disciples chose in the Gospel story, but that was way back then!  Just because that’s what THEY chose on their trip to god-Mart, that doesn’t mean that’s what we have to choose!  

But, just out of curiosity, what would it look like if WE chose to follow Jesus, the son of the living God.  Well, I’ve got to warn you... that one is hard to follow.  After all, this is the Son of the LIVING God… and living means moving, CHANGING, risk-taking so that one is always challenging.  Following this one… following Jesus means going out there into the world, speaking up against injustice, putting his ideas into actions.  It means working actively against things like institutional and systemic racism and seeing that the things happening in Ferguson happen here too and seeing that we too play a part in it all.  It means fighting for those who need healing, not just with a one time donation and not just when it’s trending, but for the long haul and for the forgotten.  It means going where JESUS wants us to go (not where we want to go) and between you and me, Jesus ALWAYS goes to the places and people on the margins.  He goes where things aren’t exactly familiar, under control or comfortable.  He often asks his disciples to leave things they like behind and open themselves to something VERY new.  It means opening our hearts to people different from us, challenging our deepest fears, seeing the world through their eyes and seeing every person as the equal and marvelous and essential child of God they really are.  It means trying it someone else’s way, making their hopes our own, sharing the control and moving ourselves out from the safety of the way it used to be and into a new way nobody has EVER done it that way before!  It means dying to what we want as individuals... to what has been comfortable in the past and to playing it safe and being resurrected to a new life lived only in Christ; in a loving, self-sacrificial way for all people.

Well, there are a lot more gods on the shelves but have you seen enough?  Have y’all decided?  In my experience, lots of people SAY Jesus is the one they want, but when they think nobody’s looking they put Jesus back on the shelf behind a case of Ramen noodles and grab an easier one to follow.  So Prince of Peace, as we look at a future filled with a bunch of unknowns and challenges... as we look at a world that seems this summer to be more unhinged with injustice than usual... which One will we as a congregation put into that shopping cart with the rattling, annoying, sticky wheel?  Which One will we choose to follow?  Among all the possible answers that the world has to offer us, who will we together, say that Jesus is?  Amen.

Sit Down You're Rockin' the Boat!

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 14th Chapter

Immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds. And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone, but by this time the boat, battered by the waves, was far from the land, for the wind was against them. And early in the morning he came walking toward them on the sea. But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out in

fear. But immediately Jesus spoke to them and said, “Take heart, it is I; do not be afraid.” Peter answered him, “Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” He said, “Come.” So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, “Lord, save me!” Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

I dreamed last night I got on the boat to heaven 

And by some chance I had brought my dice along 

And there I stood 

And I hollered "Someone fade me" 

But the passengers, they knew right from wrong. 

For the people all said sit down, sit down, you're rockin' the boat 

People all said sit down 

Sit down you're rockin' the boat. 

And the devil will drag you under 

By the sharp lapel of your checkered coat, 

Sit down, sit down, sit down, sit down, 

Sit down you're rockin' the boat. 

I first heard that song a week before my wedding.  I left Kelly in Atlanta and flew up to New Jersey to tour a flavor supplier’s factory.  I was a product development scientist at the time, making new products for Coca-Cola.  After we had done the tour, our sales rep took us into New York City and we ate at a fancy restaurant at a table near Brooke Shields and Julian Lennon, and then we went to a Broadway show.  We saw Guys and Dolls!  Now, the theology in the verses of that song aren’t very good, but I love the tune and it’s fun to sing AND the chorus and today’s Gospel lesson have something we really need to hear.   The temptation with this story is to race past the set up and go straight to the punch line where Peter, God love him, steps out of the boat and tries to walk on water.  But in truth, a punch line isn’t any good without the set up, so let’s take a couple minutes and set it up right!  

First, Jesus puts all the disciples into the boat... TOGETHER!  Discipleship, he’s showing us, is something that is done TOGETHER!  Right over there, smack dab in the middle of our sanctuary, sits the Baptismal font... and NO, it’s not there because I forgot to put it back after I used it last!  It’s right there, smack dab in the middle of everything... ON PURPOSE, because THAT is where you and I are put into the boat to be disciples... TOGETHER!  It’s TOGETHER that we’re called to be disciples.  It’s TOGETHER that we’re called to hear and wrestle with God’s Word, to discern God’s Spirit and it is TOGETHER that we are called to reach out in service to the world.  

The other critical piece we need to pay attention to is the setting for this story.  It’s dark and it’s on the sea.  In Jesus’ day the sea and the dark were symbols that represented chaos, evil, uncertainty, monsters and everything nasty that goes bump in the night… you know, life.  It was into that chaos, uncertainty and just plain danger that Jesus shoved the disciples off from the safety and security of solid ground and out into the place where monsters lurk... into a completely unpredictable future.  Now, many people, when they remember this story, remember that the disciples were in trouble, that their boat was sinking, that they were all about to drown.  But that’s not this story!  The boat was battered, yes... the wind was against them, yes... and they were far from land… BUT they weren’t sinking.  

Working TOGETHER in the boat, the disciples were probably sore, tired and maybe even scared out of their minds BUT, they weren’t sinking.  When we’re in the boat TOGETHER supporting one another... and someone’s bailing and someone’s rowing and someone’s wrestling the tiller and someone’s trimming the sails, it’s ALWAYS better than being out in the chaos and in the darkness of life alone.  Jesus put the disciples in a boat together on purpose.  Jesus knew that for you and me to live the abundant lives God created us to live, in the middle of a world filled with wind and waves and chaos, we would need to sit down and work TOGETHER with our fellow disciples!  TOGETHER we give each other strength when we row into the darkness, when we see the rocks ahead and when our stomachs start churning.  Jesus knows that TOGETHER is the way we will get through the storm.  It was over those waves and through that wind and darkness that Jesus came to the disciples, walking on the water, trampling the chaos of the world under his feet.  Into their darkest, rockiest, scariest time, Jesus was watching and was with them.  That’s not just how it was for the disciples back then either.  It’s also a promise for us disciples now and into the future.  God is with us, ALWAYS, reminding us to take heart and to not be afraid.  

And now we come to the punchline.  Peter.  I love Peter, because Peter always does everything 100%.  Sometimes it’s 100% right and sometimes it’s 100% wrong, but Peter is the poster boy for Martin Luther’s famous advice to us to “sin boldly.”  Peter calls out to Jesus.  “Jesus, I want to try that walkin’ on water stuff.”  Jesus, knowing exactly what will happen and ready to deliver the punchline for this story says, “Come on Rock!”  And out of the boat he steps… looks around and sinks just like his name!  Just like a rock!  

NOW, here’s the important question of the day.  Why did Peter sink?  Was it because he didn’t have enough faith?  Was it because he didn’t keep his eyes on Jesus?  NO!  He had faith.  Jesus says so.  Granted, it was “little” faith, but remember, in just a few chapters, Jesus will tell the disciples that faith the size of a mustard seed is enough to move mountains!  Faith was not the problem.  The real reason Peter sank was... HE GOT OUT OF THE BOAT!  HE TRIED TO WALK ON WATER!  He got out of his seat, stood up, rocked the boat and stepped out into the chaos by himself.  He tried to be like God and sank because he wasn’t!   

Our job as a disciple is to remember that we are human and not God.  Our job is to stay in the boat and row into the future JESUS sets us off to find together.  In spite of the winds, waves, chaos and darkness that we all clearly see ahead, our job as disciples is to do our part.  Each one of us, and each of our parts, is essential to the journey... steer, navigate, work the sails, bail water, be an usher, read lessons, sing songs from VBS, set up for communion or bake cookies… ALL OF IT… all of it is essential!  It simply isn't helpful to stand up and rock the boat… to try to go it alone and try to walk on water.  The world outside rocks our boat plenty without us rocking it more from the inside!  

We need each other in this journey.  We need each other to weather the storms of this life.  We need each other to help bring the Kingdom of God to this world and we need each other to help us remember that in the darkest, loneliest, most painful, frightening and uncertain of times that we have not been forgotten… that we have each other and that Jesus is watching and will come to us no matter how far out we are in our little boat, and he will trample to peace our biggest worries and our greatest fears and bring us life.  Amen.

Eat Mor Chikin

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 14^th Chapter  

Now when Jesus heard about the beheading of John the Baptist, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself.  But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns.  When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd;

and he had compassion on them and cured their sick.  When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, “This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves.”  Jesus said to them, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.”  They replied, “We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.”  And he said, “Bring them here to me.”  Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass.  Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds.  And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full.  And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.

Even on the most boring commute, a full sized plastic Holstein cow standing in front of a completely white billboard is going to catch your attention!  I commuted into Atlanta every day back then and normally the route was completely predictable.  Then, one day, there was a cow up on a billboard.  The next day the cow was standing on just it’s back legs and appeared to be writing giant sized words with black paint.  Over the next week the cow moved down the sign and the words began to appear and in the end, the sign read, “Eat Mor Chikin” and it was the beginning of the Chick-fil-A fast food chain’s most effective ad campaign ever.  

It was a sign... a literal sign... but having folks just stop and marvel at their clever sign was NOT Chick-fil-A’s goal.  Their goal was for the sign to point to something else... their goal was to get people to stop and break their routine... to choose one of their special chicken sandwiches instead of the burger they always automatically ordered before.   

In the same way, the miraculous elements in today’s Gospel lesson are not meant to be where we stop either.  It’s easy to get mesmerized by the sign:  Five Thousand men and then the women and children too; five loaves, two fish, everyone fed and then twelve baskets of leftovers!  It’s easy to get caught up in what is clearly amazing!  But no matter how amazing it is, THAT is not where we are meant to stop.  The amazing details are meant to points us to something more.  The “more” it’s pointing to is the heart of this story... the part where Jesus tells the disciples, “The people don’t need to go away to be fed, you, disciples, give them something to eat.”  Jesus is trying to convince the disciples that they have indeed been given the ability to feed the people.  

This was a tremendously challenging lesson for the disciples then and it’s equally challenging for us disciples now!  The disciples saw a crowd of well over 5000 people, they didn’t know what to do with them or how to handle that many people.  Their solution was, in their panic, to just ask them to go away.  But Jesus, even before he knew there were only five loaves and two fish, challenged the disciples to fed the people… ALL the people.

You and I are faced with a similar overwhelming challenge.  We’ve got a few more than the dozen disciples sitting here in church this morning than Jesus had and we’ve got several thousand less people out there on the island that are hungry than Jesus had, but the odds are still pretty overwhelming.  The people though... they’re hungry just the same.  They are hungry for God’s unconditional love, they are hungry to be included, they are hungry for justice.  They are hungry for deeper relationships and deeper meaning in their lives.  They are hungry for a connection to the infinite that they might not be able to name, but long for at the depths of their beings.  The hunger is the same.  The overwhelming challenge for the few of us to feed ALL of them is the same and the overwhelming panic at that enormity of that challenge is the same.  How can so few, care for that many?  Where would we put them if they came?  Our methods for connecting to God don’t seem to translate to what those outside the church are able to hear these days?  What would we feed them if they all stayed for lunch?  It’s so overwhelming to think about that it’s tempting to say, or maybe just act in a way that says, “go somewhere else to get fed.”

But Jesus tells us the same thing he told the disciples.  “They don’t need to go away; you give them something to eat.”  When the disciples heard that, their little disciple minds panicked!  Jesus, you must be insane, we have nothing…NOTHING to give them... well, we’ve got these five loaves and two fish, but what’s that?  It’s NOTHING... isn’t it?  In the panic of being told they were supposed to feed the whole crowd, the disciples stopped being able to see all the things they DID have to accomplish that task, including their most valuable resource...Jesus!  Those disciples weren’t the only disciples to have that kind of trouble.  Disciples all over the world continually do the same thing when we are suddenly challenged with something that seems overwhelming.  Like a mackerel suddenly coming face to face with a shark, all we can think about when something overwhelming confronts us is how fast can we swim away and where can we hide!  In that moment of overwhelming panic, our brains stop using the parts that God gave us as humans and we forget that God has blessed us with an incredible abundance of gifts which can be creatively used to conquer even the hardest problems we might face.  We forget or dismiss or can’t even see the gifts God continually showers on us and we forget the biggest resource we could ever want or need... the power of God that comes to us through Christ!  

The miracle of the feeding of the 5000 is a sign that jumps up and down and shouts at us to NOT PANIC when we are faced with what seems to be an impossible calling from God!  It begs us not to miss the loaves and fishes right in front of our faces!  Union Church has WAY more in the way of gifts and resources than any of us could ever ask for or even imagine!  Look at the compassion we show for each other, look at the generosity, look at the people around you.  Do you know what gifts they have tucked away?  Do you know where they’ve been or what they’ve done in their lives? Look at the time and passion folks give in this church... the service done here that overflows out into our whole community and into the world.  Look at the natural beauty of the island and the super glue-like bonds among the people who live here.  Look too at the gifts people bring with them when they come from “away”.  Summer residents, visitors, day trippers and our new denomination all bring all sorts of loaves and fish with them when they come.  And all of them are hungry for the loaves and fish we can share with them while they are here and send with them when the ferry takes them back to the mainland.   Look around and really see the incredible abundance of loaves and the fish around you right now and then remember, on top of ALL that abundance... we also have Jesus!

There are a couple thousand people outside those doors and they have a hunger for a deeper connection to other people and a deeper connection to the Divine.  It is a hunger that is growing in them every single minute of every single day.  Jesus has called you and me to feed them.  Jesus didn’t ask the disciples then to do something they couldn’t do and didn’t have the resources to accomplish and Jesus doesn’t ask us to do something we are not able or equipped to do either.  Every Sunday when share bread here, we are reminded that Jesus is with us... our most valuable resource... calming our fears so we can see the incredible abundance we have been given and challenging us again to take that abundance and do nothing less than give the hungry something to eat.  Amen.

It's God's Party, You Can Cry if You Want To………. (But Why Would You Want To?)

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 13th Chapter

Jesus put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.’ 

He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.’

‘The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

‘Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.

‘Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad. So it will be at the end of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

‘Have you understood all this?’ They answered, ‘Yes.’ And he said to them, ‘Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.’ 

It was a good thing Rob retired early.  He needed a lot of counseling and his job just got in the way.  After retirement, Rob would call needing some counseling and for privacy, we would head down to his boat house, get out his boat and head out on the lake.  Confidentiality is really important!  We would carry fishing poles, simply as a cover so no one would get suspicious and compromise the confidentiality.  While we were in counseling, Rob didn’t fish for a specific fish.  He fished for what he called “lake run” fish.  If they ran in the lake... he would fish for them.  So, as we did our confidential counseling, we drifted across the lake pulling in anything that got caught on the end of our lines.

The parable of the nets is like that too.  In Greek there are different words for different nets but the word for “net” in this parable means a seine net.  Seine nets aren’t picky.  They pull up everything in their path and that, it turns out, is the nature of God’s Kingdom as well.  God’s Kingdom gathers in ALL of creation.  It’s ALL pulled up onto the beach and ALL means ALL.  Then, when the sorting does finally happen at the end of time, it is the One who hauled the net who does the sorting, putting the good into the bucket and letting the bad flop around on the beach.

One of the fish we caught during counseling was called a sheepshead.  Apparently, most people consider them an oily, trash fish and legally you aren’t even allowed to put them back alive if you catch one.  Rob sees them differently.  One time, he saw some pros cleaning a saltwater relative of this fish and they filleted it leaving the oily, dark layer of flesh on the skin and just keeping the lighter meat.  Rob tried that same technique with sheepshead and found out no one could tell the difference between a sheepshead and a perch when he cleaned it that way and fried them up side by side.  Most people don’t believe it... even after they see it and taste it.  They insist on seeing the sheepshead as “bad” and fit only for the beach.  Rob sees things differently.  Rob MAKES them good and sorts them into the bucket. 

That too is how God works.  Like a sheepshead, we are not exactly “good” as-is, but it is God who MAKES us “good” through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus.  All the brokenness, sin and garbage that get in the way of us being what God created us to be in the beginning is cleaned away with Christ, leaving you, me and all of creation “good” in the eyes of the One who does the sorting.  

After a morning of counseling, Rob would clean all the fish.  He said he loved cleaning fish and he insisted on cleaning both what he caught and what I caught.  He put the “lake run” fillets in a zip lock and they went in a cooler for me to take home.  Up at their house, Rob’s wife, Sally would have lunch ready and lunch always included her fresh baked bread.  The aroma filled the house.  She always seemed to bake way too much bread for just us, and that meant I had to take fresh bread home with me along with the fish.

The parable of the yeast is like that too.  The woman in the parable uses three measures of flour.  Most people don’t realize it, but three measures will make almost 80 pounds of dough... that’s 52 loaves or enough to make over 400 sandwiches!  Jesus, in this parable, portrays God as a powerful woman who kneads yeast into 80 pounds of dough BY HAND... not to make bread just for her family... not just for her immediate neighbors either... SHE is making bread for EVERYONE!  

Jesus told these parables to challenge people at the core of their faith.  He wanted to draw people in so deeply with a story they could relate to, that they would allow him into the very heart of their faith and there, he challenged everything the people then... and us people now... THINK we know about the Kingdom of God.  God’s Kingdom includes all of creation.  EVERYONE... without exception.  The tree has room for EVERY bird.  The WHOLE field is worth whatever the price.  That pearl is worth EVERYTHING the man owns.  The net gathers EVERYTHING in it’s path and the yeast gets worked into EVERY ounce of that outrageous amount of dough.  All, Jesus tells us, really does mean ALL.  

So God’s Kingdom has a place for all of creation and God has made us worthy of the Kingdom through Christ’s life, death and resurrection... BUT... there’s always a BUT... what about the fiery furnace and the weeping and gnashing of teeth?  That tiny piece of this lesson gets people more worked up than all the rest combined!  People obsess about who gets the bucket and who gets the beach... Who’s going to get a mansion and who’s going to end up in that fiery furnace?  Inquiring minds want to know, and many want to help!

    

Well, the truth is, God doesn't ask for our help with sorting!  God has, in fact, made EVERYONE “good” and like it or not God's desire is to throw EVERYONE in the bucket.  But the bucket is a gift… and like any gift you don’t HAVE to accept it.  If you insist, God will let you flop and squirm on the beach and try to get in the bucket on your own.  God’s not going to MAKE you come to the party.  Hell, it turns out, is only for the people who insist on throwing their OWN party and the wailing comes from the realization that God’s party is the only party that’s any fun. 

Jesus told these parables to tell us that God’s love is big enough and broad enough to gather in ALL of creation.  Our calling as the Church, as the Body of Christ, is to be a SIGN of God's radically inclusive Kingdom in the here and now.  Our job is to live in this world modeling the way God’s net works, modeling that tree... gathering, welcoming and creating a place for everyone we meet and treating everyone in our path as if they were a pearl of great value… like they are a treasure just waiting to be discovered.  We aren't the ones who sort, we aren't the ones who decide who goes where.  Our job is simply to tell the world that the One who is throwing the party has made each and every one of us into an amazingly wonderful treasure through Christ and in Christ we are all completely worthy and always welcome at God's party.  Amen.

The Parable of the Flaming Bag

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 13th Chapter

Jesus put before them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?’ He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The slaves said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he replied, ‘No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’” Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples approached him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.” He answered, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels. Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Let anyone with ears listen! 

David Weatherill was my best friend growing up in Florida.  Pouring gasoline into fire ant hills and lighting it on fire was honestly, only a tiny part of what we did as kids.  The vast majority was much less dangerous.  We didn’t hurt people or property... at least not on purpose.  We THOUGHT about it, and sometimes planned out every detail of the operation that we WOULD do if our consciences were just a little less naggy, but we didn’t do them.  

One we THOUGHT about but never did was a prank that went this way... We would take a paper lunch bag and put in that bag a giant, fresh, pungent pile of dog poo.  I had a big dog named Duke, so raw materials were NOT a problem.  With the poo in the bag we would sneak up on someone’s front porch just after dark, light it on fire, ring the doorbell and run.  The person opening the door would see the fire and instinctively try to put it out using the only means they had... they would stomp on it!  Of course stomping on the bag would spread that giant, fresh, pungent pile of Duke’s finest all over their shoes and the porch and the mess would be exponentially bigger than if they had just let the bag burn itself out.  For two preteen boys, the thought of poo violently spread everywhere was almost perfect... the thought that it would be violently spread not by us, but by the victim of our prank, elevated this prank-we-never-pulled to perfection!  

Why Jesus chose to tell the parable of the weeds rather than the parable of the flaming bag of poo, I don’t know.  Maybe Jesus didn’t have a big dog... or paper lunch bags.  Maybe his neighbors didn’t have doorbells or maybe Jesus just had way more class than two preteen boys named David and Erik.  But no matter which story you tell to illustrate the point, the truth behind both stories remains the same.  When you and I, who are both saint and sinner... when you and I who have both wheat and weeds in our own hearts... when you and I who are servants of the Kingdom of God and not the Kingdom’s Creator try to stamp out evil, even with the greatest good in mind, even with the most precise means available, even with the best of intentions in the world, we WILL end up making things worse, even while we intend to make things better.

In Jesus’ parable, the enemy comes quietly at night and spreads weeds in the field where the farmer has carefully planted wheat.  In the Greek, the enemy plants a specific weed... a grass that looks JUST LIKE WHEAT when it’s growing.  The enemy knew that.  The prank is carefully planned and the biggest part of the prank is counting on servants like us, in our zeal to get rid of the evil, to make a bigger mess... to pull up both weeds and wheat, doing more damage than the weeds could ever do on their own.  Remember, it’s the stomping on the flaming bag that creates the bigger mess on the front porches of our lives! 

We all know what it’s like to find that someone has planted weeds amongst our wheat… to find someone has done something destructive in our lives.  We all know what it’s like to open the door and find a little paper bag on fire on the front porch of our lives… we all know how it feels to have someone bring their drama into our lives.  We all know what it looks like... and a big part of how we know what weeds and flaming bags of poo look like is that we all have taken our turn playing the part of the enemy... planting weeds in someone’s field or leaving a flaming bag of poo on someone’s porch.  We’ve all brought up “that” subject at Thanksgiving dinner, knowing Uncle Joe would take the bait and it would lead to an epic Thanksgiving argument.  We’ve all taken unresolved hurts from other people and places and consciously or unconsciously sown those hurts into the lives of unrelated people in unrelated places.  We’ve all felt our control of some situation slipping away and decided to put a flaming bag of poo on someone’s porch so we wouldn’t be the only one in crisis... the only one dealing with a mess.  We’ve all found a reason to invite a friend to join us in our indignation over some slight, real or imagined.  It happens in families.  It happens at work.  It’s happening now in Israel and Gaza and Ukraine and it happens in every single church I’ve ever known.  

So what’s the answer?  What do we DO when someone plants weeds among our wheat?  What do we DO when someone leaves a flaming bag of poo burning on our front porch?  What do we DO with the Hitlers, Putins, Pol Pots and terrorists of our world?  What do we DO with church bullies, conflict stirrers, hurt sharers and antagonists?  

You’re not going to like the answer... the answer, of course, is love.  

Just as the farmer suggests that the weeds and the wheat be allowed to grow together, each receiving the same sun, rain and nutrients from the earth.  You and I are called to love the easy to love in our lives in exactly the same way we are called to love those who make loving them really, really hard.

You know what the people who sow weeds and light bags of poo on fire really need, because, like it or not, you and I have been those people.  When we played the part of the enemy... what we needed deep down was to be heard, we needed patience, we needed healing, understanding, grace, forgiveness and most of all love.  The more someone is causing trouble, sowing weeds and putting bag after bag of flaming poo on your front porch, the more and more and MORE they need to be pulled into the wide embrace of unconditional love Jesus showed us all how to give one another from the cross.  

Our call is to resist the urge to rush in and start pulling weeds.  Our call is to let the bag burn itself out and resist the urge to stomp out the fire.  Our call is instead, to love.  One final note though, about love.  I’ve found that often we Christians confuse that call to “love” with a call to be “nice.”  “Nice” isn’t the same as “love.”  “Nice” avoids conflict, ignores trouble, shies away from confrontation, distances us from difficult people and situations and hopes it all just goes away.  Love, on the other hand, dives in deeper into the relationship when there is conflict.  Love takes the time and energy to look for the deeper hurts.  Love listens not to respond but to understand.  Love creates clear boundaries of what is acceptable and what is not and love insists that those boundaries remain firmly in place.  Love confronts promptly when boundaries are breached but never abandons the relationship.  Love is firm but never hateful, love is clear but never vengeful.  We are called to love.

So, who has sown weeds in your wheat this past week?  Who's wheat have you sown weeds in this past week? In this parable Jesus reminds us, the weeds, both the spreading and the pulling are none of our business.  Our business is to stretch out our arms in radically inclusive love… As I have loved you, Jesus said, so also you should love one another… and remember how much Jesus loved us?  To death… and right back to life again.  Amen.

Listen! No, Really, Listen!

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 13th Chapter

That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. Such great crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat there, while the whole crowd stood on the beach. And he told them many things in parables, saying:

“Listen! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil. But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. Let anyone with ears listen!” “Hear then the parable of the sower. When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart; this is what was sown on the path. As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet such a person has no root, but endures only for a while, and when trouble or persecution arises on account of the word, that person immediately falls away. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the lure of wealth choke the word, and it yields nothing. But as for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”

In seminary I learned Greek, the language of the New Testament.  They had us learn Greek because sometimes subtle meanings are lost in translation.  So this week, when I read where Jesus said, “Listen!” at the beginning of this parable, I wondered what “Listen!” was in Greek.  It’s a good thing that I looked, because it turns out that “Listen!” translated as, “Erik, you are about to read this parable completely and totally wrong, so delete what you’ve done so far and start over!”  Now, I wasn’t the best Greek student so that might not be a “perfect” translation, but I got the message.   

This parable, it turns out, is the Parable of the SOWER, but what I was about to do and what many people do with this parable is to turn it into the Parable of the FARMER.  We read this parable and assume that God is a FARMER with a farmer’s goal of bringing in a harvest.  Farmers plant to maximize the return on their investment.  I assumed, and I think many people assume, God is a Farmer too and as a Farmer cares only about the GOOD SOIL because it is only in GOOD SOIL that a harvest of 100, 60 or 30 will happen and the assumption is that the harvest is THE thing God cares about.  

But Jesus, this week, reminds us not to “ASSUME” but instead to “LISTEN!”  This is the Parable of the SOWER, not the Parable of the Farmer.  The Sower doesn’t only care about the “Good Soil” that brings a harvest.  The Sower cares about sowing the seeds of God’s infinite and unconditional love, grace, forgiveness and compassion in EVERY kind of soil EVERYWHERE!  The Sower’s goals, you see, are not as narrow as those of the Farmer.  The Sower has important work for those seeds to do in EVERY kind of soil.

When we think of the idea before us, the idea of merging with other churches, we all know people who are welcoming that idea like the hard, packed soil of a path welcomes a seed.  A Farmer might ignore the path or break it with a pickax until it changes, but the Sower has a greater vision for his seeds than JUST a Farmer’s harvest.  The Sower intends, in addition to a harvest, that the birds will eat the seed sown on the path and be fed.  That the birds will then “deposit” that seed right where the Sower intended it to go from the beginning, planted now with exactly the helping dose of fertilizer it needs to grow!  The Sower loves, values and has important work for that hard packed soil on the path to do.  Jesus is reminding us that the people and churches we know who are hard paths, have important work to do in this process which can’t be done by any other kind of soil.

The same is true of the Rocky Soil.  There are folks who see coming together as the final solution, the way out of a financial bind, a way to maintain “the way we’ve always done that” or a path to reclaim the glory days.  Many others know that coming together for shared ministry will be EASY, compared to the work that will need to be done after that, figuring out who we are together and what we're being called to do together as a new community of God’s people.

A Farmer might say that investing in planting in the Rocky Soil is a waste, that if we aren’t all coming together for greater mission, beyond merging, beyond simply survival, then it isn’t worth trying at all.  Except the Sower knows that even quick growing plants without deep roots have something to give.  The Sower has a use for the enthusiasm of the quick growing plants and even for the plants that whither in the sun.  The withered plants make compost and the compost builds the soil making a place for another seed to grow.

Even the seeds that are sown among the thorns... and you know who you are!  Even you, the thorniest soil, has value and is important to the Sower.  The concerns you have are real and important to hear.  They pull the dreamers among us back toward earth.  Even the fears that come out as wild conspiracy theories worthy of wrapping our heads in foil... even THOSE have something of value buried deep beneath them... something important lies underneath even the strangest and most unreasonable fears and panic and it is worth the work to dig down beneath all that and hear what is at the base of those fears.    

In the end, when Jesus says “LISTEN!” he’s challenging our narrow vision of what we think God is doing in our world and the narrow ways we believe God will get that work done!  This parable tells us that the power of God’s infinite love, compassion, grace, forgiveness and the transformational power of what God is sowing among us reaches WAY beyond our limited idea of what “good soil” looks like and is actually at work.... in, with and under every person, every type of soil and in each one of our churches.     

Our call... not our Lutheran call or our Episcopalian call... but OUR call as people of God, as we talk and dream and plan for doing God’s work together in a new way, is that we model what we do after the work of the Sower!  That as we meet and talk and ask questions and plan, we focus on sowing the seeds of God’s love and God’s promise into every single molecule of what we do with reckless, uncalculating abandon and then take the time to step back and simply allow each seed do whatever it is God needs that seed to do in that particular place, person or church at that time.

This exciting (and also terrifying) opportunity that God has set in front of us has admittedly not come at the optimal time.  Prince of Peace has real healing work it still needs to do.  Our congregation is a bit tired, sore and overextended and yet here it is!  So, as we meet after worship today and as we talk and plan and dream and worry in the days to come, may we keep in our minds the Parable of the Sower and that we simply can’t fully wrap our minds around all that the Sower is looking to accomplish in us!  The Sower sees in us much more potential than we could ever see in ourselves.  May this parable continue to remind us that what the Sower has sown is, right now, powerfully working within ALL the soil of ALL the people of St. Andrew’s, St. Barnabas, Christ Church, St. Marks, St. Matthew’s and Prince of Peace and the Sower’s seed will indeed accomplish abundantly far more than we could EVER ask or even IMAGINE on our own.  Amen.

When Jesus Drives, Life Tastes Better

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 11th Chapter

“But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’ For John

came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”

At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

It’s the 4th of July weekend and personally, I can’t think of anything more patriotic than grilling meat and since the Gospel is also all about food and eating, it seems divinely ordained that this sermon focus on grilling!   I love grilling but so often when I find a new grilling recipe it’s so complicated that you need a Master’s Degree in Food Science to pull it off!  Now it just so happens that I HAVE a Master’s Degree in Food Science but when I’m grilling, those super complicated recipes just take the fun out of putting meat and fire together. 

Jesus also had a problem with things getting too complicated.  His problem wasn’t with grilling but with the Pharisees.  One of the things they complicated was the food and eating part of life and so in today’s Gospel lesson, for different reasons, both Jesus and John the Baptist were under fire for their choice of eating habits.  You see, in Jesus’ day social networking meant sitting down and eating a meal together.  That was the way people stayed connected.  By adding extra rules about eating, the Pharisees isolated the Jewish community so they would remain separate from the outside world and that isolation, the theory went, would make it easier to be faithful.  John the Baptist ignored that rule by choosing to eat alone, outside of the community.  Since he didn’t follow the rules by eating with other good Jews, and didn’t act “normal,” the Pharisee’s accused him of having a demon.  John was certainly filled with unusual things like locusts, but not demons.  Jesus got in trouble for breaking the rule in the completely opposite direction.  Unlike John, Jesus did eat with other people, the trouble was that he ate with EVERY single sort of other people!   

To be fair, the Pharisees were trying to help.  They saw the Ten Commandments as life’s steering wheel and steering by the commandments is what kept your life out of the ditches.  The Pharisees, honestly wanting to help, added additional rules so you wouldn’t just stay out of the ditches, but by following these extra rules you wouldn’t even get close to the yellow line!  Unfortunately, even with good intentions, the extra rules made life too complicated and in the end, the people lived for the rules rather than the rules helping them live for God.    

More, it turns out, is not always better.  THAT is why I like The Webber Big Book of Grilling.  This is the one grilling cookbook that cuts through the technical mumbo jumbo and just gets down to what really matters:  Meat, some simple ingredients and fire.  That approach makes it a pleasure to grill and, here’s the key, because it’s not so complicated, it encourages me to grill more... not less.

THAT is what Jesus was doing as well.  He wanted to cut through the technical mumbo jumbo the Pharisees had piled onto God’s Law because all those extra rules weren’t actually helping the people get closer to God; in fact most often, they were distracting people from being faithful and some people just gave up all together.  Jesus offered a different approach.  Instead of worrying about all those extra rules of the road... simply let Jesus drive!  That’s what “take his yoke upon you” really means.  The easiest way to go down the path of life toward the peace and fulfillment God wants for all of us is not by adding complicated rules and doctrines.  The easiest way is to simply allow your life to be steered by Jesus... by living the Jesus Way... by giving instead of getting... by loving God and loving neighbor.

Of course, there are a million other things out there, besides Jesus, that offer to drive our lives for us and promise peace and prosperity in return.  If we follow their plan, buy their product, put on their yoke, get more money, grab more power, buy better gadgets... if we just get MORE… THEN our lives will be so much better!  But, when we yoke ourselves to money, power and stuff, we ironically don’t get more peace even though that’s what we wanted!  We simply get MORE and that MORE becomes an even greater burden to our lives.  Then, feeling less peace, we try to hold on even tighter, get more control, get more stuff, climb higher, step on more people and it all becomes an endless cycle that continues to drain life instead of give it. 

The difference between yoking our lives to Jesus and yoking our lives to all the other things that promise life, but fail to deliver, is that all those other ways always say you need MORE to be at peace, while the Jesus Way teaches that the more completely we give our life away, the more we live for the other, the more we focus on loving our neighbor, the greater the peace... the better the life we will have.   Now, I’ll be the first one to admit - I can preach it… but when it comes to living it, “Yeah, verily, I stinketh at it!”  Like the Apostle Paul, I don’t seem to do what I want to do, but do the exact thing that I hate.  It shouldn’t be that hard, just let Jesus drive!  But the reality of being human is that sometimes it is easy for me to let Jesus drive but at other times I just have to insist on driving myself and invariably I find my life rolled right into one of those ditches and up to my neck in muck.

The Good News is that no matter how well we trust and no matter how well we stay on the road or end up in the ditch... no matter how well we let Jesus drive or insist on driving ourselves, God’s love for us is complete.  Now, God would RATHER that we enjoy the journey of this mortal life and the way to do that is by following the road God, through Christ, has laid out for us - giving of ourselves, loving God and loving neighbor.  God would LIKE for us all to stay out of the ditches… simply because, well, God loves us!  But God isn’t going to heap on extra punishment for falling in the ditches… the muck you find there naturally is it’s own unfortunate reward.  The truth is that God really does LOVE us and created us to live an abundant life, not one spent covered in muck… but whatever way we choose, as we choose day by day, God’s love for us will always be with us.

You see, life is like a beautiful 2” thick Prime Ribeye steak given to us as a gift by God.  It is ours to do with as we would like.  We can choose to take control and cook it ourselves and it will inevitably taste like it was baked in an oven to flavorless leather OR we can give it… all of it… to Jesus and our lives will taste like it was given a perfect dry rub, seared and finished on a hot grill to a perfect medium rare and served with a well aged red wine.  The Jesus Way, it turns out, is simply better… it doesn't need to be any more complicated than that!  Amen.