Bloody Moons and Hallelujah Days

Isaiah 25:6-9

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.

It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.

The Prophet Isaiah says, “On THIS mountain!”  This one… RIGHT HERE… Right here, right where we are today, RIGHT HERE on THIS mountain, on this Berkshire Mountain.  The Lord of Hosts will make a feast for all peoples… a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines!  Do you see it?  You’re having trouble seeing aren’t you?  The people Isaiah told this to back in the day had trouble seeing it too.  That’s why Isaiah gave them some more details… He said, it’s a feast of rich food filled with marrow.  That’s the kind of food where you’re going to need more than one napkin.  One little napkin, dabbing at the corners of your mouth, just isn’t going to cut it!  THIS is a feast of well-aged wines strained clear… the good stuff… not the two buck Chuck… not to cast aspersions on Chuck, but this is the really, really good stuff… and I’ve got to tell you… when I close my eyes and think about the Kingdom of God, THAT’s the vision I see!

It’s a vision of ABUNDANCE not scarcity.  A vision of WIC out of business.  Not because they ran out of money but  because everyone has enough!  It’s a vision where we find more chairs and put together more tables, not build a higher fence.  It’s a vision of a feast given as a gift for the guilty, not as a reward for the righteous… so even the likes of me, gets to eat!  Isaiah tells us it’s going to happen RIGHT HERE!  We don’t need to go get it, this feast isn’t take out… it’s delivery… It’s coming to us… right here to THIS Berkshire mountain and as Christians we believe Jesus is standing at the door knocking because in Jesus’s life, death and resurrection, the feast has been delivered!  

So tell me something… Why am I having so much trouble these days seeing that feast?  I see the hungry… but it’s been hard to see the feast.  I’ve seen young men shot for nothing… but it’s been hard to see the feast.  I’ve talked with a woman who gave birth to her youngest child in a boat between Syria and Greece… but it’s been hard to see the feast.  I’ve seen angry white men march with hate in their eyes and torches in their hands… but lately… it’s been hard to see the feast.  I’ve got to confess there seems to be too many days lately when the sun has refused to shine… and it’s been hard to see the feast.

Oh when the sun, refuse to shine

Oh when the sun refuse to shine

Oh Lord, I want to be in that number

When the sun refuse to shine.    

I’ll tell you what, whether I want to be in that number or not, I’m in it, and like it or not, I appreciate it when someone is brave enough to use really honest words.  Sometimes there IS a shroud on the mountain… a sheet covering the nations and sometimes the sun DOES refuse to shine.  If Isaiah can be honest like that and still get a book in the Bible, then you and I can call it like it is too!  There’s too much hunger in this world… too much hate… too much death.  Isaiah doesn’t pull any punches.  He doesn’t pretend the world is all puppy dogs and unicorns.  He’s honest.  Sometimes the world is dark and hard and cold and sometimes things are very, very, very much NOT like they should be. 

And when the moon, turns red with blood

And when the moon, turns red with blood

O Lord, I want to be in that number,

When the moon turns red with blood.

That’s the honest story, even on our very own Berkshire mountain and it’s important to be honest.  But if we’re going to be honest, we need to be all-the-way honest.  We have to tell the rest of the story.  We’ve got to sing the whole song.  The world IS hard, dark and painful… that’s true… AND at the very same time… Happening right here on THIS mountain, Jesus has brought us together to share a feast as well.  Now, if you’re a stoic Swede like me… you’ll be tempted to wait to crack a smile until ALL the darkness becomes light.  You’ll feel guilty singing a song before ALL the hate everywhere has melted away.  You’ll want to wait to sit down at to feast until ALL the world gets fully RIGHT… but Isaiah didn’t tell us what was coming to just to make it harder for us sit on our hands.  Isaiah told us about this feast so that all of us, including the stoic Swede here, would start that feast RIGHT NOW!  Right now… right where we are, no matter what dark and ugly things are going bump on the news… Isaiah is telling us to put on our Sunday clothes, wash our hands, comb our hair (if we’ve got enough to comb) and start marching in and enjoy the feast TODAY!

O when the Saints, go marchin' in

O when the Saints, go marchin' in

O Lord, I want to be in that number,

When the Saints go marchin' in!

It’s hard to hold those things together though, isn’t it?  It’s hard to hold the sun refusing to shine and people going hungry… and hold that together with the promise of a feast of rich foods filled with marrow.  It’s hard to hold the moon turning red with the blood of children shot down for no good reason and for every hateful reason… it’s hard to hold that together with the promise of a feast of well aged wines strained clear.  It’s hard.  In fact, it’s worse than that!  Because if you try to hold those things together all by yourself, it’s all going to just spin apart into either delusion or despair. 

That’s why we need more of THIS!  More time spent with each other… TOGETHER!  We need to be together to wipe away each other’s tears until God finishes the job and there are no more tears that need wiping.  We need to be together so we can hold one another close when the sheet of death is pulled up over the ones we love until that day when God comes and swallows up death forever and we need to sing the WHOLE SONG together and remind each other that no matter what horrible thing is happening in the world today, there is also a feast happening right here, right now, on this Berkshire mountain!  And that means that no matter what dark and horrible things are happening in the world today… TODAY is also a Hallelujah Day!  So let us be glad and rejoice in God's salvation! 

And on this hallelujah day

And on this hallelujah day,

O Lord, I want to be in that number,

On this hallelujah day! 

Big S-Saints and little s-saints

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew, the 5^th Chapter

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying: 

 ‘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 children of God. 

 ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 

 ‘Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. 

When I was growing up, Christmas Eve was HUGE… because PRESENTS!  We’d eat our Swedish Christmas dinner, then, my sister and I would do the dishes, because PRESENTS couldn’t be opened until the dishes were done and my mom was tricksy that way!  Then FINALLY… the PRESENTS!  Oh, yeah, and after that we’d all go to church… whatever!  But PRESENTS were the thing!  We opened them one person at a time around the circle.  When it was my turn I always unwrapped like a hurricane, with paper and bows flying everywhere!  My mom though, always unwrapped her gifts savoring every moment... appreciating the bow, commenting on the paper, really taking time to fully admire the gift.  It was TORTURE!  Waiting through all that painfully slow present-savoring before it could be my turn again!  It was awful!  Later in life I began to appreciate the deep, savoring, unwrapping of gifts, mostly because it was fun to torture my kids in the same way my mom tortured me!  

This week I’ve been thinking about the difference between Big-S saints like St. Francis who took care of the poor or St. Christina the Astonishing, who could smell sin… really, she could smell sin!  I’ve been thinking about the difference between those Big-S saints and little-s saints who are like the people whose names we read this morning and the people sitting here today… little-s saints like you and me.  We little-s saints got to be saints simply because God says we are!  It’s one of the things we celebrate in Baptism…that God has made us each into a saint… Simply and only because God says, “It is so!”

But knowing there are both Big-S Saints AND little-s saints got me wondering.  How do you go from being a little-s saint to a Big-S Saint?  The answer, I think, might be in how we unwrap and savor the gift of being made little-s saints by God.  I think too that maybe those “Blessed Are’s”… the Beatitudes we just read… are God’s instructions for unwrapping and savoring that gift.  Some folks seem to really, really be able to savor that gift.  Like my mom did with Christmas presents, these people carefully unwrap the gift of being made a little-s saint and in doing that, they don’t just see the gift, but they also see the beauty, care, compassion and love in which that gift was wrapped. They take time to watch the way the bow shimmers in the light.  They carefully open the box and hold their gift of sainthood up to the light and REALLY SEE what God has given them.  They MARVEL at it!  They revel in it… but even more than that… these are the folks who don’t shove that gift into the back of the closet... they love that gift so much that from that day on, it goes with them everywhere and becomes a part of everything they do in their lives. 

The better we’re able to do that… to unwrap, savor, cherish and pass on that gift… the more we experience the fullness of the gift we’ve been given.  I think it’s the folks who are able to do that very, very well that we all end up recognizing as Capital-S Saints… they didn’t start with anything more than the rest of us.  They are simply the ones who have been able to make the very most out of the same gift of little-s sainthood that we’ve all been given in Christ.  

When those folks, who unwrap and savor that gift find themselves poor in spirit, they are the ones who are somehow able, in that moment, to be thankful for it!  Thankful for the reminder that it isn’t their spirit that transforms the world, but the HOLY SPIRIT that moves creation toward the Kingdom of God!  When those folks experience life’s greatest losses, somehow they find a way to be thankful.  Because in those moments where they miss the embrace of the ones they’ve loved so deeply… they find a way to be thankful that their loss allows them to feel God’s embrace more clearly.  

They are the people who find joy in NOT being the biggest and the most important, but in knowing that God made them to fit perfectly right where they are in every moment.  They are the ones who have a hunger and a thirst for making the world work right.  They are the ones who, by looking so closely at the gift they've been given, are able to see God’s heart beating inside them and with that, are then able then to see God’s heart beating in everyone around them as well.  They are the ones who understand the power of bringing people together in a world that seems bent on spinning people apart.  They are ones who, in seeing themselves as saints, are able to see everyone around them as saints as well.

The Big-S Saints don’t have a different, better, or more wonderful gift than you and I have as little-s saints.  We all begin in the same place with the same overwhelming gift, as little-s saints of God!  As this day proclaims, we are indeed, All Saints!  The difference between little-s saints and those Big-S Saints, is that they have taken the time… a little more each day… to more clearly SEE the beauty of the gift they have been given.  They have over and over again, unwrapped that gift’s next layer… going deeper and deeper every day, discovering more and more of God’s love, compassion and generosity wrapped inside.  They are the ones who fall so fully in love with the gift of little-s sainthood, that they can’t help but to take it with them everywhere they go… take it a little further into the world every day… share it a little more widely every day… and give more of it more deeply to the people they meet along the way. 

You and I… we’re the little-s saints… made saints as a gift from God.  May we see more clearly the beauty of the gift we’ve been given.  May we unwrap more deeply the layers of the gift we’ve been given.  May we fall so fully in love with this gift we’ve been given, that we carry it farther, share it more completely and in doing all that, live into the name God has already given us… the name of saint!  Amen.  

That Face!

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew the 22^nd Chapter

Then the Pharisees went and plotted to entrap Jesus in what he said. So they sent their disciples to him, along with the Herodians, saying, “Teacher, we know that you are sincere, and teach the way of God in accordance with truth, and show deference to no one; for you do not regard people with partiality. Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?” But Jesus, aware of their malice, said, “Why are you putting me to the test, you hypocrites? 

Show me the coin used for the tax.” And they brought 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.” When they heard this, they were amazed; and they left him and went away.

There are at least two places to mess this one up.  The first is to see this as a story about Jesus making politicians look like idiots.  That one’s VERY tempting.  The second is more serious… and that’s to see this as a story telling us there is part of the world where God works and another, different part of the world, where God does not.

“Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”  At first glance it might look like Jesus is saying there are two circles of influence in the world.  One here.  One over here.  One controlled by Caesar.  The other controlled by God.  A political circle and a spiritual circle… both completely separate.  But really, what Jesus did here is to remind us that Caesar’s political circle is completely inside God’s circle which surrounds ALL of creation.  On the surface, Jesus asked “whose face is on that coin”, but the REAL question Jesus asked was “who do you think gave the emperor that face!?”  

EVERYTHING… the good AND the bad… people, war, peace, disease, sickness, health, food, water, disasters, triumphs, love, death, flags, anthems, presidents, emperors… EVERYTHING… EVERY-THING belongs to God.  If I was Bishop Curry, this is where I’d probably start singing “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands!”  The BIG temptation of this story is to read it the way the Pharisees and the Herodians HEARD it, and miss the way Jesus TOLD it.  

BOTH the Pharisees and the Herodians believed there were places in the world the other couldn’t touch.  Two separate circles.  Over here… political, business, and worldly things that “belong to Caesar”… apart from God.  Over there… the religious, church, and spiritual things that “belong to God” apart from Caesar and n’er the twain shall meet.  God’s laws, the prophets warnings and Jesus’s teachings are all fine and dandy inside church walls or in our hearts, but out there… those shouldn’t mix with how we do government, address violence, or think about poverty, hunger, healthcare and justice.  

What Jesus was SAYING… not what the Herodians and Pharisees HEARD now, but what Jesus was SAYING… is that God not only has something to SAY about every aspect of every single moment of our lives, but that God has every aspect of every moment of our lives... every face in all of creation, wrapped up in the infinite, unconditional, loving, ever-transforming and redeeming circle of God’s embrace!  

The faith stuff isn’t at all separate from the world stuff.  Because ALL the stuff is God’s STUFF.  All those crazy notions Jesus held up, like unconditional and sacrificial love, looking out for the LEAST, LAST and LOST before you look out for yourself… ALL that stuff… stuff like real justice, radical forgiveness, unhindered generosity, perpetual peace and uncompromising compassion… ALL of it… it’s not just how Sunday morning’s supposed to work.  THAT’S the way God is transforming the WHOLE WORLD to work and that’s what all the fruit talk’s been about the last few weeks.  WE’RE supposed to bear fruit!  As Christians, WE’RE called to be part of God’s transformational work! 

Now, you know why all this fruit talk sounds so hard, don’t you?  It’s because it’s hard!  But this gospel makes it harder!  Because as we go out there and do that hard work, Jesus wants us to remember that it is God’s hand that formed every face we encounter along the way.  In this story, Jesus told them, God made every Jewish face… AND every Roman face.  Every face.  God made Caesar’s face and God’s hand still forms EVERY face.  Now, think about that… EVERY face.  Then and now… EVERY… FACE… I’ll give you a second to let that sink in… EVERY…FACE… Yup, even THAT face!  You see where this is going, don’t you?  That means God made the faces on both sides of the aisle, both sides of the gun, both sides of the prison bars, both sides of the ocean.  God’s hand formed the faces that endure the hate and the faces that spew it.  God’s hand formed faces that kneel and faces that stand.  God’s hand formed every face, and along with the faces, the hearts and souls of all of creation!

You see where this is going, don’t you?  As we do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with God… as we work in the vineyard for racial justice, an end to violence, and for enough, good, food and clean water for all… What this means is that as we do that work we need to look for God’s fingerprints in EVERY face we encounter along the way.  EVERY FACE.  In the hurting faces AND in the faces of those who do the hurting.  It’s so much easier to divide and conquer though, isnt’ it?  Divide the world into:  us OR them, in OR out, good OR bad, up OR down, heaven OR hell. 

But that’s not the Jesus way… because it isn’t the truth and doesn’t lead to life.  The truth is in that song:  “He’s got the whole world in his hands!”  So, when we work for justice, kindness, inclusivity, peace, and compassion… not just in church on Sunday, but in every part of our lives… As we do that work, Jesus challenges us to see God’s fingerprints in EVERY face.  That person who’s working against love, compassion and justice… THAT broken, hurting, person trying to get rid of their pain by passing it on to someone else… That person… THAT person, hides behind a face which also bears the fingerprints of God.  

Now, that doesn’t mean we give up the fight and let that face roll over the world.  We MUST continue to work toward the transformation of the world.  Remember, God has a clear opinion about how the world should work… There ARE the blessed ARE's after all... the peacemakers, the meek, the ones who hunger and thirst for what is right…  But as we strive, little by little to do God’s work, we must always remember that God’s fingerprints are everywhere and on every face.  On the faces of those easiest to love and on the faces of those who make loving them nearly impossible...  and even on the face where God’s fingerprints are sometimes the very, very hardest for us to see… God’s fingerprints are even on the face we see in our mirror.  Amen.  

Thoughts and Prayers

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew the 21^st Chapter

 ‘Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watch-tower. Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country. When the harvest time had come, he sent his slaves to the tenants to collect his produce. But the tenants seized his slaves and beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again he sent other slaves, more than the first; and they treated them in the same way. Finally he sent his son to them, saying, “They will respect my son.” But when the tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, “This is the heir; come, let us kill him and get his inheritance.” So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him. Now when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?’ They said to him, ‘He will put those wretches to a miserable death, and lease the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the harvest time.’ 

Jesus said to them, ‘Have you never read in the scriptures:
“The stone that the builders rejected
   has become the cornerstone;
this was the Lord’s doing,
   and it is amazing in our eyes”?
Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom. The one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and it will crush anyone on whom it falls.’ 

 When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they realized that he was speaking about them. They wanted to arrest him, but they feared the crowds, because they regarded him as a prophet. 

Jesus told this parable, and the two we've heard in the last two weeks, in the last week of his life.  First he told of the Divine winemaker who wanted grapes at any cost.  Next he told of a father who sent his sons into the vineyard to work.  One did.  The other didn’t.  And now, once again Jesus tells the story of the Divine winemaker who is looking for grapes!  No excuses.  No “right” words.  No tricks.  Just, “SHOW ME THE FRUIT!”  This isn’t a new theme.  This is THE theme!  The theme of Matthew’s whole Gospel!  Way back in Chapter 3, John the Baptist appeared with a camel’s hair coat, leather belt and eating bugs with honey to help them go down!  John started this fruit talk saying, “Bear fruit worthy of repentance!”  The Gospel began with, “SHOW ME THE FRUIT!”  

Monday was 275th day of 2017.  Monday was the 273rd mass shooting of 2017.  The litany began right away.  “Bad people will always be able to get guns, so there’s nothing we can do but offer our thoughts and prayers.”  Interesting.  Two weeks ago, the Divine Winemaker didn’t just think and pray about his harvest problem.  He went out at 6, 9, noon, 3 and even 5 and grabbed anyone he could find, tried a crazy new pay scheme and by hook or by crook, got the grapes to the crusher.  So isn’t there a new idea we might try for this problem, a crazy scheme to test out?  “No, none of that will stop every gun, so all we can do is offer thoughts and prayers.”  Interesting.  

This week the mayor of San Juan waded through water laced with raw sewage begging for help for her people.  “Well, you live on an island.  In the middle of the ocean.  Hurricanes happen.  There’s nothing we can do to stop hurricanes but we’re sending our thoughts and prayers.”  Interesting.  Last week a father asked his two sons to go to work in the vineyard.  One said he would, but didn’t.  The other said he wouldn’t go, but did.  The father in that story preferred the son who in the end tried, rather than the son who lied.  So, don't you think we ought to at least try something?  “No, nothing we would try would stop hurricanes, all we can offer is our thoughts and prayers.”  Interesting.   

But just like the landowner in this week’s parable the world has caught on!  They hear about sending “thoughts and prayers” and how do they react?  “We don’t want your “thoughts and prayers!” We need food, water, and electricity!  We don’t want your “thoughts and prayers” we want our husbands, wives, friends and children to not be shot in our homes, schools, theaters and streets.  We don’t want your “thoughts and prayers!”  We want you to SHOW US THE FRUIT!     

The caption on a picture looking into the back of an empty semi trailer reads, “The first shipment of your thoughts and prayers has arrived!”  Yesterday’s parable has become today's internet meme.  Both parable and meme shouting the EXACT same message.  The message we’ve been hearing from the third chapter of Matthew’s Gospel, all the way to the twenty first!  And the message is:  Do Something!  SHOW US SOME FRUIT!  

I relate to the anger.  I'm tempted too to throw “thoughts and prayers” away as useless garbage too.  But that’s not what John the Baptist preached and that’s not what Jesus taught.  Because here’s the thing.  Everything we do, begins with a thought.  Getting out of bed requires a thought.  Seeing someone in pain requires a thought.  Thoughts are the beginning.  Thoughts arn't garbage.  They allow us to do more than simply react to the world like a lizard.  Thoughts are part of what makes us human.

Prayers too are far from garbage.  It is in prayer that we calm our anxious, reactive, minds so that we can access the big, creative, compassionate human brains God put between our ears.  In prayer we find clarity and creativity to do more than just "eat it or run from it".  In prayer with others we discover our collective resolve, remind one another that we are not alone, remember that God works unexpected wonders and remember that God has promised there are more of those wonders yet to come!  Thoughts and prayers are not trash.  Thoughts and prayers wind the spring, charge the batteries and draw the bow.  

What John the Baptist began with… what Jesus continued with and what we, as Christians insist upon today, is NOT that “thoughts and prayers” are useless, but that “thoughts and prayers” must only be the beginning!  Thoughts and prayers, after all, are what led the people of Israel to leave Egypt, but it was the walking that got them to the Promised Land!  Thoughts and prayers gathered the civil rights movement together, built courage, commitment and resolve, but it was walking into diners to sit at lunch counters, refusing to move to the back of the bus, walking across the Edmund Pettis bridge and even becoming martyrs, that still marches us toward a dream.  

In this parable.  In the last two parables.  In the entire Gospel of Matthew… the message is not that words don’t matter or we should throw out our thoughts and give up on prayer.  Rather, the message is WE MUSTN’T STOP WITH ONLY THOUGHTS AND PRAYERS!  We MUST have thoughts!  Thoughts of empathy, compassion, generosity and love.  We MUST have prayers!  Prayers for clarity, focus, peace, inspiration and a non-anxious spirit.  But we can’t stop there!  Notice the cries of the world around you with your thoughts.  Gather yourself in body, mind, spirit and community in prayer.  BUT THEN GO!  Go into the vineyard, pick some grapes, and make some wine!  None of us will ever harvest every grape.  That's never been our task!  Our task is to pick one grape and put it in the bucket and pick one more and then another and then another.  You and I may not finish the harvest oursleves, but as the Talmud says, “You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.”

May we offer the world our thoughts… thoughts of the vision of our world working like the Kingdom of God.  May we together offer the world our prayers… prayers for a non-anxious presence, peace, clarity, generosity and creativity.  And then, may we together, take one step and then another toward making the vision of our thoughts and the peace of our prayers a little more real and a little more amazing in the world’s eyes each and every day.  Amen.  

Who Said You Could Protest THAT Way?

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew the 21^st Chapter

When Jesus entered the temple, the chief priests and the elders of the people came to him as he was teaching, and said, ‘By what authority are you doing these things, and who gave you this authority?’ Jesus said to them, ‘I will also ask you one question; if you tell me the answer, then I will also tell you by what authority I do these things. Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?’ And they argued with one another, ‘If we say, “From heaven”, he will say to us, “Why then did you not believe him?” But if we say, “Of human origin”, we are afraid of the crowd; for all regard John as a prophet.’ So they answered Jesus, ‘We do not know.’ And he said to them, ‘Neither will I tell you by what authority I am doing these things. 

‘What do you think? A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, “Son, go and work in the vineyard today.” He answered, “I will not”; but later he changed his mind and went. The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, “I go, sir”; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?’ They said, ‘The first.’ Jesus said to them, ‘Truly I tell you, the tax-collectors and the prostitutes are going into the kingdom of God ahead of you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him, but the tax-collectors and the prostitutes believed him; and even after you saw it, you did not change your minds and believe him. 

Lying, and tricks, and power plays, Oh MY!  One group KNOWS they’re right because they have LOTS of power and money and with enough power and money can make even the horrible alright.  Even cozying up to foreign governments is fine if it means winning!  The other wing of that same group KNOWS they’re even MORE right than the first group because they are MORALLY right, with fanatical, fundamentalist, certainty.  “Those people,” all over the country, should be FORCED to follow our faithful, fundamentalist ways!  It’s how God ordained it!

You know, those two groups used to HATE each other with the fiery hate of a thousand burning suns!  But here they’ve found a common enemy.  That guy.  That guy who keeps pointing out injustice.  What’s worse is “that guy” gets people’s attention.  Did he have to do THAT?  Did he have to do it HERE?  Couldn’t he do it, you know, in a way it would be easier to ignore?  It used to be that the rich and powerful folks and the God and country folks couldn’t agree on ANYTHING.  But since “that guy” came to town, the rich and powerful Chief Priests and the God and country Pharisees made a miracle happen!  They found the one thing on which they could agree.  Jesus has GOT to GO!  

Jesus was a threat.  He said the rich and powerful would be cast down and the powerless and poor would rise up.  The Chief Priests WERE the rich and powerful, and the Pharisees knew the poor were obviously sinful, so you can imagine, neither were fans of Jesus!  So, together they confronted Jesus and asked him “by what authority do you teach like this.”  Their hope was to trip him up, or at least shove him out of the spotlight and they wouldn’t say no to an early grave for him either!  

Jesus dodged the trap with a parable that made the rich and powerful Priests and the ultra religious, super pious, fundamentalist, Pharisees shake with anger.  Jesus told them about two sons.  One SAID he would get right to work but didn’t.  The other defied his father in public, saying he wouldn’t work... but then actually went out and worked.  Jesus told them, by way of this story, that God cares very little about what folks say, how they spin their story or even what they send out by carrier pigeon or even by little blue tweety bird!  What God really cares about is WHAT YOU’RE DOING.  Are you gonna DO something?  Or are you just TALKIN’?  

He was talking about faith, but faith, in Jesus’ day, wasn’t something that happened up here in the ol’ noggin.  It wasn’t a list of things to agree to, it wasn’t a sticker for your car or liking and sharing a post to prove you loved God.  Back in Jesus’ day, faith wasn’t something that happened in your head or even with your words.  Faith was much more about what you did with your feet and your hands and your life.  God, it turns out, pays WAY more attention to how you walk than what you say.  That means, Jesus wasn't really asking the rich, powerful, and puritanical if they thought John the Baptist had good ideas.  He was asking them if they had started LIVING like John the Baptist!  Clearly they hadn’t and that meant they were trapped.  John the Baptist was the third rail of Palestinian politics… the rich, powerful and puritanical hated John, but the people LOVED him.  So with one, little, tiny, parable Jesus got all of Jerusalem’s attention.  Basically Jesus asked, "In all the time these rich and powerful, God and country people have been yackin', have you ever seen them DO anything"?  Nobody had.  They were all SHOW and no GO and God doesn’t watch the show.  God’s MUCH more interested in the GO.  

So, what’s GO look like?  It looks like deep gratitude for what we’ve been given.  It looks like seeing the person others look through as if they aren’t there.  It's hearing that quiet voice that says, “this doesn’t feel right” when the rest of the world sticks their fingers in their ears and shouts, “LA LA LA!”   It looks like a life lived in service… a life of little things done for someone else who can never pay you back.  It looks like boosting a small voice so it might finally be heard.  It looks like bringing healing, wholeness and life to everyone whether the world thinks they deserve it or not; whether they'll appreciate it or not; whether they'll ever even thank you for it or not.

That makes GO hard!  So hard it’s impossible to GO all by yourself because it means not only feeding the hungry but asking why people are hungry.  Not only caring for the poor, but asking why working 40 hours a week can’t earn everyone enough for a place to live AND food to eat.  It means not only being charitable, but changing the world so that everyone has enough... enough food, shelter, self worth and dignity.  But it’s only in living in the GO that we’ll realize along the way that we’re really living and finally experiencing a life that is full, real, abundant… and eternal.

The difficult twist to this parable is that in this parable Jesus is asking you and me the same question he asked the priests and pharisees.  Are we all talk, or are we taking a real step toward who and what we value?  Are we just show or are we GO?  GO is HARD but it’s the path to a real, meaning-filled life… an eternal and abundant life, not just for ourselves but for the world.  The other way… well, it just doesn’t go anywhere.  So what’ll it be?  TALK and SHOW or GET UP and GO?  Amen. 

One Perfect Moment

The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew the 20^th Chapter

“For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for the usual daily wage, he sent them into his vineyard. When he went out about nine o’clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace; and he said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.’ So they went. When he went

out again about noon and about three o’clock, he did the same. And about five o’clock he went out and found others standing around; and he said to them, ‘Why are you standing here idle all day?’ They said to him, ‘Because no one has hired us.’ He said to them, ‘You also go into the vineyard.’ When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, ‘Call the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.’ When those hired about five o’clock came, each of them received the usual daily wage. Now when the first came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them also received the usual daily wage. And when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, saying, ‘These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.’ But he replied to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”

My Master’s thesis was titled “Optimization of a Sherry Baking Process for Muscadine Grapes and a Feasibility Study for Sherry Baking Utilizing High-Temperature, Short-Time Technology.”  Basically I tried to see if you could make Sherry wine from native, North Carolina grapes.  It turns out it’s possible… technically.  Taste wise though, there’s a reason nobody does.  On the up side I learned a few things about wine making and that makes me wonder about today’s parable.  

You see, winemakers are generally an obsessed lot.  So, when it gets close to harvest time they go out in the vineyard almost every hour and take a sample, eat a few grapes and test them for sugar and acidity.  As the sun moves across the sky, as the dew dries, as the rain falls, as the day warms up or cools down, the grapes on the vine constantly change and then there is that ONE… PERFECT… MOMENT where everything is just right.  The trick to making great wine is to pick ALL your grapes in that ONE… PERFECT… MOMENT.  And, since the grapes keep changing as long as they are on the vine, when that moment comes, you’ve got to move FAST!  The land owner keeps going out to get more workers because THIS is that ONE… PERFECT… MOMENT.

He gets everyone he could find to start at 6 a.m.  They agree on one denarius for a 12 hour day, which was a living wage, but there aren’t enough workers.  So he goes out and grabs a second bunch and promises them whatever’s “right.”  Still, there aren’t enough people to so he sends others.  The grapes are still changing on the vine, you know!  There’s no time to talk about pay, THE ONE… PERFECT… MOMENT is slipping away!  He needs EVERYONE picking… even people hired at “the eleventh hour” could make all the difference if, with that last hour’s push, all those grapes can get into the crusher! 

And then the day’s done, the grapes are in the crusher and it’s time to dole out the cash!  Everyone gets a denarius.  The one hour workers open their pay envelopes, their eyes widen, but shockingly they don’t say, “Hey, you paid us too much!”  The twelve hour guys though, look in their envelope, and their eyes widen and they shout, HEY!  THAT’S NOT FAIR!  

The landowner however, they all soon learn, doesn’t care about “fair” and if they had been paying attention, he gave away his M.O. when he told the second group what he would do for them.  He said, “I’ll do for you what is RIGHT”… this landowner does what’s “right” not what’s “fair.”  So THAT’s what this parable teaches, right?  God is passionate about justice!  God cares about doing what’s RIGHT… generously giving us what we need, regardless of what the world says is “fair” or how things have always been done.  That’s a whole sermon right there and if life was “fair” I’d say “Amen” and we’d all sit down and get to coffee hour all that more quickly.  But life’s not fair and as good as justice is (and it’s REALLY GOOD), justice is only the tip of the iceberg in this parable.  You see, I think we miss something really important when we forget that this is a winemaker, and winemakers are an obsessed lot.  

So, take a minute and imagine what happens in the scene that follows in this little wine making town.  On the way home, the workers start talking in the car.  It was so bizarre that in the drive through at McHummus they tell the guy in the window what happened.  They sit down and eat and can't stop talking about it.  And what are they saying?  “Do you believe what that guy just did!?  He paid everyone the SAME!”  “Yeah, EVEN the ones who only worked ONE HOUR!  Can you believe it?”  And soon, all around the table, all around the town, all around the COUNTY, the story of this obsessed, wack-a-doodle winemaker goes viral.  Their conclusion?  This guy’s crazy!  They also think, next year this guy is going to be sorry because EVERY SINGLE PERSON in this whole town… heck this whole COUNTY is going to show up at this guy’s vineyard at the eleventh hour, work for an hour and expect a whole day’s pay!  

So it looks like this winemaker’s made a horrible mistake, right?  He’s done something completely crazy and next year at the harvest he’s going to pay through the nose!  But is this winemaker crazy like a crazy person or maybe… just maybe is he crazy like a fox?  Because what’s the one thing this obsessed winemaker cares about most?  It’s not his reputation.  It's clear he doesn’t care what other people think about him.  It’s not holding onto cash.  He seems fine throwing that around.  You might want to say “doing what’s right”, and that’s in there somehow, but I’m wondering if the thing this obsessed winemaker values most isn’t simply MAKING GREAT WINE.  

He’s a winemaker!  Could it be that what he wants, more than money, more than a good reputation, more even than doing what’s fair is to get his grapes harvested in that ONE PERFECT MOMENT… in the ONE HOUR when every grape is absolutely perfect?  SO, did this winemaker just sneakily, craftily, brilliantly create a situation where next year, every single person in the WHOLE county will show up for one hour of work and because EVERYONE is there at once, did he just fix it so his entire harvest will get to the crusher, not just on the one perfect day but in the one perfect HOUR?

If THAT’S what’s going on here, could Jesus be telling us that we have a God who doesn’t care what people think, doesn’t care about playing fair and doesn’t care about the cost?  Because if THAT’S what Jesus is telling us, then it looks like we have a God who will do literally ANYTHING, spend ANY amount, disregard what ANYBODY thinks, just to make sure EVERY SINGLE PERSON from every single corner of creation piles into God’s Divine vineyard in that perfect hour… on that perfect day, so that by hook or by crook, by faith or even by flimflam God makes sure EVERY SINGLE ONE in all of creation ends up in the front yard of the Divine Winemaker’s Kingdom.  Is that what Jesus is saying?  Or is it just that we have a God who loves really good wine?  You know, I think it's probably both!  Amen.