Epiphany III - Skip Windsor

Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

Let us pray:

“Where we cannot convince, let us be willing to persevere. Where we cannot be strong, let us be willing to endure. Where we cannot redeem, let us be willing to hope. We know that we cannot do everything, but help us, O God, to do something, for Jesus sake. Amen.”

On behalf of the men, women and children of Christ Church, I welcome our friends and neighbors from Carter Memorial United Methodist Church and their pastor, Gary Shaw, to our worship service this morning. You have traveled a much further distance than coming from 800 Highland Avenue to 1332 Highland Avenue.

We are grateful that you would leave your home church and come to worship with us; and this generosity of spirit is not lost on your brothers and sisters but most appreciated here at Christ Church.

When Caroline Edge and I first talked about and thought about our annual joint service in 2007, we did not know what we were getting ourselves into; nor, did our two communities know where it would lead. It truly was a “leap of faith.” From that moment on we have held three services (and this is the fourth) alternating between Carter Memorial Church and Christ Church allowing us to worship together in what our two denominations call “Interim Eucharistic Sharing.”

I prefer to call us “partners in faith.” Not only do we worship together, sing together, play softball together but we are also in business together: selling CD’s together! For those among us who do not have a CD they will be on sale after our service today!

I am grateful to Millie, Pam, Vera, our organists Jane and Aaron, and our joint adult and bells choirs for their fabulous and inspiring body of work contained on the combined Carter Memorial Church-Christ Church CD.

As our two communities gather together this morning, I would invite us to offer a hearty round of applause to our adult and bell choirs for their musical gifts, their generosity of time and talent, and for a marvelous offering to us and to the wider community. +++++

This is an appropriate Sunday to worship together since it comes during the week of the Prayer for Christian Unity which is book ended between two major feast days of the Christian Church: The Confession of St. Peter on January 18th and the Conversion of St. Paul on January 25th. Since 1908 these eight days in January are reserved as a time for special prayer for Christian Unity. For the past 50 years, a theme has been chosen and materials prepared co-operatively by ecumenical groups and circulated internationally. This year’s theme is based on the text from The Acts of the Apostles 2:42: “They devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and fellowship to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”

Prayers for Christian Unity serve to remind us that the early church was one church; and it is a call to us to renew our desire for unity among Methodists and Episcopalians and all Christian churches and for us to return to the essentials of our faith and life together. As we remember the first Christians and seek to renew our Christians ties with one another, it is helpful to always keep in mind that there is more that unites us than divides us in faith. Given the theme for this year’s prayers for Christian unity, we can discern that there are at least four pillars upon which we can agree as partners in faith.

The first pillar is the apostolic teaching of the Word. Before the gospels of Mark, Matthew, Luke and John were written towards the latter part of the first century, the apostles’ teaching and their own personal testimony guided those fledgling Christians about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. These young Christians not only listened to the apostles’ teachings but also were devoted to them and to their words and witness. For a world in trouble, doubt and fear, this was Good News; and from this Good News was born the gospels so that successive generations would come to know the saving power of Jesus Christ and how this power was given to the Church in the person of the Holy Spirit.

The second pillar is fellowship. We are knit together believing there is one Lord, one faith, one baptism. We come together in community to share our time, talent and treasure; but, more than this we come together to share our joys and sorrows, our nightmares and our dreams, our burdens and our strengths. It is a ministry of our hospitality and presence where we greet and meet one another standing on common ground knowing that we are bound together – one to another – through the Holy Spirit. In the early church all who believed shared all things in common selling their possessions and goods, distributing to all, as any have need (Acts 2:44). The Romans would say about these 1st century Christians, “See how they loved one another,”

The third pillar is Holy Communion also called the Eucharist. It is the primary sacramental act of the Christian Church. By breaking bread with one another we become friends; we seek forgiveness; and we commit ourselves to one another. It is also a celebration of thanksgiving. It memorializes Jesus’ last meal with his disciples and commands them to continue this table fellowship in remembrance of his life, death and resurrection for we are called to be a sacramental people: offered, blessed, broken and given as Christ’s body to the world. As we are fed and nourished in Holy Communion, we are called to go forth to fed and heal and hungry and broken world.

The fourth pillar is prayer. Prayer is the source of our power being empowered by the Holy Spirit to go out and make disciples and to seek and serve Christ loving our neighbor as ourselves. Through prayer we come to know the creator, redeemer and sustainer better. Through prayer we are bound together into a holy host to love and care for the least, the last, the lost and the lonely. And through pray we come to see and know how we are being called into the world for common mission and a unified ministry of the baptized. We are given the Lord’s Prayer to share and to pray together so that in praising God, seeking God’s will, asking for our needs, for forgiveness, for deliverance, and for hope we will increase in faith.

The Word. Fellowship. Holy Communion. Prayer. These are four pillars that we claim from the apostles’ and from the first church that saw itself as one community. As Methodists or Episcopalians or Roman Catholics or Protestants, we can claim these pillars of unity as we seek to proclaim the Good New of Jesus Christ in the world today. I like to believe that what you and I do as the communities of Carter United Methodist Church and Christ Episcopal Church in worshiping together is to incarnate, in our own small, way the dream of Jesus who prayed that all of us might be one.

In the Gospel lesson for today, Jesus calls the first disciples, James and John and Andrew and Peter, to a great adventure in mission. Through divine guidance, Jesus confirmed the truth about a kingdom ministry that would be shared. He would not do it alone but called a diverse hardworking group of people to go with him. Those Jesus called first were fisherman whose ruddy looks, calloused hands, and salty personalities would be counterintuitive to the principalities and powers of his day. They had no experience in evangelism or stewardship. They had neither education nor credentials. Yet, they went and followed Jesus to help share in his mission to make the reign of God visible to all people for all time.
They did not know where it would lead them but they trusted Jesus and so left behind their nets to become fishers of people.

You and I are called to leave behind our old nets and netting and to undertake a great adventure in mission. In service to God and to God’s people, you and I can do so much more together and than we can do separately in proclaiming, teaching, and healing. As difficult as it sometimes can be being in dialogue about matters of governance and ministry between our two denominations, there is far more that unites us than divides us. I am grateful for this day. I am grateful for the gifts we share and the ministry we share in Needham; but most of all I am grateful to God in Christ who gives us the Holy Spirit who moves us and beckons us forth in common mission and purpose.

Epiphany II - Holly Hartman

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, Amen.

When I was a young mother, I participated in a book group with members of my church. We discussed books that usually had to do with spirituality and parenting. One of the members said something back then that I have thought of many, many times. She was talking about how to explain certain religious concepts to her children, and said something like this:

“The things I hate about church is the use of the word ‘sin’. Sin makes it sound like we are evil. I don’t like the way it is said so much in worship. How can I explain it to my kids when it makes me feel so bad?”

None of us really knew what to say to that- She was right, of course,- the word “sin” DOES appear very prominently in our liturgy. We are a penitential people; we are asked, very clearly, to “confess our sins” before we partake in the Eucharistic Feast.

This bothered the young mother, and she was afraid that her kids would see themselves as “sinners.” And none of us at that time had the ability to help her with this. We all sat there in silence, and then, probably changed the subject to a more comfortable topic.

Unfortunately, some time passed, and we didn’t see this family very much anymore except for Christmas and Easter. I knew they were still church members but they quietly slipped away from being active in parish life. I often wondered if perhaps the comment that young mother made was more significant than we had realized. What exactly was she struggling with when she talked about her discomfort with the notion of sin? What was she looking for? It’s a question worth asking.

In the Gospel of John this morning, Jesus has just been identified by John the Baptist as the Son of God. There is no ambiguity about this anymore, the way we have seen in other gospels- it is clearly stated here that the Messiah whom we’ve been waiting for is indeed Jesus. It’s Jesus who is the Annointed One, the One who was pre-destined to be our Saviour. The disciples who have been following John the Baptist now turn and begin to follow Jesus. And one of the first things that Jesus does in this newly “outed” state of his is to ask them “What are you looking for?”

The significance of this question is enormous. What ARE we looking for in our spiritual faith journey? How many of us, like the young mother I knew, have questions along the way that we struggle with, maybe even voice, but never receive an answer? What are we looking for, and how can we find it?

By asking this question, Jesus issues his followers an invitation. An invitation to seek. An invitation to turn to Jesus and to ask the difficult questions that are naturally part of any spiritual journey. An invitation to examine some very difficult concepts that one must engage in in order to fully live into this Christian life that we are called to do.

If we don’t ever ask the question “What are we looking for?”, then we run the risk of either blindly accepting what we are told, making for a rather superficial spiritual life....or worse, denying that we even have questions, conflicts, struggles with our faith journey.....again, not living an authentic Christian life. If we don’t voice this question in one way or another, then we lose a sacred opportunity to explore the ways in which God might want us to follow Jesus. I believe that a Christian community- a church- is a place where we can offer each other the gift of sacred listening- that is, allowing each other the space to ask difficult questions and to seek the answers together as a people who have committed themselves to following Jesus.

Looking back, the group of young mothers didn’t really have the tools to be able to help our friend with her concerns about sin. We listened, but by saying nothing, might have made her feel badly for even asking the question. I am speculating now, but I believe we missed the opportunity to help her -and ourselves- seek and find some answers about this notion of “sin”, for example, that may have helped her feel more connected to our community and more able as a young mom to help her children with their faith journey.

I am not suggesting, of course, that we all need to be Bible scholars or enlightened spiritual gurus, but I do think that by asking the question “What are we looking for?”, we can begin to find some answers that will deepen our understanding of what God, through his son Jesus Christ’s example, is calling us to be.

Let’s go back to the concept of sin. On one hand, I can understand how it might be off putting to label ourselves as “sinners”- and in some circles, this word is used intentionally to promote guilt, which is turn, acts as an agent of control to make people think about things in a certain, narrow way.

On the other hand, however, with some discussion and wrestling with this word “sin”, we might realize that acknowledging our sins is really, in fact, acknowledging our humanity.

Yes, we, as human beings, are sinners. We ALL make mistakes that hurt other people and ourselves. It’s perhaps an unfortunate yet very expected part of our human condition, and we cannot avoid - we “err and stray from God’s ways like lost sheep, by what we have done and by what we have left undone”, over and over again, in ways both small and large, every day of our lives.

But instead of despising ourselves for our “sin”, the invitation from Jesus is one that comes out of love. There is hope. The Gospel reading this morning speaks to this hope. God has sent us a “Lamb of God”- Jesus, of course- to “take away the sins of the world.” We don’t need to be isolated and ashamed when we commit acts of sin. We don’t need to deny them. We take comfort in the knowledge that there is someone- Jesus- who’s job it is to redeem us of our sins.

Within this softer context, perhaps the mother that I knew so long ago at another church, may have been able to eventually find relief and even joy in the act of confessing her sins- aloud and in community, together on Sunday mornings- acknowledging and accepting her very human state and asking for a new start- before partaking in the Eucharistic Feast.

I haven’t been at Christ Church very long- just about four months now- but I see many places in this community where people are given opportunity to ask difficult questions and to seek answers together. One such place occurs every Sunday, between the services, when people are invited into the Memorial Room to discuss the mornings readings. I haven’t been to the Wednesday morning Bible Study but imagine that a similar discourse occurs there. The intercessory prayer group, which meets monthly after church to pray for those in need, is a place where church members speak very openly about their struggles and their faith. I am hoping that, within a short time, a women’s retreat, a book group, and perhaps a group for young mothers will also be places for open seeking and sharing one’s spiritual journey with others.

I pray that this community of Christ Church will continue to strive to be a place where her members, her People of God, will know what it means to ask the question “What are we looking for?” and will know how to seek each other out to find answers together along the way.

Please pray with me.

God, Thank you for sending us your Son. Our Messiah, our Annointed One, our Lamb of God. Thank you for giving us each other and for always reminding us of your steadfast love for us and desire to follow the ways of your Son.

Jesus, Lamb of God, you take away the sin of the world. Jesus, bearer of our sins- have mercy on us. Grant us thy peace.  Amen.

Epiphany I (Baptism of Our Lord) - Timothy Kenslea

Why do we get baptized?  My guess is that many, even most, of us here today have been baptized, as two new young members of our church are about to be.  I doubt many of us gave it much thought at the time—especially since we probably had as little to say about the decision to be baptized as these young people did.

We do know that baptism has been one of the central sacramental traditions of the church from its beginning.  All of us are familiar with some sturdy conventional interpretations of the meaning of the rite—interpretations that are rooted in scripture.

In Matthew’s gospel, just before today’s reading, John the Baptist refers to the baptism he administers “with water” as being “for repentance” (Mt 3:11).  Many of us have learned to associate baptism in that way with cleansing from sin.  Paul, in his letter to the Galatians, tells them to consider baptism a kind of initiation rite, in which the newly baptized “clothed [them]selves with Christ” (Gal 3:27).

In the gospel accounts of the baptism of Jesus, though, Jesus gives us another way to think about baptism.  Matthew’s account, which we heard today, is particularly instructive.  Matthew’s is the only gospel that records a remarkable conversation between Jesus and John the Baptist.  I imagine it taking place in a kind of stage whisper.  John expresses real surprise:  “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?”  Jesus replies, “Let it be so now.”  He adds an assurance that this will be the way for them — for both of them —“to fulfill all righteousness.”

We know, when they had this conversation, that Jesus and John knew of each other —    in all of the gospels, John the Baptist gives his followers the promise that “one who is more powerful than I is coming after me” (Mt 3:11).  We have reason to believe that Jesus and John knew each other, maybe even quite well.  Matthew doesn't tell us this, but Luke — the other gospel that recounts Jesus’ nativity, infancy, and childhood — tells us that their mothers are relatives (Lk 1:36).  So John, who sees his baptism as one of repentance, expresses surprise.   The roles should be reversed, he insists.  Jesus does not need to be cleansed from sin; nor does he need to put on Christ like a garment.

So why does Jesus go to John to be baptized? What are we, the baptized and the about-to-be-baptized, to make of the example of Jesus, as we try to follow it, in this case?

I think it’s important, in trying to understand Jesus’ baptism by John, to remember that this is not just baptism with water, but baptism in a river.  To be baptized by John, Jesus steps into the waters of the River Jordan.

Rivers exert a powerful pull on our imagination, still.  I started to make a list, off the top of my head, of references to rivers in popular culture.  I stopped counting songs after I came up with Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Sarah McLachlan, Joni Mitchell, the Talking Heads.  It’s the river of life, the river of dreams; it’s the river we go down to, we’re drawn to; it’s the river we want to be taken to, the river we wish we could skate away on.  Anyone who grew up in my generation remembers Michael, rowing that boat ashore on the deep, wide, chilly, cold Jordan River.  Fans of the Broadway musical can never forget how Old Man River just keeps rolling along.

A river forms the backbone of what’s arguably the greatest American novel, in which Huck Finn travels along the Mississippi on a journey from immaturity almost all the way to responsible adulthood, and his friend Jim makes his journey from slavery, to freedom, back to slavery, and finally back to freedom for good.

But rivers had, if possible, an even more powerful hold on the imaginations of people who lived at the time of Jesus.  When I think, as a history teacher, of all the things rivers meant in the ancient world, two things stand out:  A river is a highway, calling people forward on a journey; and a river is a boundary, challenging people with the prospect of what's on the other side, if only they dare to cross.

At the start of the long journey that will take him to Calvary — to the cross and the tomb and the stone rolled away — Jesus steps into the river to be baptized by John, “to fulfill all righteousness.”  When he steps out of the river, a voice from heaven calls him “my Son, the Beloved.”

Jesus is calling us to follow his example in baptism.  What does this mean for us?  In this light, it means to embark on that journey, to cross over that river with him, to break down those boundaries—whether they separate nation from nation, race from race, or class from class.

How are we to do this?  This is why the choice of today’s second reading, from    the Acts of the Apostles, is so felicitous.  The connection is not just that Peter mentions Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist.  Peter also gives us a powerful example of what we, as baptized people, are called to do.

Peter is such a complex, engaging, sympathetic, flawed character in the gospels.  He stands for us.  Witnessing the Transfiguration, his response is almost comically enthusiastic:  “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three [tents] here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah” (Mt 17:4).  He fell asleep during the Lord’s dark night of the soul at Gethsemane (Mt 26:38-46).  And of course, what we always remember most about Peter is that on that night of Jesus’ arrest and torture by the Romans, he denied that he knew Jesus — three times — just a few hour after insisting, “Even though I must die with you, I will not deny you” (Mt 26:35).  And this from the man Jesus said would be the rock (Mt 16:18) on which he would build his church!

But here, in the Acts of the Apostles, we see a different Peter — a transformed Peter.  To place today’s reading in context:  Peter is on a journey to Cæsarea.  He crosses over an unspoken boundary when he preaches the good news to the Gentiles there.  “We are witnesses,” Peter says of himself and his fellow disciples.  “[We] were chosen by God as witnesses.”

Peter and the other apostles had experienced a different kind of baptism at Pentecost  (Acts 2:1-4) — not a baptism by water, but a baptism “with the Holy Spirit and fire” — the one that John had told his followers the one who came after him would bring (Mt 3:11).

Empowered by his baptism by fire, and by the experience of seeing, and eating and drinking with, the risen Lord, Peter — even weak, flawed, self-important Peter —is able to proclaim his startling message.  His fear has left him.  His testimony about Jesus is simple and clear:  “Everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

As it was for Peter, our baptism is not just a ritual of initiation or absolution.  It is a call to us, flawed as we are, to follow Christ, and to be witnesses to his message of salvation.  However we fulfill that call to be witnesses, may we have Peter’s ultimate humility in recognizing that it is a journey not of our own choosing but of God’s.  May we recognize that in our baptism we are chosen and empowered by God to go on this journey, to break through boundaries beyond our imagining—we are called by Jesus to follow him, and step into the river.

Advent I - Skip Windsor

Matthew 24:36-44
What Time It Is

It’s happened already. No sooner than the turkey is gone and the pumpkin pie is eaten, the perennial Christmas songs begin playing on the radio, providing background music at Starbucks, and filling the mall’s walls with sounds of “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer,” “Have a Holly Jolly Christmas,” and “Feliz Navidad.” Like everyone else, it is easy to get in the swing of things and accompany Johnny Mathis on the radio when he sings, “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire with Jack Frost nipping at our noses…” After hearing Burl Ives and Jose Feliciano’s continuous voices awhile, one wonders where are the Christmas songs? The real Christmas songs like “Come all ye faithful,” “It came upon a midnight clear,” or “Hark! The herald angels sing.”

In previous generations, children grew up singing songs about the birth of the Christ Child, about star struck shepherds, about choirs of angels, and about kings bearing gifts. If not in church, where? There are few public places today where a youngster can hear the Christmas hymns like the ones contained in your hymnals in front of you. And the irony of it all is that we are nowhere near December 25th yet. It is still November. There is still a month to go before Jesus is born. So, today’s lesson from Matthew comes like a shock of flowing ice water over us making Jack Frost looking quite pale in comparison. Here we hear Jesus as a grown man. He is fully into his public ministry. He has already called the disciples, provoked the principalities and powers, and preached the Sermon on the Mount.

Now he is telling his followers to be ready. “About that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, only the Father.” The key word is this sentence is “that.” That day means when there will be a reckoning. When things that were up will be down and when those things that were down will be raised up. Even Jesus declares not to know the day when will be the coming of the Son of Man. Only God knows. This warning shot comes over the bows of the commercial ship we call “Christmas.” Jesus is warning his disciples to pay attention to the signs that are all around them that something, someone, is coming. The irony of ironies as we begin a new Christian Year is that the early season of Advent speaks not about Bethlehem and birth but about the return of the Risen Christ, the Alpha and the Omega, in the fullness of his glory. This is definitely not the message from Macy’s. It is the message from the Father.

Placing the Gospel lesson about End Times at the beginning of Advent is not to highlight our lassitude but to live with awareness of the expectations and obligations of God’s reign. This is not to put the fear of God in us or place us on heightened alert like some imminent terrorist attack. Rather, it is to mark a way of living and embracing the unexpected in ways that grounds our interactions and relationships on a daily basis. I am reminded of the story of an innkeeper on Nantucket who as a little girl helped her parents in the summer to greet and befriend the guests of the inn. She remembers a set of elderly sisters from Boston who came every August and never ventured forth but sat out on the porch and read their Bibles. Year after year, the sisters came in August, sat on the porch, and read their Bibles. Finally, when she was much older, the future innkeeper’s curiosity got the best of her; and she asked them why they read their Bibles year in and year out. She never forgot what they said. They said, “We are cramming for finals.”

Advent is about cramming for finals not knowing when the final exam is going to be. A gardener tends to her garden all the time. She must weed, water, and till being patient but ready at all times. A soldier on duty must be alert and every watchful to protect his troops. A lifeguard must be vigilant watching the people in the water but also the shape of the waves, the movement of the current, and the impending rain clouds. Just as a gardener, a soldier, and a lifeguard are watchful and need full attentiveness so you and I need to be attending to our spiritual lives. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus is telling his followers about being attentive to the obligations of being a disciple and living up to the expectations of those who wish to follow him. In the midst of the demands of daily life as people nurture their families, cultivate their careers, and sustain their health, Jesus asks the disciples to be attentive to their relationship with God.

Stephen Covey in well-regarded book on management called Seven Habits of Highly Effective People speaks in one chapter about time management. He proposes that people live in four spheres or quadrants: urgent and important, urgent and not important, not urgent but important, and not urgent and not important. Some of those categories are obvious: a random telephone solicitation is not important and not urgent; a hospital emergency is urgent and important; deciding what tip to leave after lunch is urgent but not important (except to the waiter!); and going to exercise is important or not urgent. Covey believes that the one people need to work on most is the important but not urgent sphere of our lives. It is here where we decide about our health: physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. And it is in this quadrant where Advent lives.

Imagine instead of counting calories you could count your blessings. Instead of fretting about your food intake you could consider your spiritual intake in worship, prayer, contemplation and reading. Instead of worrying about tomorrow you could be nurturing what surrounds you today. The invitation of Advent is to live where you will be most healthy in body, mind and spirit. It is the season to take stock of what is really important in life. It is the time to walk in the light of the Lord. It is the time to make connections with God and with one another. As we are already being commanded to consume this holiday, we are invited to go another way and to share with others God’s gift to us through Jesus Christ. It means that as we take care of ourselves we are to take care of others as well. If we become more attuned to the spiritual and material needs of others, we will not worry about tomorrow for in today there plenty to consider, reflect and do.

Just as we think about the holiday shopping season not being about the Nativity of Jesus, and Advent not being just about his first coming but his second coming, too, so Advent is not just about ourselves but about the welfare of others. Christian ministry and mission never take the day off. In the most recent edition of Newsweek magazine, the lead article is about the food divide between the rich and the poor. It details how income divides what people can afford and what they cannot afford. According to the article by religion editor, Lisa Miller, 17% of Americans live in households that are “food insecure.” Such insecurity arises when a family runs out of money they cannot buy food. It is also linked to other economic measures like housing and employment. In America food has become a premier marker of social distinction about who can afford to buy healthy food like fish, lean meats, grains and vegetables and who cannot afford it; and those who cannot buy more processed foods because they are cheaper and taste good. The USDA cites that in the last three years food stamps have risen 58% and women and children, who are on food stamps, tend to be more overweight than who are not. The current debate about buying soft drinks with food stamps brings this whole justice issue into sharper clarity.

The rise of food activists and the advent of the food movement have raised the awareness not only of this economic and social divide among Americans but also how we are to think about how to distribute locally grown and organic food to the least of our brothers and sisters among us. Deeper involvement in conversations with Big Food, public school diets, food pantries like ours in Needham, local community farms and food co-ops, are ways to demonstrate choices and alternatives to sustaining healthy lives and the healthy well being of others. An Advent call to watchfulness is a call for us to shift our consciousness and to see food as a shared resource rather than as a consumer item.

In this season of consumerism, Advent is the herald’s call to us to consider our obligations as followers of Christ to build up the Kingdom of God right now. These obligations are not high and mighty; rather they are about compassion, togetherness, intimacy, and even to the most simple of pleasures to break bread in healthy ways with our neighbors in need. As a community of faith we are formed and informed by Jesus Christ to be healthy people to help make a healthier world.

So as we begin a new church year and are at the advent of the Advent season consider your life. Consider not what the future holds but rather what holds you today. For if we listen to the still small voice within we will hear something far more merry than we hear on the radio, far more joyful than any gift, and far more hopeful than anything we can imagine or pray for. So be watchful and be glad. For salvation is nearer to us than we ever knew.

Pentecost XXIII - Lynn Campbell

2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12, Luke 19:1-10
Climb a Tree!


When was the last time you climbed a tree or looked down from a great height? For me it was this past summer while serving as a chaplain at the Barbara C Harris Summer Camp. I was there to help with bible study and the twice-daily worship, to provide pastoral counseling to the campers and the staff and be a calming presence to homesick kids. But there was another part of the job that was unexpected. It involved joining right in with the kids no matter what activity they were doing that day. Some how the kids convinced me to do the high ropes with them. I awkwardly climbed a tree and walked across a rope that were entirely too high and too narrow for my liking. It is one of my best memories from camp- even if I did wake up the next day with sore muscles and a massive bruise on my leg!

Climbing a tree is something normally reserved for kids. Certainly not an activity for dignified adults. This was just as true in Jesus’ time as it is now. People were not often running through town and climbing trees. But that is exactly what Zacchaeus in today’s Gospel story did. Now, Zacchaeus was a tax collector, the chief tax collector. His job required maintaining a certain reputation and perhaps a level of fear in the people of Jericho. In first century Palestine the Roman government contracted with private individuals to collect taxes. As long as the government got its proper payment, the tax collector could charge whatever amount he wanted. As you can imagine this made the tax collectors quite rich and quite unpopular. They were seen as thieves and traders. Devout Jews would have avoided all contact with these known sinners. As the chief among these tax collector Zacchaeus was not on many people’s top ten list of favorite people.

But none of that mattered to Zacchaeus on the day Jesus passed through Jericho. Everyone in town had probably heard about this man named Jesus and wanted to see him. People talked of him raising a widow’s son from the dead, they curing Simon’s mother-in-law and the paralyzed man who was lowered to Jesus from the top of a roof. And just a few weeks ago we heard the story of Jesus healing the 10 lepers. Pretty unbelievable stuff. A crowd gathered in Jericho to see this infamous man pass by. Maybe they would witness or be a recipient of one of his miraculous actions. Zacchaeus was one among many in this crowd. Scripture tells us that he was short of stature and not able to see over the growing crowd. If he wanted to see Jesus he was going to have to do something.

So, he decides to climb a tree. As a professional businessman Zacchaeus took a risk by running through the crowd and climbing the sycamore tree. Imagine it. It probably looked a bit ridiculous. There is no graceful way to climb a tree. I can imagine someone in the crowd pointing at Zacchaeus and laughing. But he isn’t thinking about the people around him. Their jeering doesn’t bother him. Instead there is a sense of urgency and need that drives him to put his reputation aside and climb the tree.

This summer I realized that climbing a tree has the potential to change our perspective. Once over that initial fear of being so far above the ground I began to look around. In the distance the cabins, the chapel, and the fields were visible, as were groups of happy kids running around laughing and having a wonderful time. I could see the beauty of the campgrounds and the great attention paid to its care. There was something about seeing all of this at once that opened my heart to God’s presence surrounding me in nature and in each of those campers. Climbing to new heights can be both terrifying and amazing. Whether it is on a high rope course, a mountain peak, or in our imagination, we get a new perspective on life. It opens us to new ways of seeing and experiencing God. Was Zacchaeus similarly struck by this changed perspective, by the people he saw and the landscape that surrounded him?

Regardless of what urged him to climb that tree or what happened once he was nestled onto a branch I’m guessing Jesus’ words nearly knocked him out of the tree. “Zacchaeus,” Jesus calls, looking right up at him. “HURRY and come down; for I MUST stay at your house TODAY.” Jesus calls him out by name. Jesus looks up, over the crowds and into the tree and calls him down. It is almost as if Jesus is looking for him, as if he came to Jericho for Zaccaeus.

There is a sense of urgency for Zacchaeus and for Jesus. Zacchaeus must see Jesus and Jesus must go to the house of Zaccaeus TODAY. It can not wait. Jesus is entering Jericho. His journey to Jerusalem is coming to an end. We know that he is walking towards his passion and death. He’ll soon be nailed to the wood of a tree, he’ll soon be crucified. Time is running out. He must get the message of God’s saving love to everyone open to hearing and receiving it. And Zacchaeus is ready to hear and receive it.

Zacchaeus, as the chief tax collector, is a man marginalized from his own Jewish community. He may think no one is desperately seeking him. But Jesus is. Just as Jesus calls Zacchaeus by name, he calls each of us by name. We may need to change our perspective in order to hear his voice. Maybe what we need to do is climb high into a tree in order to see with fresh eyes and to hear in new ways. A new perspective comes by making time in our busy lives for God, by venturing to new and unsettling places, by reaching out to people in need in our Christ Church community and beyond. Many of us have also experience a changed perspective through unexpected moments of joy or sorrow. These moments are important because they break us open in new ways and open us to the voice of God. And it is this voice that leads us on the journey of discipleship.

When Jesus looks at Zacchaeus he doesn’t see a sinner without hope of salvation. He sees a beloved child of God. From the vantage point of the tree, Zacchaeus experiences the loving expression on Jesus’ face. He hurries down the tree and with happiness welcomes Jesus to his home. Without hesitation he gives away half of his possessions to the poor and vows to repay four times what he has defrauded anyone.
The crowd watches this happen and grumbles to one another. How can Jesus seek out this known sinner and go to his house? To this crowd Jesus announces the good news of salvation. “Today salvation has come to this house because he too is a son of Abraham.” A son of Abraham, a member of the community, a member of the family of God.

Jesus seeks out each one of us, and calls us by name. And this doesn’t happen just once in our lifetimes. It happens over and over again. Being open to these encounters will change us, as it changed Zacchaeus. These encounters will call us to mend broken relationships, to risk knowing and being known in community, and to move out of our comfort zones in service of God’s kingdom of justice and peace. They’ll lead us deeper into community and deeper in our relationship with God.

And for all this we give thanks. We give thanks to God. And we remember the words of Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians where he writes: “We must always give thanks to God for you, brothers and sisters, as is right, because your faith is growing abundantly, and the love of everyone of you for one another is increasing.” We give thanks for our changing perspective because these changes open the way for our faith in God to increase and for our love for another to grow abundantly.

Trinity Sunday - Skip Windsor

Romans 5:1-5
Earn This!

Today is Trinity Sunday and is the only Sunday in the Christian year given over to a theological doctrine. No wonder many preachers try to escape this Sunday from preaching. The only clergyman I know who likes to preach on Trinity Sunday is Peter. Since he has preached the last two Trinity Sundays, it is only fair that I take my turn in the pulpit today.

As we celebrate Trinity Sunday today, I am reminded of the story told about Sir Winston Churchill who was a member of Trinity House, London, and a service organization dedicated to the well being of sailors. He was invited to France for a special occasion dressed in the Trinity House uniform, which puzzled the French. One Frenchmen got up the courage to ask Churchill what the uniform was he was wearing. Churchill said: “I am an elder brother of the Trinity.” To which the astonished Frenchman replied: “Mon Dieu!”

We also celebrate Memorial Day this weekend and pause to remember our nation and our fallen warriors who died in service to our country. This weekend we will see many American flags and red ribbons festooned throughout many cemeteries honoring the valorous dead. The Holiday began soon after the Civil War and was originally called Decoration Day as a time to decorate the graves of the dead with flowers. Originally, May 30th was chosen because flowers would be in bloom; and today, Memorial Day is officially the last Monday in May. Tomorrow, on this weekend, we remember and honor those who gave their lives for our country and for our freedom.

At first glance Memorial Day has absolutely nothing to do with Trinity Sunday. One is a secular holiday and the other is a feast day of the Christian Year that follows on the heels of Pentecost. Memorial Day is concrete. It is about real people – veterans, fallen heroes, war and peace. Trinity Sunday, on the other hand, is abstract. Some would even say obtuse. It has little to do with ethical decision-making nor personal values nor courage nor honor and nothing about nations and peoples. Many preachers will avoid mixing the two occasions and will probably preach about The Trinity since no one knows anything conclusive about the Trinity anyway - including the preacher!

However, a careful reading of our epistle lesson today from Paul’s Letter to the Romans which addresses suffering and sacrifice reveals themes related to martyrdom, freedom, and service. The Apostle Paul is writing to a small mixed Christian community in Rome. Their diversity is both their gift and their burden. Some are Jewish Christians and some are Pagan Christians. It would be like putting Lakers fans in a room with Celtics fans and calling them all Americans. Paul wanted to teach them that all people are awakened to the grace of God. Through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ each person – male and female, Jew and Gentile, slave and free – has a personal relationship with God and with one another.

By being reconciled with God and with one another Paul points out that God does not want us to simply enjoy only a one-on-one relationship with him but to enlist all Christians to God’s service by building up the reign of God and working for his kingdom. And this will put all kinds of pressures, problems and sacrifices on the disciples requiring sacrifice, endurance and hope even when there seems to be nothing happening. According to Paul, since we are awakened to God’s grace and love we can boast in our sufferings and live with patient endurance. Believing in a God graced world, we have all the gifts we need to grow and mature into the full stature of Christ regardless of the changes, challenges and chances of life.

The poet Goethe writes that character is cumulative. And Paul is saying the same thing: The journey of faith is grounded in day-to-day decisions. Christian character is formed through the cauldrons of suffering, sacrifice, endurance and hope. Whatever comes our way in life we are given a model of faithful endurance through Jesus Christ. Through his sacrifice that gives eternal life, Jesus invites us to look beyond our own self-interests to the greater good of others, to offer thanks for our blessings and to glorify God who gives life and sustains life.

Through the eyes of Paul, particularly from today’s reading in Romans, Memorial Day is a vivid reminder of the sacrifices mad by others on our behalf. It is also the occasion for us to re-commit ourselves to the greater good living out in action and deed the words of Matthew 25: “When I was hungry you fed me. When I was naked you clothed me…” Because of the sacrifices of others, Memorial Day is the occasion to shed of our narrow self-interests for the greater good of family and friends, church and community, the nation and the world.

In this current age of personal, corporate and national self interest where material goals are to pay less taxes, to make more money, to blame the other guy, and to be indifferent to the fragile ecosystems of our earth, air and waters, Memorial Day invites you and me to balance our self interests with the wider interests of our planet and its people. Right now, you and I are witnessing the greatest environmental disaster in our country’s history. We are engaged in another kind of war. Who is to blame for the mammoth oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico? We can point fingers; but at some point we have to take personal responsibility for what has happened given the world’s great need for oil.

Our immediate responses are anger and frustration. Anger will not change a society let alone change a planet. Our moral response is manifold and includes environmental initiatives with less dependency upon fossil fuels, more for wind, solar alternatives, and increasing and diligent collaboration with other cultures and nation on environmental sustainability. In the midst, environmental degradation and pollution can we still hope? Can we have a dream of the earth that is healthy again? It will require a new way of living. It will require both sharing and sacrificing. It will require a commitment to environmental sustainability that will call into question how we use the earth’s resources with one another. It will demand a universal vision of how to live as a global community. It will require prophets and sages. It will require the wise and the courageous. As faithful people, you and I are called to dream the good dreams of God in an age of nightmare.

Those who came before us were dreamers and visionaries. Those who served our country in time of war held dreams of a better country and a free world devoid of oppression and fear. Our fallen warriors sacrifices to the greater good in time of war can serve as inspirations for us who are locked in multiple wars right now: the war for the environment, the war to fight terrorism, the war to combat poverty.

In the motion picture Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks plays a WWII officer in charge of a squad of men who are given orders to find a Private Ryan and to return him safely home because all the rest of his brothers were killed in the war. After finding Ryan behind enemy lines, Hanks and his squad of soldiers must defend a bridge in a French village until reinforcements arrive. In the climatic scene of the film, the soldiers defend the bridge against the Germans and the officer played by Hanks is mortally wounded. As he is dying Private Ryan comes over to him after seeing that most of the men who “saved” Ryan are casualties. The officer’s last words to him are: “Earn this.”

If you go to a cemetery this weekend and you see an American Flag by a grave or some gently arranged flowers nearby and feel the breeze of the wind gently blowing near you, perhaps you will hear the faint whispers of the soldiers, sailors, Marines and air men and women saying “Earn this.” We have our freedom because of them. We have a remarkable country because of them. What we stand for is because of them. You and I can earn “this” not just by honoring them tomorrow on Memorial Day but also by living up to their values of sacrifice, patriotism and courage.

These are the values Paul speaks about in Romans. These are the values of a Christian when Jesus said, “Take up your cross and follow me.”

In the name of God, creator, redeemer and sustainer. Amen.

Easter Day - Skip Windsor

Luke 24:1-12

The Fire in the Equation

The Lord is Risen! The Lord is Risen Indeed!

Not long ago, my son, my grandson and I visited the Museum of Science in Boston. Among the live exhibits, the three of us watched the lightning show in the Theatre of Electricity. We enjoyed a thrilling display of sparks, lightning bolts, and loud cracks that kept everyone wide-awake including dozing grandfathers!

For those of you who have never experienced the Theatre of Electricity you have to imagine that you are sitting beside the Wizard of Oz. There are complicated elongated panels with funny looking dials and brightly colored lights. There are coils that seem to snake around the podium that glisten silver.

There are two large domes called the Van de Graaf generator which produce sparks that travel to two smaller grounded spheres. The sparks fly when the voltage on the domes get big enough to ionize the air turning the generator from an insulator into a conductor. When that transformation happens it happens very quickly -- like 1/1000 of second. Bang. Zap. And it’s over. Everyone is wide-awake!

After the show, while my grandson wandered over to the mammoth control panel monitored by the Wizard of Oz, my son and I started talking about those things beyond our comprehension: electromagnetic fields, the force of gravity, black holes, the Big Bang. We concurred that there are some things that just cannot be explained away. I am reminded of a cartoon of two professors with one of them pointing at a blackboard scribbled with complex-looking equations. In the middle of the blackboard instead of an equal sign it has the words, “then a miracle occurs.” And the one professor is pointing at the words saying to the other one, “Can you explain this a little bit better?”

Today as we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, Easter is the miracle in the equation. It is the “Something” that cannot be explained away. Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, writes, that the miracle of Easter stands in the middle of a second Big Bang. It serves as an eighth day of creation when the atmosphere was divinely charged and the world was irrevocably changed.

Williams thinks of Easter as the fire in the equation; and I think that is an apt description of Easter as fire. It is about the Light: the light of creation, the first ray of daylight, and the radiant light of the Paschal Candle. The fire in the equation for us is the risen Christ. When He rose from the tomb truth, goodness, and hope rose with Him.

If Easter is about truth then Easter is about you and me. What we profess as truth shapes our understanding of things – even things such as resurrection. The Easter story is about the disciples’ initial understanding of the resurrection of Jesus. Was it true? And what truth shaped them to become the people they became?

In today’s Gospel reading from Luke the evangelist writes uncharacteristically even hesitantly. For those familiar with Luke’s Gospel know that he is a consummate storyteller. Only Luke includes the Parables of the Prodigal Son and the Good Samaritan. Only Luke highlights Jesus as a man of prayer and valorizes women as much as men in both his Gospel and in The Acts of the Apostles.

For those who read carefully the Easter text this morning you will find Luke use the word “but” five times. Like a boulder in the middle of the road this obstinate conjunction causes one to pause and take note. The narrative demands us, like the evangelist, to see that there are two competing stories being told at the same time. The stories are odds with one another.

One story recounts that the man Jesus, who some claimed as the Messiah, died –End of story. What happened on the cross crushed all their hopes and all their dreams. There was a hopeless finality to Good Friday. This was, and is, the rational and empirical story of Jesus of Nazareth. He lived and died a failure.

And this joyless and hopeless story is the enemy of the Easter Story. And yet it is a narrative that some people acknowledge today: Jesus was only a kind rabbi from Nazareth. He was a good and godly man and, at most, an interesting footnote in history. For some today, He is worth studying but not worth knowing.

The other story embedded in Luke is that something happened like an electrical charge that changed everything. Luke the physician, the man of science, is writing like one who can hardly believe the truth – But when they went in the tomb they found no body. But the men said, “He is not here but has risen.” But Peter saw the linens lying by themselves.

Luke the physician, the meticulous historian, surrenders all rational thinking to the truth as witnessed by the disciples: “Christ is alive!” “Remember how he told you in Galilee, remember how he told you on the holy mountain, and remember how he told you again before his entry into Jerusalem that he would die and on the third day rise again?” By remembering his promises, the disciples experienced a resurrection in their own lives that transformed them forever. All that Jesus spoke to them was true.

The second gift that rose with Jesus was goodness. All that Jesus said about the first shall be last and that last shall be first, about the meek shall inherit the kingdom of God, about loving your neighbor as yourself, and about being with His followers to the end of all time, was all true. His resurrection was his vindication about All that was good, all that was true and all that was beautiful was going to last forever through Him.

Tom Long, well-known preacher, tells the story of a young boy who was a great fan of both Capt. Kangaroo and Mister Rogers. The boy faithfully watched both television shows and one day it was announced that Mister Rogers would be paying a visit to the Capt. Kangaroo show.

The boy was ecstatic. Both of his heroes, together on the same show! Every morning the boy would ask, “Is it today that Mister Rogers will be on Capt. Kangaroo?”

Finally the great day arrived, and the whole family gathered around the television. There they were, Mister Rogers and Capt. Kangaroo together. The boy watched for a minute, but then, surprisingly, got up and wandered from the room.

Puzzled the father followed him and asked, “What is it, son? Anything wrong. “It’s too good,” the boy replied. “It’s just too good.”

Maybe that’s it. Maybe the news of the empty tomb, the news of the resurrection, the victory of Jesus’ victory over death is just to good to be true, too good to grasp all at once. Yet, we do not have to apprehend the gift of Easter all at once. The spiritual life is one of progressive revelation knowing that the goodness of God never ends.

And if God’s goodness is endless then Easter is also about hope rising. You and I live in a body of hope. It is an energizing field. It makes for a spiritually charged atmosphere bigger than we are. God gives us more hope than we can handle.

In the Risen Christ we are embraced in an electromagnetic field of love that connects us to all things and to all people. Just like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, we find that the power was within us all along – As Jesus said many times to his disciples, “The Kingdom of God is within you.” By Him, through Him and with Him, we are born to a new life that is ever new, ever fresh, ever young and ever connected.

After the monsoons and flooding we have experienced this past Lent, we look with hope to sunnier skies, drier basements and warmer weather. Might not that hope just be a glimmer of Easter? Signs of resurrection are all around us.

Looking outside on this beautiful Easter Day, it is worth concluding this Lent season and commencing this Easter Day with those famous words of the Protestant reformer, Martin Luther, who wrote, “Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time.”

Let us pray:

Almighty God, on this Day of Resurrection, you give us more hope than we can handle. We thank you for the promise of truth, the joy of goodness, and the gift of hope. This and more we ask through Jesus Christ our risen Lord. Amen.