Pentecost XX - Myra Anderson

Take my lips and speak through them. Take our minds and think with them. Take our hearts and set them on fire. Amen.
My big brother, Trey, is a lanky 6 foot 6 agronomy professor at Michigan State University. Trey often tells his students, many of whom grew up on farms, that life boils down to one simple question:

Are you a chicken, or a pig?

Because when it comes to breakfast, the most important meal of the day, the chicken is a critical contributor, but the pig is committed. He’s all in.

If Jesus had been from Arkansas, he might have used this analogy with the rich man in our gospel story. Instead, he was a bit more blunt.

When the wealthy man approaches Jesus on the road, the man seems desperate. He has wealth, he has security, he has followed all the rules – but now there’s this talk of “eternal life”. He has everything he thinks he needs in this life, so now he needs to know how to secure the next life.

The first thing we’re told Jesus does in response to the man’s question is love him. Love him.

But then, what Jesus tells him seems of no comfort. He tells a man who thinks he has it all and has done it all just right, “You lack one thing: go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.”

We’re told the man goes away “shocked…and grieving, for he had many possessions.” I find Jesus’ words troubling as well. I know I won’t be able to bring myself to give everything away. I like to think of myself as generous, who doesn’t, but am I willing to engage in the sacrificial giving that Jesus calls on the man to do? It’s a tall order.

I think the rich man’s problem in this Gospel, though, and therefore ours, is that he doesn’t listen to the second half of Jesus’ formula for receiving what he lacks: after giving it all to the poor, Jesus tells the man, “then come, follow me.” Later Jesus tells the disciples that no one can save themselves: “For mortals it is impossible, but not for God; for God all things are possible.” Jesus loved the man. What the man lacked was full acceptance of that love. What the man needed to do was shed himself of what kept him from accepting that love and following Jesus. Jesus asks the man, as he asks each of us, to give up our reliance on wealth, or status, or self, or whatever it is that keeps us from God, and instead to accept God’s divine love and live into the grace God pours freely upon us, and to live in its abundance.

Paul, in his letter to the Hebrews that we heard this morning, sums it up perfectly: “Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

No matter where we come from, or what we have, we all can approach the throne of grace with boldness. In my brother’s words, be a pig. Be all in, with whatever it is you have been given in abundance – wealth, talent, time, compassion.

I had the privilege of attending the annual Project Hope Rise & Shine breakfast last spring. Project Hope is a Boston-based program that serves poor and homeless women, providing everything from emergency shelter to job training and placement. Christ Church’s own Circle of Hope is an important partner in Project Hope’s mission. We provide not only clothing for women and their children in shelter, but also business clothing to the women in the job training program. The Rise & Shine breakfast celebrates these women, the Ambassadors of Project Hope, women who overcome personal setbacks and struggles to persevere on the path to economic self-sufficiency.

The keynote speaker at the breakfast was television personality and evangelical preacher Liz Walker. She spoke about the abundance of grace that we receive when we recognize that life is a gift, a gift of God’s boundless love. It is not an “achievement”. It is a gift to be celebrated and shared. And when we awaken to this grace, we return grace. And she spoke of Project Hope, a place where people give so freely of their time and their resources to help the neediest among us, as being a place where grace abounds.

This is the time of year, the season of Christian stewardship, when we give thanks for the grace we have received and think about our gifts to the church for the following year. We will soon receive a letter with a pledge card, asking us to carefully consider our gift for the coming year and to please be as generous as we can – to be our most generous selves, as Skip says, in what we give of our treasure and of our time. But if you’re like me, you’ll put that card in your bill pile, the one pile you know you have to go through at some point in the coming weeks. And you’ll sit down to pay your bills, and get either a little or a lot anxious about the ever increasing expenses of taxes, utilities, tuition, food – all of those expenses of daily life. And you’ll worry that you can’t afford to be as generous as you would like. I’m maybe not my most generous self at that moment.

Or maybe instead of with your bills, you’ll put that card with other requests from various charities for monetary gifts. You’ll look at your overall budget for charitable giving, and give the church what you consider to be a generous share. But none of these other charities are asking what the Church asks: that you give of all that you have – treasure, time, talent. So you may not be your most generous self in this setting either.

You could approach your stewardship pledge one of these ways, but I think in today’s Gospel Jesus is showing us a better way. Jesus is telling us that grace comes from being all in. The United Methodist Foundation defines Christian Stewards as “those who awaken to God’s abundant, freely given grace permeating all creation…every dimension of their lives becomes a witness of the living Christ and a channel of God’s grace poured out to all.” Being all in means being open to receiving God’s grace through giving: of our wealth, of our time, of our hearts – of all that we have, and of all that we are.

I suggest this year that we live into that grace, that we try to be all in. So try this: Keep that card near you at all times, pray with it, and wait. Wait to fill it out when you encounter one of those little moments of grace that abound at Christ Church:

• maybe after you make a delivery for Circle of Hope to a family shelter in Boston, or drop off clothing donations to Barbara Waterhouse and experience her enthusiastic gratitude; I know that’s one of mine.
• maybe after you sit in on a presentation by Emilie Hitron and the medical team returning from Haiti, or you go to Haiti yourself
• maybe after you drop your food donations downstairs for Shelter Cooking, or accompany Nancy Langford on a Monday trip into the Cathedral
• maybe after you set the altar for the next day’s service with Liz or Bea or one of the other members of the Altar Guild
• maybe after you receive the gifts of the bread and wine on Sunday morning in communion with your brothers and sisters in Christ
• maybe after you witness the joy of seeing your children learning the stories of God’s people in Children’s Chapel
• maybe after you receive words of sympathy and reassurance from Julia when you put a loved one’s name on the Parish prayer list
• maybe after you receive laying on of hands and prayer for healing at the rail on Sunday morning
• maybe after Skip or Lynn or one of our lay Eucharistic ministers brings you communion in the hospital, or the Pastoral Response Committee brings you a meal if you are homebound after surgery, or from illness or loss
• maybe after you experience the community of the Women’s Spirituality retreat, or the Men’s Cuttyhunk retreat
• maybe after hearing the choir sing a particularly moving or glorious anthem, or the children sing “Let There Be Peace on Earth” as we all did in the service a couple of weeks ago.
• Or maybe after hearing a really good sermon.

These are just a few of the moments of grace that fill our hearts every day in Christ Church, all year long. That’s when I want us to fill in that card. That’s when I want us to return that call asking for volunteers. That’s when I want us to respond to the invitation to serve in leadership positions in the Church.

And then just imagine with me the grace that will flow when we follow Jesus’ call to be all in. All in. Our money, our time, our hearts.

May this be the year we approach the throne of grace with boldness – together. May this be the year we receive God’s grace, and pass it on.

And may Christ Church always be a place where grace, amazing grace, abounds.

Amen.

Pentecost XIX - Skip Winsdor

Planting Seeds of Hope
“Why did you go into the ministry?” Over the past several decades of my ordained ministry this question has been posed to me many times. The short answer, that since I was previously a banker, I said, “I wanted to be a full service banker.” The longer answer is that my grandmother, Gertrude or “Gertie” believed in me. She planted seeds of hope in me that I could be ordained.

This morning I would like to speak with you about planting seeds of hope. Like the seeds scattered on fertile ground, our gestures of generosity, our actions on behalf of others, our willingness to listen to other people’s dreams, and our desire to help others grow in the Christian faith and life bear fruit far beyond the present into the future.

As members of Christ Church, we know that this place and this community has been fertile ground for people to be generous, for people to help enable and heal others, for people to listen to other people’s dreams and visions, for people to instruct and teach others by word and example what it means to be a follower of Christ, and for countless others to be touched by the power of the Holy Spirit by merely walking through our church doors to see the beauty of this chancel and of our beautiful stained glass cross.

At this time of year when we prayerfully consider what financial pledge to make to Christ Church for 2013, I invite us to consider pledging as planting – planting seeds of hope.

My grandmother, Gertie, held the hope for me that I could become a minister. When I had little money and held two jobs while starting seminary: one at the Harvard Coop Bookstore and the other in the kitchen of Episcopal Theological School, she paid for my seminary tuition. By her generosity, she held the hope for me that my call to ministry was a real one.

The same holds true in our church. When we make a financial commitment to Christ Church, we are holding the hope not only for ourselves but also for countless others. By believing in the Christ Church community we:

• Listen to other people’s dreams. To dreams the good dreams of God for reconciliation, tolerance and peace.
• Help and assist others, both young and old, to be the people God calls us to be. As the prophet, Micah, proclaims, “What does God require of us: To do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”
• Create a place and a space where families find teachers and mentors, who by their word and example instruct our children and youth to grow into the full stature of Christ.
• Bring the Good News of Christ to the least, the last, the last and the lonely through clothing to the Long Island Shelter, through hearty and healthy lunches with the Monday Lunch Ministry, through our commitment to the Millennium Development goals at the school in Lazile, Haiti.
• Maintain a beautiful church building as a place of prayer and worship but also as a resource to the wider community whether it be a pre-school like First Bridge, an outreach program like AA, or a meeting space for the Needham High School or a diocesan event like Episcopal City Mission.
• Serve as a home to us where we can meet for fellowship, knitting, lunches, dinners, breakfasts, or to have fun for Halloween or Christmas.
• Stand as a visible symbol to the Needham community that there is a place with a history and a tradition that anchors all who come here in the Episcopal and Anglican ethos where liturgy and music is practiced with piety and professionalism.

All this and more happens; and it only happens through our financial pledges that plants seeds of hope both for today and for tomorrow. And where do our dollars go to plant seeds of hope? Let me tell you:

Our 2012 church budget is $536,000. Our pledges are $356,000 (66%). Our endowment income where we draw no more than 5% is $67,000 (12.5%). Rentals for the church, rectory, and the library parking lot are $88,000 (16.5%). And fundraising and gifts is $25,000 (5%).

Expenses for ministry and mission for a balanced 2012 budget is $536,000. Salaries for staff (two f/t clergy, parish administrator, p/t director of music, p/t facilities manager, organist, and p/t bookkeeper) are $317,000 (59%). Our mandated diocesan assessment to the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts is $65,000 (12%). Annual maintenance, repairs, and upkeep on all church owned property is $102,000 (19%). Operations such as office, technology, and altar guild & worship plus educational program materials for education add up to $32,000 (7%). And outreach through Community Concerns, Circle of Hope, and the Millennium Goals is $18,000 (3%).

The 2012 budget represents the support of the infrastructure of Christ Church that is comprised of the church buildings, the church staff, the diocesan assessment, and the operations, programs, and outreach of the church. The importance of maintaining and sustaining the infrastructure of Christ Church is that it allows it to be a place for ministry and mission to occur:

1. Education and formation: Children’s Chapel, Church School, Youth Group, Adult Forums and Adult Bible Study.
2. Witnessing and testifying: A good example is Katie McCracken’s testimony of her recent visit to Haiti in this month’s Visitor.
3. Faith and practice: Living in a safe Christian community where mutual pastoral and healing support happens every day while allowing members to worship together every Sunday enjoying our beautiful choir and hearing and receiving both God’s holy word and receiving the Spirit of Christ through the Eucharist.

This time of year when we make decisions about our financial support of Christ Church consider all that we do throughout the rest of the year from December through September: We see in the rest of the year the outgrowth of the planting of these seeds of hope; but now during the pledging season we are invited and called to plant seeds of hope through our financial support of Christ Church.

Many good things are happening because of this growth:

• The addition of two talented choir section leaders in Mark and Chris
• Circle of Hope reached over $1 million in clothing given out – in 4 years
• The Cuttyhunk Men and Women’s Spirituality are most active in years
• Renewed partnership with St. Luc Haiti through the MDG’s
• Community Concerns making a difference to others thru grants
• Shelter Cooking (MANNA) involves over 70 volunteers
• PRM, LEM’s, Knitting Ministry, Intercessors, Healing Ministry active daily
• Wednesday Morning Bible Study the largest class ever
• Children’s Chapel, Church School and youth under Lynn and Kim
• Property Committee: Drainage, paint HND, refurbish chapel, etc.

The infrastructure, the church, is on sound footing because of our stewardship and financial commitment through pledges. Without you none of the ministries I just mentioned would occur. You have planted seeds of hope that are being harvested every day.

But more planting and more seeds are needed to sustain and enhance our church infrastructure. Here is my invitation to you as your rector:

1. Increasing operations revenues for office equipment, communications and technology
2. Building repairs, deferred maintenance, rising fuel, and unexpected property needs require more funds over time
3. Increase outreach of Christ Church from 3% to 5%
4. Prepare for rising ancillary staff expenses: as mandated by the diocese for pension and health insurance
5. Enhancing education and fellowship programs with current books, curriculum and entertainment
6. Creating a reserve fund of 5% for emergencies in next year’s budget

To do these things and to maintain the harvest of Christ Church ministries, we need to consider increasing our pledges by 10%. Such an increase of almost $35,600 to nearly $400,000 in pledges for 2013 will allow Christ Church to meet all of its fixed costs needs, increase our outreach, and allow for a needed rainy day fund to account for emergencies.

To see the outgrowth of our vibrant and vital ministries in the future, we must consider how we plant now and how much we will plant. As a bishop of the Episcopal Church once said, “Money is a spiritual issue and how much we give is a faith statement.”

My grandmother, Gertie, loved the Gospel text for today. No. She did not like the first part. What she loved was the last part especially the last verse in Mark 10:16 about being a little child coming to Jesus.

She liked it because of the comfort it gave her. You see, in her lifetime, she lost two husbands and survived all three of her children.

For years she looked for meaning about why these tragedies happened. No words, no book, helped her until she turned to this passage in the Bible. Nothing rational could explain her losses only a simple childlike faith in God helped her.

My grandmother believed that somehow those she loved but saw no longer rested in the loving arms of the Creator. “Only as a little child will I enter the kingdom of God,” she said. This was her faith. This was her hope. She held the hope for me when I first went to seminary. It is a hope I carry now because of her.

Christianity is all about hope. In the prayer book’s Catechism, it says that, “Christian hope is to live with confidence in the newness and fullness of life, and to await the coming of Christ in glory and the completion of God’s purpose in the world” (p. 861).

You and I are called to be planters of hope by supporting Christ Church both for us and for others. During this season of sowing, let us be generous, sowing seeds of hope so that all people will come to know the loving and redeeming power of God through Jesus Christ our Lord at witnessed here at Christ Church.

Let us pray:

Almighty and most gracious God, we give you thanks for our community of Christ Church. Strengthen and guide us in all things knowing that through the power of your Holy Spirit all things are possible. All this we ask in the name of your Son, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Pentecost XVI- Holly Hartman

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.

There is a man who generally can be found in Boston Common, sitting close to the exit of the Boston Common Garage.  If you park your car in this garage, then climb the stairs up to the outside, you will often hear this man singing:

“Does anybody have spare change?   Does anybody have change change change?”

I have walked by this man enough times now to know that, not only does he ask for change, but that he has an incredibly charismatic aspect which warms me, and I suspect, others, to him.  He will comment- in his singsongy voice- on each and every person that walks by him.

 

For example, the first day, as I was walking by, I heard him sing  “Does anybody have a black and white skirt?” and I realized he was referring to me!   I reflexively smiled, which elicited the next line” Does anybody have a nice smile?”.  

This made my day.  I felt noticed, recognized, and for a brief moment, valued that I was identified as someone who has a nice smile.  And perhaps...if a stranger thinks I have a nice smile, then maybe I am perceived as a warm person....which is a characteristic I value, especially in my new identity,  my role as a deacon.  Wow! 

Issues of identity are part of our human experience.  We spend a good part of our psychic energy trying to discover who we are.  And, according to noted psychologist Erik Erikson, if we don’t emerge from adolescents with a fairly solid sense of this, we experience “identity crisis” and may well spend a good part of our adult years figuring this out.   Who am I?   How am I perceived by the world?

In Mark’s Gospel this morning, Jesus raises critical questions of identity when he asks his disciples the questions  “Who do people say that I am?”, and when they answered that question, followed by “ Who do YOU say that I am?”   It was time to get everything out on the table and make sure that these disciples knew who they were dealing with.

Peter knew.  His answer, technically was correct.  “You are the Messiah.”   But, as Jesus is Jesus...nothing is that clear.   Peter might have been shocked when Jesus responded as he did “Get behind me Satan!   For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.”    Then he went on to explain that while yes, he was the Son of Man- the Messiah, He was not the type of Messiah that Peter and the others imagined.  He would rise to Glory, yes, in the end, but it was what would happen in the meantime that Jesus wanted his disciples to understand.

So he began to explain to them what lie ahead for him.   The was a Messiah, alright, but a SUFFERING Messiah.  While lie ahead for him was going to be anything but an easy ride.  And if they wanted to continue on this path of following him, there was going to be enormous heartache and sacrifice.  Jesus warned of the need for his followers to “deny themselves and take up their crosses”, and of “losing their lives in order to save them”.  It was going to be difficult, impossible for some, to be faithful followers of this kind of a messiah.  Were his disciples up to the task?  Were they prepared to lay down their lives for the sake of Jesus and his Gospel teachings? 

And what about us.   As Christians,  are we prepared to “deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow Jesus”?   Are you?   Am  I?”

In order to answer these questions, we circle back to the issue of our identity.  Because I believe that what Jesus is asking us to do, is know who we are, not in the eyes of society, but in the eyes of God.   

What is our identity in the eyes of God? 

It is no secret that in our society, what defines our identity, most often, is what we DO.  What we do in our professional lives, what our titles may be, what roles we play.  We are doctors, or lawyers, or husbands, or daughters, here at Christ Church we are choir members, or Vergers, Vestry members, or priests.   And we often relate to each other within the context of those roles that we play.   Which is natural and even necessary most times.

 

But what God is asking us to do, and what Jesus is trying to convey, is to look at who we are when all of these roles are stripped away. 

Take my Boston Common friend, for example.  Based on assumptions, I would guess that he is poor, probably homeless, maybe mentally ill.   Not too many people have the guts to put themselves out there like he does, trying to interact with every person that he encounters, and I don’t believe it is just so he can get money from them.  If you walk by him without giving him anything, he continues to sing about you! 

My Boston Common friend is an example of someone whose roles in life have been stripped away.   He probably doesn’t have a vocation, which is why he needs to ask for money.  He may not have a prominent role in a family like many men of his age do- father, grandfather, husband.   Now, in all likelihood, he may be an integral part of the community of homeless men and women that live on or near Boston Common, and he may have an important role to play in that community.

But in an outsiders eyes, in the eyes of “society”, he is someone who, for one reason or another, has been stripped of many of his roles in life.

Some who walk by him may notice his disheveled appearance, his long and uncombed hair, scruffy clothing, and be turned off by his begging, which is really what he is doing.

But others see him as a person who wants to connect with others, has a need to see others and be seen himself.

God gives each one of us the most important kind of identity- the identity of being a beloved child of God, even before we are born.  And NO one is spared this identity- it is there for the taking. 

The hard part is learning to take it, to accept it, and to grow into it.  Because if we could do this easily, we wouldn’t need psychologists like Erik Erikson to analyze identity crisis and role confusion and what happens when we don’t get what we need in life that leads to these unfortunate human conditions.   When we get so caught up in what our parents think of us, then our peers, then society at large, that we lose the essence of who we are suppose to be, who we are suppose to follow, and how we are suppose to do that,  according to our Creator.

If we, like the disciples, were asked directly by Jesus to deny ourselves and take up our crosses, to lose our lives for his sake and the sake of the gospel so that paradoxically it will be saved, what would that look like?

I believe that what is would look like would vary according to who we are.  But I also believe that there is a common thread of truth running through this very difficult challenge that would be real for all of us. 

If we took this seriously, and we should, then I believe that God is asking us to examine who we are when we stripped down to nothing- at least, nothing in the eyes of society.  Who we are when the earthly things are taken away- our homes, our material possessions, our roles in life.   Not that God wants us to be without these things, only that God wants us to put our priorities in order.  Enjoy our earthly things, but be wary of our attachment to them.

Because if we can imagine who we are without these things, then perhaps we can imagine how much we are loved by God.  I believe that that is why those of us who travel to places in the world, accompanying people who live in dire poverty for a little while, are attracted to these people.  I believe that is why I am so taken in my singing Boston Common friend.   Without the veil of worldly possessions, there can be authenticity,  a sense of knowing who we are in the eyes of God.  Beloved.  Cherished, and held in high esteem by the One who has created us.  Expected to do good in the world.  Expected that if we are willing to lose our life- loosen our attachments to our human life- for the sake of God, then we will have a life in God that is deep, true, and working towards all things good.   I pray that we will turn our hearts towards this type of life.

 

 

Pentecost XV- Skip Windsor

                                                              Be Open

                     “He sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’ ” (Mk 7:34)

This morning, as we return to Christ Church and resume our shared ministry in Christ, I would like for us to consider the idea of church as a listening place.  The Gospel reading from Mark today invites us to listen to God’s call and to listen to one another with fidelity and truth, honesty and compassion.

Phillips Brooks, the great 19^th century preacher of Trinity Church, Boston, after fifteen years as rector there, decided to make a personal gift to the parish that he loved so much. Brooks commissioned, and had made, a stained glass window for the clergy vesting room. He gave it the name Ephphatha, which means, “Be open.” The window portrays Jesus healing of “The man who was deaf and had an impediment in his speech.” Of all the many healing stories and of all the mighty acts of Jesus, Brooks chose this event for his window at Trinity. It was to be a window for all succeeding generations of preachers. Of this window, Brooks wrote to a friend, who admired it,

“I am glad you like the little window in the robing room because it is my very own thought entirely and one I took the deepest interest. The makers did their work just as I wanted them to, and the result has already given me great satisfaction and inspiration. I hope that it will help a long line of future preachers at Trinity to speak with free and wise tongues.” (Phillips Brooks, by Alexander V. G. Allen, p. 420)

Ephphatha. This word of Jesus written in the Phillips Brooks Window at Trinity must have symbolized to Phillips something special about the personality, the humanity and the divinity of Jesus. And, it is from today’s gospel reading from Mark that provides an important clue for us to understand the mystery and the majesty of the incarnate God,  Jesus Christ.
 
The region of the Decapolis lies on the southeast coast of Galilee; and as Jesus entered the town of Sidon his reputation as a healer preceded him. People heard about demons being cast down, lepers cleansed, and about a paralyzed man being healed and forgiven with the words, “Take up your mat and walk home.” For many people these miracles of Jesus were sensational events front-page National Inquirer material such as we might see at the Sudbury Farms checkout counter:

 --- “90 year old mother expecting her 23^rd child.”

--- “Kansas couple home again after spending a year in a UFO.”

--- “Carpenter from Nazareth spits, says magic word and heals man born deaf and speechless” (more inside on page 6.)

Jesus may have been front-page material for the people of Sidon but he did not want such notoriety because he knew his healing actions were widely misunderstood. He performed miracles but he was no miracle worker. He did magical things but he was no magician. None of this was to call attention to himself. It was all about God. All of his actions were to proclaim the Good News of God that would evoke in peoples’ tired and lonely lives hope, inspiration and joy.

Jesus was the bearer of a hope beyond the boundaries of their imagination. It was no wonder that he took the deaf and speechless man aside. All prophetic ministries begin in the pastoral. All healing comes from a deep well of compassion. All encounters with the living God begin with a one-on-one relationship.

Imagine then how much care and concern for others filled Jesus. He embodied divine love. The prophets foretold of his coming. The prophet Isaiah prophesied that One would come and would bind up the wounds of many:

“He will come and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongues of the speechless sing for joy.”

Jesus didn’t seek the power, the glamour nor the lure of the world in order to influence it. Rather, the force unleashed by Jesus to the sightless, the deaf, the speechless, the lame and the marginalized was the healing power of God’s love. It was a love of profound depth, of such unchartered width and so immeasurably great that the thickets of discord and the thorns of affliction would be completely cut down forever.

This was never more intimately and compassionately realized than in today’s gospel lesson. Like so many things, it all begins with a one-on-one relationship.

 Jesus did not let sensationalism stop him from healing. Instead he took the disabled man to a quiet place. In that place, Jesus’ physical actions matched exactly the needs of the man as he put his fingers in the man’s ears. Touching the man with his own saliva, Jesus utters the word, Ephphatha that is “Be open.”

In that moment of encounter transcending time and space, miracle and magic, Jesus says a word of prayer, not as a command but as a sigh. Captured in this intimate moment between Jesus and the man is the revelation of the true identity and reality of Jesus as both fully divine and fully human.

This is the sigh of a loving and protecting Creator who groans with us in our travails and hardships with unwavering love and loyalty knowing and assisting us towards wholeness and holiness. It is the sigh of a Nazarene who lived in this world being raised in a loving family, educated as a pious Jew, grew in wisdom and stature as a rabbi, and inspired a motley group of men and women to become his disciples. Jesus’ sigh reveals not only the man but also God who became flesh and experienced both the joys and tragedies of human life.

Sensing these mountainous burdens among God’s people, Jesus emits the same sighs of frustration, despair, and despondency as they felt. Feelings we share today. Jesus’ sigh is offered on our behalf and on behalf of the world.  It is offered to all people who feel muzzled, imprisoned, silenced, and pronounced as unimportant and insignificant.

You and I are called through our baptisms into a shared ministry with Christ to “hear one another into speech.” It is a ministry in which we extend ourselves to one another – friend, foe and neighbor – with honesty and integrity remaining in community with another despite our differences and persuasions.

Ephphatha. Be open. It is the word of prayer spoken in Jesus’ own idiom, undefiled down through the centuries, calling us as healers in his name to be open as a church to all people. We are not only to be a speaking place but a listening place hearing others into speech, hearing others into wholeness.

The world right now needs more listening places. Places where people can come and begin to learn their own words for themselves, speaking up for themselves, gaining self respect and dignity and beginning the healing and transforming process to holiness and wholeness.

The Church, the people of God, is the listening place where the silent, the speechless, and the maimed come to be opened and to be healed. In our world today there is a blistering sound of audible cries of people who need to be heeded and heard. The infant voices of freedom in Russia and Iran need to be heard. The muffled sounds of the abandoned in Haiti and Bolivia need to be heard. The belches and cries of the hungry in Boston and in the bleached out prairies of the Midwest need to be heard. The voices of lonely immigrants living on the margins of society need to be heard. The silent among us need to be heard.

As long as you and I remember whom we serve and who listens to us with loving care, we will be empowered to listen to others empowering them into speech and into action. As long as we recall Jesus’ word to the deaf and speechless man, Ephphatha, be open, our souls will be set free, the lonely will be befriended and the needy with find comfort, hope and healing.

It is no wonder that Phillips Brooks wanted this Gospel story and this word emblazoned on his window at Trinity Church. Ephphatha. It is a word to be cherished by all preachers. It is a word to be cherished by us all.

And now to God who is able to do more than we ask or think may all honor and glory be given in the Name of Jesus Christ throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

 

 

 

           

 

 

 

           

Pentecost XIII - Holly Hartman

“May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.” Amen.

As we near the end of the summer, in this last week of August, we also come to the end of Chapter Six in John.

For me, as I suspect for many of you, the end of the summer is a mixed bag. I have been spending a lot of time in Maine this month, where I particularly am aware of the nip in the air, especially in the evenings, and waning daylight hours. Even some of the leaves are starting to turn color! This summer, especially, I want to hold onto each lovely, lazy warm day and resist the change that fall brings- kids moving back to college, leaving a hollow feeling in the house, and also the increase in my own level of activity and responsibility. I’m resisting getting out of my false comfort zone that this month has brought and coping with the ever changing circumstances and challenges of life.

There was a great deal of resistance to change in this Chapter in John, too. Resistance of Jesus’ followers to change their way of thinking in order to believe what he was saying. I can’t blame them. Jesus was saying some pretty controversial things, with his talk of eating flesh and drinking blood, his talk of living forever. Talk that was so outrageous that many of Jesus’ disciples quit on him after that. “This is just too hard; we can’t accept it anymore.” They turned and left.

I think we can all relate to these disciples. In some ways, we are programmed, for survival’s sake, to resist change. In a very biological way, our bodies crave to maintain “homeostasis”- a condition of stability and constancy. Challenges, as the ones that Jesus were presenting, often ignite the body’s fight or flight response. Instead of continuing to stay and “fight”, or grapple with the meaning of the words of Jesus, and the change in thinking that he was demanding, most of his followers threw their hands up and said “enough”.

But twelve of them remained. Twelve of them chose to stay, be uncomfortable, and trust that this Jesus was offering something that they could not turn away from. And when Jesus questioned them, asking “Do YOU, also wish to go away?”, Simon Peter spoke for all twelve. “Lord, to whom can we go?” It was a statement of faith, followed by his assertion that indeed, he and other others- “they had “come to believe” that this man was “the Holy One of God.”

The ones who left had not fully “come to believe”. Maybe they believed halfway....they followed the teachings of Jesus as much as they could....but they just couldn’t take that last leap of faith to believe the Jesus was who he said he was. They resisted change.

How difficult it is to step out of old habits and thinking and “come to believe.” If you are familiar with 12 step programs, you will know that, in fact, there is a whole step devoted to this. It’s Step Two. Before you can overcome whatever addiction or situation is afflicting you, you must “Come to Believe” in that it is only a power greater than yourself who can help you. You must change your way of thinking, and give up your old ideas of self-control and powerfulness. The very expression “come to believe” indicates a process- a movement from one place- the place of non-belief, to another place- that place of knowing with your whole being that something that is true. In the case of the 12 steps, as in the case of the 12 disciples, “coming to believe” is a spiritual journey, one that may involve resistance, wavering, hard questioning, and then finally....acceptance that this “Higher Power”, or something bigger than just our own human selves, the can “restore us”. For the 12, acceptance that Jesus truly is the son of God and that it is through him that they will receive eternal life.

So John, Chapter Six, concludes on a high note. It concludes with assertion in a belief that it truly is Jesus who comes from the Father, who can give us eternal life. And here, “Eternal Life” doesn’t just mean life after death in a place like heaven-it means living a very high quality of spiritual life on earth. That, no matter what our circumstances are, God will provide what we need. As Christians on a spiritual journey, we too are constantly being challenged in our every day lives. Life itself throws us so many curve balls. Just when we think we have something all figured out, or settled- something else comes along to upset the apple cart! Like my false sense of escape from life in Maine, we sometimes hide our heads in the sand when life’s changes become too overwhelming to cope with. And this is all normal human behavior. But in John, Jesus shows us that by coming to believe in him, and through him in God, we are never left alone to deal with the changes and challenges in our lives. We need only to try, over and over, to turn to the source of strength and power who will guide us along our way. I would like to close my reflections this morning with one of my favorite poems, from Irish poet and philosopher John O’Donohue, from his book entiteld “To Bless the Space Between Us.” This poem is called “For a New Beginning.”

For a New Beginning

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life's desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

Pentecost IX - Lynn Campbell

In the name of the one God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Have you ever read a story, one that you have read many times before, and have a character pop out at you as if that person had never been there before? You wonder how you never noticed the significance of the person’s actions in all the many times you read the same words? Well, that is what happened to me when I read the Gospel for today. A character I barely noticed before jumped off the page and demanded my attention.

“There is a boy here”, Andrew told Jesus, “who has five barley loaves and two fish. But what are they among so many people?” Imagine this young boy. Thousands of people gathered on the grass along the side of the Sea of Galilee. Thousands of people who are far from home, who have been draw together by this man who brought healing to the sick. They come without food and without money. Seeing the people, Jesus asked Philip, “Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?” Philip, being ever practical, looked around and calculated in his head that not even 6 months wages would be enough to give each person a taste of bread. No, not possible to feed this group. Andrew also looked around, assessed the need in relation to the resources he has found among those gathered and came to the same conclusion. No, not possible to feed this group. The need is too great. Yet we have this young boy, quickly passed over by the disciples, not even named in this story, this young boy offers the little he has brought with him. In the face of huge need he offers what he has. 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish. How have I not noticed this boy before?

He has changed the way I view this miracle story. The number of people in need doesn’t daunt him With a hopeful heart (and maybe a healthy amount of naïveté), he simply offers to the community what he has. And in Jesus’ hands, his small offering, becomes enough to feed more than five thousand people. This simple meal becomes a feast.

It seems to me that the miracle isn’t just that two thousand years ago Jesus multiplied the bread and fish, it is also the actions of this boy. That makes this story also about a miracle that can continue to happen today.

What if he had kept this food to himself? What if he was overwhelmed by the great need around him and didn’t think to offer his gift? What if he kept his food to himself, fearing if he gave it up he would be left with no food for his journey. But he didn’t allow fear or insecurity get in the way, rather he opened the possibility for miracles to happen.

When I’m faced with great need, I know my temptation is to think that my small gift can’t make a difference. I wonder if that ever happens to you? Sometimes I think we are tempted to say that the gifts God has given us aren’t enough. We hold back because we think what we have to offer won’t make a difference, or it isn’t perfect enough yet, or we are scared there won’t be enough left for ourselves. Holding back doesn’t serve anyone. Holding back doesn’t give Jesus the opportunity to work in and through us. We see this morning that amazing and astounding things can happen when we place what we have into the hands of Jesus.

We don’t have to look far to see this truth in our own lives. I was reminded of it this past Thursday when I attended the worship service at the Crossing. The crossing is a church community housed at the Cathedral that truly welcomes everyone. It is filled with people who spend their lives on the margins of society. These women and men, many who thought there was no place for them in church, many who had given up on God, found a community in which they can be fed at the altar and be sent out as agent of God’s love in the world. This all started 7 years ago when the Rev. Stephanie Speller, their lead organizer had an idea of a different way of being church. She gathered some young adults together to imagine what this could look like. They never could have dreamed of the successful ministry that now exists. What if Stephanie or those she gathered looked at the spiritual hunger around them and decided it was just too great? If they had looked into their hands and said, we don’t have enough or let’s wait until we have our plan perfected, hundreds of people would not have been touched by the loved of God and this life-giving and life-changing community would not have been born. By placing what they did have in the hands of Jesus and in service of the community, their gifts multiplied, people were fed, and Christ Jesus was made known.

Or we can think about Circle of Hope, an organization that now serves hundreds of homeless and poor people in Boston. This organization that has helped so many people started with a few donations in the garage of a Christ Church parishioner. Imagine if she or the leaders who followed her looked at the number of people in need and did nothing.

These are just two examples but I bet if we pulled this group together we would have as many examples as there are people in this chapel. We can trust the words written by Paul in his letter to the Ephesians, “now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly more than we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generation, forever and ever.”

The invitation in today’s Gospel reading is to be like the boy who gives what he has in order that all can be fed. No matter how insignificant it might seem to us we can trust that in the hands of Jesus, great miracles can happen, much more than we can ask or imagine. Great abundance is possible.

Amen.

Pentecost VI - Charles Dale

From the Gospel according to Mark: “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us? And they took offense at him.”

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Do you ever hear a song that you can’t get out of your head? For me, the last time was a few years ago and the song was “One of Us” by Joan Osborne. Do you remember it?

What if God was one of us? Just a slob like one of us?
Just a stranger on the bus trying to make his way home.

This song is full of questions - questions that, if you think about them seriously, do not have easy answers.

If God had a name, what would it be?
And would you call it to His face if you were faced with Him in all His glory?
What would you ask if you had just one question?

Well, this first question is interesting in a couple of ways. The Bible makes a pretty big deal out of the name of God. In Exodus, chapter 3, we read:

But Moses said to God, "If I come to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?" God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM." He said further, "Thus you shall say to the Israelites, 'I AM has sent me to you.'" God also said to Moses, "Thus you shall say to the Israelites, 'The LORD, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you': This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.

In Hebrew, the name of God is written with four letters, יהוה (yodh he waw he). This is referred to as the tetragrammaton, and is pronounced in English as “Yahweh” or “Jehovah”. I know people who never write this out, even in English. They write G-d instead. This is to avoid all possibility of using the name of God in vain. As you may know, my wife is Jewish, and I’ve been to quite a few Jewish services over the course of our 31+ years together. Something that strikes me about many of the Jewish prayers is that they begin with the words, “Baruch atah Adonai elohaynu melech ha'olam...”, which means “Blessed are you O Lord our God, King of the Universe...” Two things about this are worth noting - there’s no mention of Yahweh, even though we translate it as “Lord our God”. The word “Adonai” is literally “Lord” and the rest is understood. And even “Adonai” is not written out. It is abbreviated as יי (yodh yodh). As it has been explained to me, the Jewish faith holds God as the unapproachable, omnipotent, omniscient Creator of Everything, whose name is so holy that humans dare not even speak it.

Compare that, for a moment, with the name that Jesus taught us to use - “Abba”, which is often translated as “Father”. But it’s even more personal than that. If you grow up speaking Hebrew as Jesus did, the first words you learn are most likely “imah” and “abba”, so perhaps we could get a better sense of them as “mommy” and “daddy”, terms of endearment from a young child to his or her loving parents.

Wow. Talk about contrasts. So, which is it? The unutterable, unknowable Immensity? Or the loving Papa? I think it’s both. As Christians, we grow up saying the Lord’s Prayer - “Our Father, who art in Heaven...”, but I think we would also do well to hold on to a bit of “Baruch atah Adonai elohaynu melech ha’olam...”.

I think Joan Osborne gets at this by inviting us to consider how we would address God if (and here it should really be “when”) we come face to face with Him in all His glory. It makes me shudder just to think about it.

And, what would you ask if you had just one question?

One question? Really? I have too many to count. Think for a moment. What would you ask? Why are we here? What happened before the beginning of the universe? Why is there so much suffering in the world? Why do we have to die? What is the meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything? Are we the only intelligent beings in all of Creation? Why is the mass of the Higgs boson 125.3 GeV? But I digress... Philosophy, Science and Religion have all tried to answer these and countless other questions throughout human history. Just one question? I wouldn’t know where to begin. The good news, I suppose, is that I am certain that when we come face to face with God, we will have all the answers we could ever hope for. Perhaps this earthly life is, in part, our opportunity to learn the questions.

If God had a face what would it look like?
And would you want to see if seeing meant that you would have to believe
in things like heaven and in Jesus and the saints and all the prophets?

Again, we read in Exodus, chapter 33:

Moses said, "I pray thee, show me thy glory." And [God] said, "I will make all my goodness pass before you, and will proclaim before you my name 'The LORD'… But," he said, "you cannot see my face; for man shall not see me and live." And the LORD said, "Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand upon the rock; and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by; then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen."

I’m pretty sure that Joan wasn’t reading Exodus when she wrote this song, or else it would have read, “And would you want to see if seeing meant that you would die?” Yikes! I’m guessing her song would not have been nearly as popular...

But when God entered the world, everything changed. God showed us His face – the face of Mary’s son, the face of a carpenter, the face of a slob like one of us. And what of the people who saw Jesus face to face? In a way, they did die. Their old lives were ended and they were reborn! Jesus was not someone you could go visit once a week for a nice chat. He said, “Follow me”, and they dropped everything – EVERYTHING – and followed him.

The people in today’s Gospel reading who took offense weren’t stupid and they weren’t evil. They simply couldn’t fathom how this guy could possibly be the King of the Universe. In fairness, it wasn’t until after the Resurrection that most of Jesus’ closest friends and followers came to fully realize who and what He was. God – the creator and ruler of all time and space – became a human being – one of us. “What if God was one of us?” God is one of us! Alleluia!

So come to the table! Come with love for Abba, the Father. Come with awe for Adonai, the Lord and King of all creation. Come with thanksgiving for Jesus, who became one of us so that we all might be saved. Meet Him face to face in all His glory and be changed forever.

Amen.