Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep
July 2010
Luke 11:2-4
I learned to pray at a very young age.
I remember my sister and I laying feet to feet in the twin bed,
And praying with my mom…
“Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.
God Bless…
Momma
Dad
Kari
Gramma and Granpa Miller
Gramma and Granpa Lee…
Even as I got a little older, and my mom stopped tucking us in at nights, I would still pray this prayer. At one point, I was terrified of dead bodies under my bed, so the prayer calmed me. If something was indeed under the bed, and killed me, at least I had covered my bases with God about my soul. It was a good prayer.
My grandmother prayed, too, every night. When we spent the night with her, after she would settle us on the pullout couch, she would go to her bedroom right off the living room, and leave the door cracked. In her nightgown, she would get on her knees and fold her hands and pray the Lord’s Prayer. She didn’t go to church much, but she did pray.
Prayer. Do you pray? What is prayer, anyway?
Do you go to sleep every night after you say your prayers, like I did as a child? Or first thing in the morning? I met someone once who confessed that he said the Lord’s Prayer every day in the shower. It was the time he would remember to pray? Maybe you are one of those people who just manage the days with “Please help me” and “Thank You”.
Excellent prayers.
How do you pray? The disciples were very curious about Jesus’ way of praying. They knew that Jesus, their teacher had a completely different way of knowing G-D than they had been brought up in their synagogue. They noticed that Jesus had this habit of praying—wherever, and whenever
They can’t stand it any more. Teach us to how to pray, Rabbi…teach us. And so, Jesus, tells them how—by giving them words that have become known to us as “The Lord’s Prayer.” Luke’s version is the shortest, but you get the gist.
Now. I learned the Lord’s Prayer, just like many of you, in my childhood, by saying it in church every Sunday. But as I got closer to God, as an adolescent, I didn’t find any meaning in those words—as a prayer, anyway.
I wanted to TALK to God. I had a lot to say.
So, I started to journal my prayers, and I would spill my heart out.
Pages of thoughts, of wonderings, of asking for forgiveness, and to be led into the journey that was God’s will for me. I fell out of habit of praying the Lord’s prayer, as I forged my way through college, and doing youth ministry.
I taught the young people I worked with about prayer—prayer was from the heart, it was talking to God, it was about being in relationship with God. Prayers are not something one recites.
I ignored the Lord’s prayer for years, for the most part.
Imagine my chagrin then, in my first call, where, like here at Eliot, the congregation prayed the Lord’s Prayer at the end of the prayers of the people.
I told my colleague—I can do this, but I can’t call God exclusively father. Nope. I am going to pray, Our Mother and Father in heaven, or pray, Our God in Heaven. I also was NOT going to say “kingdom” either. It was patriarchal, and defined a world where power was hierarchical. Nope, I believed in the KIN-dom of God, where all participate in equal and loving relationships. To his credit, my colleague was fine with that.
Mr. Ken, who was 95 years old, and gave his life to missionary work overseas, was not. This really troubled him. He called my colleague to complain, who told him to talk to me. He did. I listened, and as a fresh out of seminary feminist know it all pastor, I just said, “I respect that you think that Jesus wanted us to call God literally Father, but to me, God is not a Father…and for people who have had abusive relationships with their fathers, or have been oppressed by patriarchy, the word is meaningless. I think it is important to have descriptive language for God, and especially in the Lord’s Prayer, we ought to widen the options.” I suspect, also, that I was a bit smug in my response.
Then, 9.11 happened. In all of its horror and tragedy.
Do you remember, though, the story of Lisa Jefferson, who was a Verizon supervisor, who took a call from one of the passengers on US Airways Flight 93—the one where the passegers tried to take over the plane? The passenger’s name was Todd Beamer. They spoke for a little bit, and then they prayed together—they prayed together The Lord’s Prayer, and Psalm 23.
And everything changed for me.
You see, the Lord’s Prayer meant something to two strangers, that could miraculously say it together, as a source of comfort and strength, before the passengers revolted….
Mrs. Jefferson and Mr. Beamer, recited those words….
Our Father…
Who art in heaven…
Because, for both of them, it was a legacy, something they had learned in church, or from their parents, and in a time of great need, they had words…words imprinted on their minds and hearts
That came to them
In a time of unusual and terrifying need.
And then I got it. Sometimes, we just need words…to mumble…because we might not have words otherwise…or ways to connect with the saving love of God.
I don’t know if Jesus meant that we should only pray the Lord’s prayer…
And I really don’t think he cared if we used the exact words the biblical writers used…
But the prayer embodies so much about the spiritual journey, the closeness to God that Jesus emphasized in his teachings.
What is the point of prayer, then? What good is it?
Jesus says, Ask, and it shall be given. Seek and you will find. Knock, and the door shall be opened to you.
And we pray…for ourselves, for others. But rarely, if you have noticed, are people cured. We all lament at Angela’s cancer, and her heroic battle with it. But she hasn’t of yet, been cured. Prayer doesn’t cure mental illness, or even a common cold. (Sarah Miles, Jesus Freak) We ask questions, like, “why did I get cancer?” “why did God do this to me?” He is such a great person, why did this happen? Doesn’t God hear our prayers? Why doesn’t God answer them?
Sara Miles, author and director of The Food Pantry and Ministry at St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church in San Francisco, argues that prayer is not about a “cure”, but about healing. She writes:
Prayer can’t cure. All prayer can do is heal, because healing comes embedded in relationship, and prayer is one of the deepest forms of relationship—with God and with other people. And through relationship, there can be healing in the absence of cure.
This is the work that Jesus gives his followers. It isn’t about turning ordinary humans into miracle workers who say magic words over a sufferer and restore the sick to perfect health. The power and the responsibility Jesus gives all of us are more frightening. We are, he says, to know the truth, and from that ground enter into new relationships of healing….
And real healing, means, more than anything, follow in the truth: and thus a call to change and conversion.” (ibid)
Miles reminds us that Jesus always asks the desperate people, “Do you want to be well”…because healing can hurt. It sometimes means separation from your old identity into something new—do you want to be well more than you want to stay the same?”
These are hard questions…
And thus we pray…
By asking, seeking, and knocking….
Not for cures and fixes,
But for healing.
Not for fixing…
But asking God, your Abba, your Amma, the one who knows you inside out,
To change you,
To become closer to who you are created to be.
So really, the Lord’s prayer….and even my childhood prayer, are dangerous, aren’t they?
They shouldn’t be treated flippantly, or something that we just say because that’s what we do.
They are real…
They draw us into relationship,
Into seeing Jesus in each other, and in ourselves, especially when it is the most inconvenient or hard.
Does prayer work? Is there a point?
Only if we are serious….
And ready…
For miracles of healing that will surprise and scare and lead us,
At the same time.
If you dare,
I invite you to pray slowly with me now, in your hearts, as I pray the Lord’s Prayer….
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those who sin against us.
Save us from the time of trial
and deliver us from evil.
[For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours
now and for ever.] Amen.
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Living Clay
Living Clay
Jeremiah 14: 1-11
September 5, 2010
In the fall of 2005,
I was in a transition—transitioning my ordination status from PCUSA to UCC, and working half-time at a new church start that paid me for ¼ time. I didn’t know where life would lead, but I really loved what I was doing with the congregation. So, I had to find another source of income.
So, I went back to school!
The first question I asked myself was what could I do that would be flexible, enjoyable, and I could be good at?
I thought to myself, “I enjoy being with people, and counseling. That would be a very practical professional degree.”
However, I kept thinking,
“hmmm, but I also love being in a pottery studio…”
Although I had only dabbled in working with clay, the times that I did, I became lost and content in it.
So, I enrolled in a degree program in to become a professional potter, learning the trade of production pottery. (Which I might add was the least practical of the two choices—for a myriad of reasons).
It wasn’t easy.
The first semester was challenging—and the sixty page syllabus was daunting. I was to learn all the properties of clay, the physics and calculations of glaze recipes, plus make 60 cylinders, 52 mugs with pulled handles, in matching sets of 4, 20 lidded forms (as in casseroles), o thirty bowls—with different pounds of clay from 1-5, where some would nest, as in mixing bowls, and twenty plates….all on a potter’s wheel.
Mind you, at that point, I wasn’t even very good at centering, which is taking the ball of clay, and holding it on the wheel, with pressure that would show the lump completely balanced in its distribution. If the beginning lump is not balanced, it is very difficult to open and begin pulling up walls that are even and strong. Suffice it to say, I had to try many times over to produce my quota of pots. As overwhelming as this was, it was also entrancing and exhilarating.
As the wheel spun and I churned out pots, I learned about the nature of clay.
Clay is a living substance. It isn’t a passive lump of wet dirt. Throwing involves respect, it involves a certain posture on the part of the potter, to be balanced within and sitting in the correct balanced position, as well as getting used to the nature of each clay body, whether it is high fire stoneware (lots of functional pottery is made from this, as it lasts long and is strong), low fire terra cotta (think garden pots and tiles) and the holy grail of Porcelain. Porcelain, although the strongest of clay (there is a reason your toilet is made from porcelain), can be worked almost paper thin—but it is difficult to manage. A completely skilled potter may feel like a beginner when working with porcelain.
Making pottery, whether functional or decorative, is a co-creative process between the potter and the clay. Even when you get to know the clay body inside and out, when you can throw a bowl or plate in your sleep, in each instance of creation, something new emerges; a certain nuance comes up, around the shape, the clay, and even yourself. There is nothing boring in throwing a million mugs, either. Each time a potter sits down with a lump of clay, she never really knows how it will unfold into being exactly, in spite of her intention.
So, this metaphor of God being a potter in Jeremiah makes complete sense to me.
You see, the passage is all about change, and choice, and being alive.
Listen to verse 6 again.
6Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the LORD. Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.
This verse is gorgeous, isn’t it? God is trying to help Israel, God’s chosen people, to understand that they are not finished. They are like clay in the hand of the potter, yet to be realized into being, yet to be fully created with the intentions that God has for them. They are yet to become. However, there is a hint, in the following verses, that the clay is not passive in the hands of the potter, and neither is Israel passive in the hands of God.
7At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, 8but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it. 9And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, 10but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it.
On first take, we might think these words frame God as a capricious deity. They describe a Divine one that will destroy if a people do not listen to God. I don’t think this is the message. In fact, I think the prophecy is, as most prophecy is, about the nature of the hearers of the prophecy, rather than only about the divine nature of God. The message here is that God’s intentions for a people can change according to how a people will respond to the intentions of God.
Will Israel respond to the purpose that God intends for them—to truly be the chosen people of God, that will trust God, and keep the covenant? Will Israel choose, rather, to ignore that intention, and turn from God, and to other gods or cultures surrounding them?
Isn’t it beautiful to think that God is free to respond to human decision, and has the capability of changing the divine mind, instead of making a decree and holding it so. Human decisions matter to God. There is a relationship here, God is saying. You are clay, you are living clay, and you can respond to my shaping, or not. I can choose to throw you away—but I won’t. I will simply reshape you, as the potter does in the potter’s house. Note—the potter in this passage doesn’t discard the clay, never to be used again. No. The potter responds to the clay, is ever present.
In other words, God responds to us. God’s good intention for us is life, and wholeness. If we choose something other, God will respond—perhaps re-shaping us into different beings.
This passage has so much to say to us, today, as a smaller congregation in the 21st century—as well as for each of us personally.
As a congregation faced with budget issues, growth issues, we might get scared a little bit. The future might seem a little uncertain as we move into the processes of ensuring the vitality of Eliot in the future. What we give, plus revenue from building rentals and the endowment, do not cover our costs. This is a reality. However, this is another reality—God has not stopped calling us to be the good news in this neighborhood. We are called to touch a need in the community, and not simply be Eliot, for ourselves, as we always have been. Because we aren’t, we are different, and the world in which we are a church is different—even from 20 years ago.
I heard an interesting analogy this week—the difference being a bib church or an apron church. A bib church says “feed me”. An apron church is one that serves others. Which do we want to be?
Our decision matters to God. This is why it is important for us to commit to the difficult and arduous task of truly thinking through what Eliot’s direction, as God’s community, is to go. Did you know that 88% of congregations are bib congregations?
But it is hard—it is hard to be an apron church. We are Christians in a post-Christian culture. Most people don’t go to church. We live in a time where specificity about belief in God is not important—what people are looking for are to be fed, to find hope, to find a trusting community, and to make a difference in the world—in spite of being busier than ever. More so, many people are suspect of Christianity, if they know anything about it. And sometimes, Christians have an insider language that is difficult for a newcomer to interpret—especially when that newcomer really has never participated in a congregation before.
An apron church is ready for change, for growth, for commitment to the gospel and need in the community in which it lives, and beyond. An apron church calls forth relationships that are real and deep and vulnerable. An apron church has a purpose and a love, especially for those who have been disenfranchised and forgotten.
How we move into ensuring that our beloved community is vital in the future will require hard work, and discernment. Discernment requires listening to our hearts, and to the good news of the gospel. The decisions we make will matter to God. God’s intention for us is life--to fully be who we are called to be—a church that serves widely—nurturing ourselves and serving the world. We are indeed living clay. Are we willing to be re-shaped by God to live into God’s intentions? Because whatever our future is, it will require reshaping. This we know is true.
Similarly, this is true for each of us, in our relationships to the Divine. We may not believe as our parents did, or as we ourselves did long ago. We might have questions, doubts, even fears. We change. We grow. We take two steps forward, and one step back.
But God’s intent is for each of us to be a vessel, balanced and open to being the Light of the world. It’s scary—because our decision to live into God’s intentions for us makes us vulnerable. It requires giving over, being willing to be shaped into what God sees us…with all of who we are. Like clay, we are alive. We are in relationship with the potter….as the potter shapes us, we can speak to the potter, to become a beautiful, functional, gorgeous vessel of the divine.
What about it?
Shall we be living clay together?
Amen.
Jeremiah 14: 1-11
September 5, 2010
In the fall of 2005,
I was in a transition—transitioning my ordination status from PCUSA to UCC, and working half-time at a new church start that paid me for ¼ time. I didn’t know where life would lead, but I really loved what I was doing with the congregation. So, I had to find another source of income.
So, I went back to school!
The first question I asked myself was what could I do that would be flexible, enjoyable, and I could be good at?
I thought to myself, “I enjoy being with people, and counseling. That would be a very practical professional degree.”
However, I kept thinking,
“hmmm, but I also love being in a pottery studio…”
Although I had only dabbled in working with clay, the times that I did, I became lost and content in it.
So, I enrolled in a degree program in to become a professional potter, learning the trade of production pottery. (Which I might add was the least practical of the two choices—for a myriad of reasons).
It wasn’t easy.
The first semester was challenging—and the sixty page syllabus was daunting. I was to learn all the properties of clay, the physics and calculations of glaze recipes, plus make 60 cylinders, 52 mugs with pulled handles, in matching sets of 4, 20 lidded forms (as in casseroles), o thirty bowls—with different pounds of clay from 1-5, where some would nest, as in mixing bowls, and twenty plates….all on a potter’s wheel.
Mind you, at that point, I wasn’t even very good at centering, which is taking the ball of clay, and holding it on the wheel, with pressure that would show the lump completely balanced in its distribution. If the beginning lump is not balanced, it is very difficult to open and begin pulling up walls that are even and strong. Suffice it to say, I had to try many times over to produce my quota of pots. As overwhelming as this was, it was also entrancing and exhilarating.
As the wheel spun and I churned out pots, I learned about the nature of clay.
Clay is a living substance. It isn’t a passive lump of wet dirt. Throwing involves respect, it involves a certain posture on the part of the potter, to be balanced within and sitting in the correct balanced position, as well as getting used to the nature of each clay body, whether it is high fire stoneware (lots of functional pottery is made from this, as it lasts long and is strong), low fire terra cotta (think garden pots and tiles) and the holy grail of Porcelain. Porcelain, although the strongest of clay (there is a reason your toilet is made from porcelain), can be worked almost paper thin—but it is difficult to manage. A completely skilled potter may feel like a beginner when working with porcelain.
Making pottery, whether functional or decorative, is a co-creative process between the potter and the clay. Even when you get to know the clay body inside and out, when you can throw a bowl or plate in your sleep, in each instance of creation, something new emerges; a certain nuance comes up, around the shape, the clay, and even yourself. There is nothing boring in throwing a million mugs, either. Each time a potter sits down with a lump of clay, she never really knows how it will unfold into being exactly, in spite of her intention.
So, this metaphor of God being a potter in Jeremiah makes complete sense to me.
You see, the passage is all about change, and choice, and being alive.
Listen to verse 6 again.
6Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the LORD. Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel.
This verse is gorgeous, isn’t it? God is trying to help Israel, God’s chosen people, to understand that they are not finished. They are like clay in the hand of the potter, yet to be realized into being, yet to be fully created with the intentions that God has for them. They are yet to become. However, there is a hint, in the following verses, that the clay is not passive in the hands of the potter, and neither is Israel passive in the hands of God.
7At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, 8but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it. 9And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, 10but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it.
On first take, we might think these words frame God as a capricious deity. They describe a Divine one that will destroy if a people do not listen to God. I don’t think this is the message. In fact, I think the prophecy is, as most prophecy is, about the nature of the hearers of the prophecy, rather than only about the divine nature of God. The message here is that God’s intentions for a people can change according to how a people will respond to the intentions of God.
Will Israel respond to the purpose that God intends for them—to truly be the chosen people of God, that will trust God, and keep the covenant? Will Israel choose, rather, to ignore that intention, and turn from God, and to other gods or cultures surrounding them?
Isn’t it beautiful to think that God is free to respond to human decision, and has the capability of changing the divine mind, instead of making a decree and holding it so. Human decisions matter to God. There is a relationship here, God is saying. You are clay, you are living clay, and you can respond to my shaping, or not. I can choose to throw you away—but I won’t. I will simply reshape you, as the potter does in the potter’s house. Note—the potter in this passage doesn’t discard the clay, never to be used again. No. The potter responds to the clay, is ever present.
In other words, God responds to us. God’s good intention for us is life, and wholeness. If we choose something other, God will respond—perhaps re-shaping us into different beings.
This passage has so much to say to us, today, as a smaller congregation in the 21st century—as well as for each of us personally.
As a congregation faced with budget issues, growth issues, we might get scared a little bit. The future might seem a little uncertain as we move into the processes of ensuring the vitality of Eliot in the future. What we give, plus revenue from building rentals and the endowment, do not cover our costs. This is a reality. However, this is another reality—God has not stopped calling us to be the good news in this neighborhood. We are called to touch a need in the community, and not simply be Eliot, for ourselves, as we always have been. Because we aren’t, we are different, and the world in which we are a church is different—even from 20 years ago.
I heard an interesting analogy this week—the difference being a bib church or an apron church. A bib church says “feed me”. An apron church is one that serves others. Which do we want to be?
Our decision matters to God. This is why it is important for us to commit to the difficult and arduous task of truly thinking through what Eliot’s direction, as God’s community, is to go. Did you know that 88% of congregations are bib congregations?
But it is hard—it is hard to be an apron church. We are Christians in a post-Christian culture. Most people don’t go to church. We live in a time where specificity about belief in God is not important—what people are looking for are to be fed, to find hope, to find a trusting community, and to make a difference in the world—in spite of being busier than ever. More so, many people are suspect of Christianity, if they know anything about it. And sometimes, Christians have an insider language that is difficult for a newcomer to interpret—especially when that newcomer really has never participated in a congregation before.
An apron church is ready for change, for growth, for commitment to the gospel and need in the community in which it lives, and beyond. An apron church calls forth relationships that are real and deep and vulnerable. An apron church has a purpose and a love, especially for those who have been disenfranchised and forgotten.
How we move into ensuring that our beloved community is vital in the future will require hard work, and discernment. Discernment requires listening to our hearts, and to the good news of the gospel. The decisions we make will matter to God. God’s intention for us is life--to fully be who we are called to be—a church that serves widely—nurturing ourselves and serving the world. We are indeed living clay. Are we willing to be re-shaped by God to live into God’s intentions? Because whatever our future is, it will require reshaping. This we know is true.
Similarly, this is true for each of us, in our relationships to the Divine. We may not believe as our parents did, or as we ourselves did long ago. We might have questions, doubts, even fears. We change. We grow. We take two steps forward, and one step back.
But God’s intent is for each of us to be a vessel, balanced and open to being the Light of the world. It’s scary—because our decision to live into God’s intentions for us makes us vulnerable. It requires giving over, being willing to be shaped into what God sees us…with all of who we are. Like clay, we are alive. We are in relationship with the potter….as the potter shapes us, we can speak to the potter, to become a beautiful, functional, gorgeous vessel of the divine.
What about it?
Shall we be living clay together?
Amen.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Balance
Isaiah 58:9-14
9Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, 10if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. 11The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. 12Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
Luke 13:10-17
10Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” 13When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” 15But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” 17When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.
Balance
August 23, 2010
Eliot Church of Newton
Earlier in the summer, I did something to hurt my lower back. I am not sure what—I simply laid down for a Sunday nap, and when I woke up I could hardly move. There was excruciating pain like I have never experienced. Hobbling around the house just made me wince, and so, I made an appointment to see my doctor, first thing on Monday morning. The consult with my doctor revealed that I probably had a smooshed disc (huh?). She gave me some pain pills, and a sheet of exercises to do, and to call her if the pain didn’t subside.
The exercises actually helped, and I realized they were yoga poses. So when a former colleague of Liz’ opened a new yoga studio right here in Newton, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to sign up.
Now. Let me say this. I am not exactly built for yoga.
Suffice it to say that I am clearly the beginner in the class.
And, my teacher really likes to work on balance. You know—standing on one leg, stretching the other out “into the wall” and bending it towards you waist so you can grab your toes and stand perfectly still for what feels like hours, without falling.
The first class I cracked myself up, falling every time she said lift one leg….soon, not only was I the beginner, but quickly paving the way to becoming the class clown. I thought I might get better with more classes, but it seems that sense of balance, is well,…unbalanced. I spoke to my teacher after class…and she said that she likes to work on balance, perhaps to a fault. As a metaphor for life…it’s important to pay attention to. I have some work to do, it seems.
This concept of balance something hidden in our texts today.
It is the Sabbath. Jesus is teaching in the synagogue, and as he is speaking, out of the corner of his eye, he sees a woman. Bent over. The word translates not just “bent” or “bent over,” but a better translation would be “bent together” or “bent within." This is a woman who "is bent in on herself" (Jana Childers, http://www.csec.org/csec/sermon/childers_4816.htm). She has done nothing to cause her illness, and can do nothing to help herself, except, for perhaps, put herself in the path of Jesus(Jan Richardson, Painted Prayerbook, 8.20.2010).
Jesus is moved by this woman, and so calls her over, and heals her by laying hands on her. He lays hands on her. Immediately the synagogue leader is irritated with Jesus, chastises the crowd, saying there are six days to be cured—show up on those days. Not the Sabbath. The Sabbath has rules. It has balance.
Don’t you want to say, “whaaaaaaaat???”
This guy is so clueless!
But really, can you blame him?
Here is Jesus, a total renegade,
A guest teacher in HIS synagogue, and Jesus is NOT
FOLLOWING. THE. RULES.
I don’t think the synagogue leader was a bad person, he just was tightly bound to the letter of the rule of Sabbath.
Which gave permission for some actions, and not for others.
It would be like a guest preacher, walking into Eliot, and instead of following the order of worship, she just chucks the bulletin, and asks you,
What is it that you are needing today?
What can I give you? How about if we decide to have a Quaker meeting?
It would upset our equilibrium, don’t you think?
It’s interesting, too, that in the text, the synagogue leader doesn’t chastise Jesus the rule-breaker, he chastises the gathered community, over and over “You people know better. There are six days to be healed. Come on those days. Not on the Sabbath.”
It is clear his balance is toppled. He can’t fuss at Jesus, but he will fuss at those he leads.
But, for Jesus, there is always the moment—for whatever it brings. He is so balanced, within, and without, that he can read the world and match it with what he knows is true.
Balance.
In the zone.
Harmony.
Balance, in winemaking means the degree which all the attributes of a wine are in harmony, with none either too prominent or deficient.
Everything working together.
Balance.
You see, Jesus got that the Sabbath was essential,
a time out for God, for rest and reflection…
But that when someone walks in your vision and is completely out of balance,
Twisted inward,
In pain, in acceptance of that pain,
Then “Jesus has to challenge those present to consider what sabbath really means: that in its fullness, the laws regarding sabbath are designed not just for rest but for release from all that keeps us in bondage” (Richardson).
Rest, and freedom…for all.
So, I have been considering balance—not just physically so I can stand on one foot, but spiritually. Here is an example.
What do you do when you walk down the street, and encounter someone who is asking for money? Perhaps someone who is homeless, or injured, or whatever?
My personal rule is that I don’t give money. I don’t want to support someone’s crack habit, or addiction to alcohol—or get ripped off.
Frequently, here, at Eliot, a man comes,
Looking for a gift card to Stop and Shop, or Whole Foods,
which we keep in the office.
At a Newton Clergy Association meeting, we realized that this same person was hitting all of us up. Regularly. So, we have worked on a plan to manage people like him, so that they don’t suck up all our resources, so that when a true emergency arises, we will have the means to help. It’s not a bad plan. It has balance.
Yesterday, early in the morning, I happened to be in Davis Square in Somerville, to grab my early morning venti iced coffee, unsweetened, and light ice.
I walked by a man, obviously homeless, who asked me for help. I said no. He asked me to buy him a coffee, cuz his cup was empty. I said no. I didn’t trust him, I knew he was playing me, and I was irritated because he was challenging my rule. No money given on the street. Not healthy.
But you know, I was out of balance. I wasn’t seeing the whole picture.
There are rules. And then there is compassion, that defies all rules. Wholeness, freedom.
I stood in line for my coffee with my $5 dollar bill. I should get him a coffee. That would be my best choice, to control how my offering would be used.
But who am I to judge how someone spends a few dollars?
Certainly $3 for an iced coffee is worthy of judgement.
My equilibrium was challenged…and I knew I had to break my own rule in this instance, to listen to what I felt on the inside, meeting the need on the outside. I was working on standing on one leg in my heart.
I took my $2 in change, and went back outside, and handed it over,
Knowing that he might pocket whatever I gave him not for coffee, not for food, but for drugs or alcohol.
I handed him the change.
Because, it really it’s just a couple of bucks.
He is a human being with a story, with a life, perhaps bent in and hurting.
But I couldn’t heal him.
But I can offer a bit of relief, and compassion.
(caveat here: this doesn’t mean I will always hand over the money when someone asks….)
You see, balance is about breaking the rules when compassion and love demand something different.
Jesus calls us…
To seeing the world,
To seeing others,
Differently.
Jesus calls us…
To see ourselves differently.
We have so, so much power, with what little we have.
It is integral that we learn,
How to balance,
How to have the equilibrium with in,
To stand on one foot if we need to,
To break really well informed rules and standards and morals,
For the sake of helping another being
In the name of compassion and love and wholeness.
Balance.
Where do you need balance today?
Amen.
9Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, 10if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. 11The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. 12Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
Luke 13:10-17
10Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the sabbath. 11And just then there appeared a woman with a spirit that had crippled her for eighteen years. She was bent over and was quite unable to stand up straight. 12When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said, “Woman, you are set free from your ailment.” 13When he laid his hands on her, immediately she stood up straight and began praising God. 14But the leader of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had cured on the sabbath, kept saying to the crowd, “There are six days on which work ought to be done; come on those days and be cured, and not on the sabbath day.” 15But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger, and lead it away to give it water? 16And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen long years, be set free from this bondage on the sabbath day?” 17When he said this, all his opponents were put to shame; and the entire crowd was rejoicing at all the wonderful things that he was doing.
Balance
August 23, 2010
Eliot Church of Newton
Earlier in the summer, I did something to hurt my lower back. I am not sure what—I simply laid down for a Sunday nap, and when I woke up I could hardly move. There was excruciating pain like I have never experienced. Hobbling around the house just made me wince, and so, I made an appointment to see my doctor, first thing on Monday morning. The consult with my doctor revealed that I probably had a smooshed disc (huh?). She gave me some pain pills, and a sheet of exercises to do, and to call her if the pain didn’t subside.
The exercises actually helped, and I realized they were yoga poses. So when a former colleague of Liz’ opened a new yoga studio right here in Newton, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to sign up.
Now. Let me say this. I am not exactly built for yoga.
Suffice it to say that I am clearly the beginner in the class.
And, my teacher really likes to work on balance. You know—standing on one leg, stretching the other out “into the wall” and bending it towards you waist so you can grab your toes and stand perfectly still for what feels like hours, without falling.
The first class I cracked myself up, falling every time she said lift one leg….soon, not only was I the beginner, but quickly paving the way to becoming the class clown. I thought I might get better with more classes, but it seems that sense of balance, is well,…unbalanced. I spoke to my teacher after class…and she said that she likes to work on balance, perhaps to a fault. As a metaphor for life…it’s important to pay attention to. I have some work to do, it seems.
This concept of balance something hidden in our texts today.
It is the Sabbath. Jesus is teaching in the synagogue, and as he is speaking, out of the corner of his eye, he sees a woman. Bent over. The word translates not just “bent” or “bent over,” but a better translation would be “bent together” or “bent within." This is a woman who "is bent in on herself" (Jana Childers, http://www.csec.org/csec/sermon/childers_4816.htm). She has done nothing to cause her illness, and can do nothing to help herself, except, for perhaps, put herself in the path of Jesus(Jan Richardson, Painted Prayerbook, 8.20.2010).
Jesus is moved by this woman, and so calls her over, and heals her by laying hands on her. He lays hands on her. Immediately the synagogue leader is irritated with Jesus, chastises the crowd, saying there are six days to be cured—show up on those days. Not the Sabbath. The Sabbath has rules. It has balance.
Don’t you want to say, “whaaaaaaaat???”
This guy is so clueless!
But really, can you blame him?
Here is Jesus, a total renegade,
A guest teacher in HIS synagogue, and Jesus is NOT
FOLLOWING. THE. RULES.
I don’t think the synagogue leader was a bad person, he just was tightly bound to the letter of the rule of Sabbath.
Which gave permission for some actions, and not for others.
It would be like a guest preacher, walking into Eliot, and instead of following the order of worship, she just chucks the bulletin, and asks you,
What is it that you are needing today?
What can I give you? How about if we decide to have a Quaker meeting?
It would upset our equilibrium, don’t you think?
It’s interesting, too, that in the text, the synagogue leader doesn’t chastise Jesus the rule-breaker, he chastises the gathered community, over and over “You people know better. There are six days to be healed. Come on those days. Not on the Sabbath.”
It is clear his balance is toppled. He can’t fuss at Jesus, but he will fuss at those he leads.
But, for Jesus, there is always the moment—for whatever it brings. He is so balanced, within, and without, that he can read the world and match it with what he knows is true.
Balance.
In the zone.
Harmony.
Balance, in winemaking means the degree which all the attributes of a wine are in harmony, with none either too prominent or deficient.
Everything working together.
Balance.
You see, Jesus got that the Sabbath was essential,
a time out for God, for rest and reflection…
But that when someone walks in your vision and is completely out of balance,
Twisted inward,
In pain, in acceptance of that pain,
Then “Jesus has to challenge those present to consider what sabbath really means: that in its fullness, the laws regarding sabbath are designed not just for rest but for release from all that keeps us in bondage” (Richardson).
Rest, and freedom…for all.
So, I have been considering balance—not just physically so I can stand on one foot, but spiritually. Here is an example.
What do you do when you walk down the street, and encounter someone who is asking for money? Perhaps someone who is homeless, or injured, or whatever?
My personal rule is that I don’t give money. I don’t want to support someone’s crack habit, or addiction to alcohol—or get ripped off.
Frequently, here, at Eliot, a man comes,
Looking for a gift card to Stop and Shop, or Whole Foods,
which we keep in the office.
At a Newton Clergy Association meeting, we realized that this same person was hitting all of us up. Regularly. So, we have worked on a plan to manage people like him, so that they don’t suck up all our resources, so that when a true emergency arises, we will have the means to help. It’s not a bad plan. It has balance.
Yesterday, early in the morning, I happened to be in Davis Square in Somerville, to grab my early morning venti iced coffee, unsweetened, and light ice.
I walked by a man, obviously homeless, who asked me for help. I said no. He asked me to buy him a coffee, cuz his cup was empty. I said no. I didn’t trust him, I knew he was playing me, and I was irritated because he was challenging my rule. No money given on the street. Not healthy.
But you know, I was out of balance. I wasn’t seeing the whole picture.
There are rules. And then there is compassion, that defies all rules. Wholeness, freedom.
I stood in line for my coffee with my $5 dollar bill. I should get him a coffee. That would be my best choice, to control how my offering would be used.
But who am I to judge how someone spends a few dollars?
Certainly $3 for an iced coffee is worthy of judgement.
My equilibrium was challenged…and I knew I had to break my own rule in this instance, to listen to what I felt on the inside, meeting the need on the outside. I was working on standing on one leg in my heart.
I took my $2 in change, and went back outside, and handed it over,
Knowing that he might pocket whatever I gave him not for coffee, not for food, but for drugs or alcohol.
I handed him the change.
Because, it really it’s just a couple of bucks.
He is a human being with a story, with a life, perhaps bent in and hurting.
But I couldn’t heal him.
But I can offer a bit of relief, and compassion.
(caveat here: this doesn’t mean I will always hand over the money when someone asks….)
You see, balance is about breaking the rules when compassion and love demand something different.
Jesus calls us…
To seeing the world,
To seeing others,
Differently.
Jesus calls us…
To see ourselves differently.
We have so, so much power, with what little we have.
It is integral that we learn,
How to balance,
How to have the equilibrium with in,
To stand on one foot if we need to,
To break really well informed rules and standards and morals,
For the sake of helping another being
In the name of compassion and love and wholeness.
Balance.
Where do you need balance today?
Amen.
God-Bearer
There were two lectionary choices for today (the lectionary being a three y ear cycle of scripture readings from the OT, P, G, and E to be used in worship.) The first, the regular reading for ordinary time, and the other for, “ The Assumption of the Virgin Mary into Heaven.” I thought to myself, why go with ordinary when one can go with the Queen of Heaven? And so, our text today is the Magnificat, Mary’s response to her aunt Elizabeth when Elizabeth declares her blessed among women, and blessed be the fruit of her womb.
Luke 1:46-53
And Mary said,
'My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for God has looked with favor on the lowliness of God's servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is God's name.
God's mercy is for those who fear God
from generation to generation.
God has shown strength with God's arm;
and has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
God has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
God has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.'"
God-Bearer
Rev. Karla Miller August 18, 2010 Eliot Church of Newton
Recently, I have had a surge of protestant clergy friends tell me how much they secretly adore Mary, the Mother of God, which has piqued my interest, as well. As a child, I was always a little jealous that my Catholic friends could pray to her, but Pastor Melheim told us confirmation kids we couldn’t have ANY thing to do with saints let alone praying to tham. “Lutherans use the DIRECT hotline to God”, he would rant.
Back in the days when Christianity was still being—orthodox-ied, there were some arguments about how to deal with Mary, stemming from how they were understanding Jesus. In 431, The Coucil of Ephesus decreed that since Jesus was both fully God and fully human, Mary must be understood as “Theotokos” , meaningly literally God-birther, affirming the fullness of the incarnation of God. Some just wanted to call her Christotokos, bearer of Christ, but the Council refuted that.
Theotokos—God bearer.
Isn’t that beautiful? Giving birth to God?
But what kind of birth was it? Throughout the ages of western Christendom, Mary, the mother of God has been a model of piety, of humble submissiveness to Divine Plan, an “obedient, desexualized, merciful mother and beautiful virgin that is projected into heaven as the eternal feminine.’ The perfect woman. What we sister believers should strive for.
I don’t like this model of Mary, and I don’t think it is true to her story
Look at the story of the annunciation in Luke 1. Mary is “much perplexed” (read: troubled, seriously concerned) about the angel Gabriel’s news that she will bear a child that reign in a kingdom with no end, she asks one fairly direct question —“ how can this be, since I am a virgin”….implying, that she and her betrothed, Joseph, are not, well…you know, sexually active. (IF you buy the fact that the Greek word used here actually meant “virgin” as we know it, rather than “Young woman” which was the word in Isaiah 7:14, which this whole prophecy of Gabriel’s is from). Gabriel adroitly assures her that the power of the most HIGH (that’s God) will overshadow her and the Holy Spirit will come upon her and protect her…..which is empowering, but doesn’t answer the most question at hand. However, Mary doesn’t press the point. The assurance of God is enough. She responds “Here am I the servant of the Lord—let it be to me according to your word.”
A “model believer”, indeed. But there is more to this story, I feel certain.
But notice one thing. Does Gabriel promise divine seed to implant in her womb? No! His promises of the Holy overshadowing and protecting Mary is a “figurative way of speaking about the child’s special relation to God, and NOT implying the absence of human paternity” Might I add here that the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke were oral traditions—possibly women’s stories that circulated long before the writers redacted them into their gospels. Some scholars posit that both Luke and Matthew inherited illegitimacy traditions about Jesus’ paternity within those narratives, which have been muted and silenced in the texts we have today?
And I have the sense that Mary’s story is mystery and miracle….
And I have to say, the idea of a virgin birth, immaculate conception sanitizes her story, because the miracle has no real purpose but for the ancient church fathers to subordinate women, to deny the creative process, and to prove that Jesus was divine.
The story is dehumanized.
Which totally defeats the main point of Christianity---
The divine becoming one with us, beoming human?
I want you to notice something with me. Look at the text in Luke one. Do you notice the literal space in between the story of the annunciation, and the story of the magnificat?
This space actually occurs in the earliest manuscripts of Luke.
Before the space, the annunciation. After the space, the magnificat.
What has happened? We don’t know the story of conception. We are not privy to what happens to Mary, in `between the visit from Gabriel, and the visit to Aunt Elizabeth. What has happened?
She is 12 or 13 or 14 years old.
She has become pregnant.
Who has done this to her?
Magic?
Did she have a lover, Joseph?
Did someone do wrong to her?
We don’t know.
All we know is that she is running to her aunt, and maybe remembering, vaguely….this visit…this promise.. of overshadowing…of empowerment…of the divine….
Being pregnant out of wedlock typically would mean stoning, or death,
But clinging to that shred of divine visitation…
She is greeted with blessing from her cousin…
And…
Oh.
Maybe…
However this child was conceived…there is a sense that the birth will be blessed…
And that the mother of this child will be blessed…because…she remembers the promise of protection and Mary is empowered…
Mary decided to go for it. She decided to risk it.
This is the model believer.
Defying cultural expectations and norms.
Daring the law to punish her.
She puts it all out there.
Because the fact is….
The story is stronger---and more miraculous—
Without a virgin birth…
It’s a story against the odds,
It’s the song she sings defiantly that ….
The lowly will be raised up,
That the so called dominant powers will be brought down off their thrones,
That the hungry will be fed…that the proud and mighty will be scattered…
Mary’s song…
From the very breath in her lungs
Is one of hope against hope…
Against all the odds….
And when we hear her agonizing screams in the travailing of birth,
her panting breath and the clutching at the arms of Joseph and the crying out in undescribable pain….and sweat…
We know….
This Mary is no quiet, submissive one.
She is gritty and hopeful…
She is…as Elisabeth Shussler Fiorenza writes…
“The young pregnant woman, living in occupied territory and struggling against victimization and for survival and dignity”
It is she who offers the possibilities for a different understanding of Jesus and the divine…
And this is in part,
What Mary of Nazareth offers to us today….
In the most shadowy of times, she offers hope against hope….
And in spite of fear of death and domination and discrimination and disempowerment,
angels whisper in our ears to tell us,
Each of us…
That we participate in the bringing forth of God in a broken world, from our broken lives…
“What you bear will be special and blessed,
What you bring forth will be touched by the divine, and will be a light to the world…what is conceived within will be blessed in its birth…”
The mystic Meister Eckhart wrote, “We are all mothers of God, for God is needing to be born in the world every day”
We, like Mary, must participate with God in the redemption of the world….
We must give birth to the life we are living now,
in these days….
And …if we get that what we bring forth is the very presence of the divine…
If you felt that what ever you gave birth to was God…if you knew that you were the mother of God today….
How holy would our days be…
Then how holy would our work be…
How holy would your family be…
Oh, how holy might our worlds be…
If we truly believed
That we could bear God in this world.
What about you?
Are you a God-bearer?
How?
Amen.
Luke 1:46-53
And Mary said,
'My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for God has looked with favor on the lowliness of God's servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is God's name.
God's mercy is for those who fear God
from generation to generation.
God has shown strength with God's arm;
and has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
God has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
God has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.'"
God-Bearer
Rev. Karla Miller August 18, 2010 Eliot Church of Newton
Recently, I have had a surge of protestant clergy friends tell me how much they secretly adore Mary, the Mother of God, which has piqued my interest, as well. As a child, I was always a little jealous that my Catholic friends could pray to her, but Pastor Melheim told us confirmation kids we couldn’t have ANY thing to do with saints let alone praying to tham. “Lutherans use the DIRECT hotline to God”, he would rant.
Back in the days when Christianity was still being—orthodox-ied, there were some arguments about how to deal with Mary, stemming from how they were understanding Jesus. In 431, The Coucil of Ephesus decreed that since Jesus was both fully God and fully human, Mary must be understood as “Theotokos” , meaningly literally God-birther, affirming the fullness of the incarnation of God. Some just wanted to call her Christotokos, bearer of Christ, but the Council refuted that.
Theotokos—God bearer.
Isn’t that beautiful? Giving birth to God?
But what kind of birth was it? Throughout the ages of western Christendom, Mary, the mother of God has been a model of piety, of humble submissiveness to Divine Plan, an “obedient, desexualized, merciful mother and beautiful virgin that is projected into heaven as the eternal feminine.’ The perfect woman. What we sister believers should strive for.
I don’t like this model of Mary, and I don’t think it is true to her story
Look at the story of the annunciation in Luke 1. Mary is “much perplexed” (read: troubled, seriously concerned) about the angel Gabriel’s news that she will bear a child that reign in a kingdom with no end, she asks one fairly direct question —“ how can this be, since I am a virgin”….implying, that she and her betrothed, Joseph, are not, well…you know, sexually active. (IF you buy the fact that the Greek word used here actually meant “virgin” as we know it, rather than “Young woman” which was the word in Isaiah 7:14, which this whole prophecy of Gabriel’s is from). Gabriel adroitly assures her that the power of the most HIGH (that’s God) will overshadow her and the Holy Spirit will come upon her and protect her…..which is empowering, but doesn’t answer the most question at hand. However, Mary doesn’t press the point. The assurance of God is enough. She responds “Here am I the servant of the Lord—let it be to me according to your word.”
A “model believer”, indeed. But there is more to this story, I feel certain.
But notice one thing. Does Gabriel promise divine seed to implant in her womb? No! His promises of the Holy overshadowing and protecting Mary is a “figurative way of speaking about the child’s special relation to God, and NOT implying the absence of human paternity” Might I add here that the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke were oral traditions—possibly women’s stories that circulated long before the writers redacted them into their gospels. Some scholars posit that both Luke and Matthew inherited illegitimacy traditions about Jesus’ paternity within those narratives, which have been muted and silenced in the texts we have today?
And I have the sense that Mary’s story is mystery and miracle….
And I have to say, the idea of a virgin birth, immaculate conception sanitizes her story, because the miracle has no real purpose but for the ancient church fathers to subordinate women, to deny the creative process, and to prove that Jesus was divine.
The story is dehumanized.
Which totally defeats the main point of Christianity---
The divine becoming one with us, beoming human?
I want you to notice something with me. Look at the text in Luke one. Do you notice the literal space in between the story of the annunciation, and the story of the magnificat?
This space actually occurs in the earliest manuscripts of Luke.
Before the space, the annunciation. After the space, the magnificat.
What has happened? We don’t know the story of conception. We are not privy to what happens to Mary, in `between the visit from Gabriel, and the visit to Aunt Elizabeth. What has happened?
She is 12 or 13 or 14 years old.
She has become pregnant.
Who has done this to her?
Magic?
Did she have a lover, Joseph?
Did someone do wrong to her?
We don’t know.
All we know is that she is running to her aunt, and maybe remembering, vaguely….this visit…this promise.. of overshadowing…of empowerment…of the divine….
Being pregnant out of wedlock typically would mean stoning, or death,
But clinging to that shred of divine visitation…
She is greeted with blessing from her cousin…
And…
Oh.
Maybe…
However this child was conceived…there is a sense that the birth will be blessed…
And that the mother of this child will be blessed…because…she remembers the promise of protection and Mary is empowered…
Mary decided to go for it. She decided to risk it.
This is the model believer.
Defying cultural expectations and norms.
Daring the law to punish her.
She puts it all out there.
Because the fact is….
The story is stronger---and more miraculous—
Without a virgin birth…
It’s a story against the odds,
It’s the song she sings defiantly that ….
The lowly will be raised up,
That the so called dominant powers will be brought down off their thrones,
That the hungry will be fed…that the proud and mighty will be scattered…
Mary’s song…
From the very breath in her lungs
Is one of hope against hope…
Against all the odds….
And when we hear her agonizing screams in the travailing of birth,
her panting breath and the clutching at the arms of Joseph and the crying out in undescribable pain….and sweat…
We know….
This Mary is no quiet, submissive one.
She is gritty and hopeful…
She is…as Elisabeth Shussler Fiorenza writes…
“The young pregnant woman, living in occupied territory and struggling against victimization and for survival and dignity”
It is she who offers the possibilities for a different understanding of Jesus and the divine…
And this is in part,
What Mary of Nazareth offers to us today….
In the most shadowy of times, she offers hope against hope….
And in spite of fear of death and domination and discrimination and disempowerment,
angels whisper in our ears to tell us,
Each of us…
That we participate in the bringing forth of God in a broken world, from our broken lives…
“What you bear will be special and blessed,
What you bring forth will be touched by the divine, and will be a light to the world…what is conceived within will be blessed in its birth…”
The mystic Meister Eckhart wrote, “We are all mothers of God, for God is needing to be born in the world every day”
We, like Mary, must participate with God in the redemption of the world….
We must give birth to the life we are living now,
in these days….
And …if we get that what we bring forth is the very presence of the divine…
If you felt that what ever you gave birth to was God…if you knew that you were the mother of God today….
How holy would our days be…
Then how holy would our work be…
How holy would your family be…
Oh, how holy might our worlds be…
If we truly believed
That we could bear God in this world.
What about you?
Are you a God-bearer?
How?
Amen.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Right Under Our Noses
Good morning, and Welcome to Eliot Church on this wondrous day that God has made.
Let us rejoice and be grateful in it!
If you are with us for the first time, welcome.
If you are for the first time after a long time, welcome.
We celebrate your presence with us, as it enriches our worship together and hope that you will be touched by God’s presence in this community of believers and wanderers, seekers and questioners.
Welcome!
Right Under Our Noses
September 30, 2007
Luke 16:19-31
When living on the upper west side of New York City, my encounters with people who were homeless and/or panhandlers were often and many. There was the trio of men on the red line of the subway who would sing gospel songs in harmony for handouts. On my walk home from the grocery at 115th and Broadway there was the regular, wishing you a good day, every day, shaking his blue paper coffee cup. There were the more pathetic cases, like the occasional person who would wander the subway car, muttering to himself, drenched in the stench of his own excrement and urine, reeking so horribly that it would make you gag and hide your nose in your scarf or coat collar to filter out the offensive smells. Once, on the upper east side, on a very cold, wind-biting evening, I remember a woman, stretched out along the side of the giant Crate and Barrel near Madison Avenue, stark naked, skinny, clearly strung out on something, her body rocking against the store window showcase of gourmet kitchen tools and candles the size of a large cat and people just hurrying by, averting their eyes. I was one of those people who didn’t see her, either. She was right under my nose. And I had no clue what to do, and I was in a hurry…for something. I sucked in my breath, and kept going. Someone else who knows what to do will do something, I thought to myself. I overheard a man say the police have been called. See, someone else came through....I hurried on. The chasm was so wide between an obvious need and my important life that I didn’t even know there was a chasm. Unforgiveable.
I was haunted of that very brief scene when I first read the gospel for this morning. The story that Jesus tells is illustrates what is right under our noses, a great divide that separates us from our worlds and the Other. The multiple contrasts put forth in this masterful piece of storytelling highlight the divide with exaggerated imagery and deep questions:
The rich man (nameless), clothed in purple and fine linen,
Then, Lazarus, covered in sores and ulcers
The rich man feasts sumptuously daily, reclining at table
Lazarus, “had been thrown by the gate” (Greek translation), meaning he didn’t even get to the gate by his own volition, longed for scraps from the table
The earliest listeners of this story would have considered
That the rich man was blessed by God….
And Lazarus, unclean, sick, pathetic, was cursed by God.
(It would be hard to argue with that, even today)
In death, Lazarus is carried away by angels, to the bosom of Abraham
The rich man is buried, and is in Hades.
And the Great Chasm divides them, still, in life and in death, as their fates are reversed in life and in death (Exegetical work gratefully borrowed from Brian Stoffregen, at http://www.crossmarks.com/brian/luke16x19.htm)
So, while appreciating the fine literary merits of this tale, we still have to ask: What is Jesus getting at?
First, this story is about wealth and what we do with it. Jesus was pretty clear, along with the Law of Moses and the Prophets, along with the words from Timothy, that those who are of privilege must remember the poor. The rich are to use their wealth to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, house the homeless, and fight for the rights of the impoverished in our world and work towards economic justice. I might be slightly overstating. Or not. As good church people, we embrace this message of justice, and frankly we probably are a little appalled at the rich man’s behavior. How could he, knowing the law and the prophets, just not SEE this miserable human being named Lazarus, covered in sores, pathetically lying at the gate where he cannot even move to help himself. Only the dogs care for him by licking his wounds.
I am troubled by the rich man. I know the rich man is me. In fact, I am richer than I thought. I even checked. I went to the global rich list.com and learned that I am the 31, 974, 381st richest person in the world, in the top .53% richest people in the world. That is just in monetary calculations--I know how rich I am because of my marriage, my family, my ministry, my faith. But back to money. For $8, I could buy 15 organic apples at Whole foods or 25 fruit trees for farmers in Honduras to grow and sell fruit at the local market. For $73, I could buy a IPOD shuffle (which I did this week), or a new mobile health clinic to care for AIDS orphans in Uganda (which I did not do this week). I should have bought the mobile health clinic.
Should, should, should.
We all can do more with what is under our noses.
And we try.
And, we all can do better.
Especially me. Let’s all do better with the abundance, we have, o.k.? Let’s promise to give a little more, do a little more, advocate a little more, learn a little more. Just a little makes a huge difference (really only 73 dollars buys a whole mobile clinic in Uganda? Sign me up for at least 3!)
On the other hand, when I get through my guilt of privilege, I do know that being responsible and biblical about my wealth is a priority for me. And I know this is true for all you here today. Certainly, if any of us had dying person oozing with sores and starving from hunger, any person at Eliot would laying on our doorstep, we wouldn’t hesitate to help. You would take him to the hospital, pick up a filet mignon, baked potato and a salad with blue cheese dressing on the way, and visit him every day in the hospital. You would, because he doesn’t have health insurance, figure out a way to pay the hospital bill and pay for his prescription drugs. You would be so angry about this, you would write your congress person to do something about affordable health care in our country. You would also make phone calls, maybe even to CAN-DO or Habitat, or to your neighbor with an empty apartment in her two family home, to make sure he had a place to live when he was well enough to be released from the hospital. You would be with him as he looked for meaningful work, finding ways for him to receive vocational training or other education so that he could actually land a job. You would even serve as his reference. And you would bring him here, to church, so that he might discover the joy of being with other seekers, believers and questioners…AND if he were an evangelical, or liked a different kind of worship style with trap sets and hand-raising, you would find a socially conscious and gay friendly praise church that he could go to.
You would do that.
This I Know.
I have only been at Eliot six months, but I know that.
But this is the rub--that doesn't really happen. This is the Great Chasm. I looked out my window in the front yard. No dying people laying there. I looked out beyond the deck, by the fence in my back yard. No lurking sore infested people being licked by a pack of mongrels there, either. The problem with privilege is that it removes us from the rest of the 6 and half billion people in the world that are less privileged than we are. Our homes are glass towers, even if they are 100 year old over priced Victorians with bad insulation and 40 year old boilers that don’t really work in New England. It’s a roof over our heads, complete with a feast every night for dinner, even if it is just sodium infused Chinese take-out. To top it off, we are busy. Busy, trying to juggle working (we are a NATION of performers, we love to work, we are workaholics) or retirement (dang, we earned it!) and loving our families and staying on top of it all. For some of us, the chasm is our busy-ness.
In the story of Lazarus and the rich man, there is no hope for the chasm to even be remotely narrowed. The rich man, you see, just can’t help himself to “save” himself in life, because he didn’t choose to listen to the law and the prophets or notice what was right under his nose. Really, he had all he needed in life—and the treasure wasn’t purple silk or linen or grocery cart full of smoked salmon and gourmet chocolate. His true treasure was the law of love and the teachings of the prophets. But he forgot it, or put it on a shelf. He didn’t live in that love…and thus created a chasm between the reality of the world’s hurt and pain and suffering, right at his gate.
And even in his death, from an imaginary burning hell, he still doesn’t get it. He tells Abraham, to send Lazarus to help him out…how ironic is that? The one he didn’t even supposedly see in life, now can be useful in death…but only as a servant to cool his tongue, and as messenger to warn his living brothers (what about his sisters?). He still acts from his place of privilege. He still doesn’t really get it in spite of the reality right under his nose…or over his head, if you will. News to rich man: If people have all they need from the law and the prophets, they aren’t going to be moved by someone returning from the dead, Abraham reports. The great chasm is fixed. (Mary Luti, “Send Lazarus” in Christian Century, September 9-16, 1998, page 819)
But the chasm between our lovely lives and the needs of the world is not fixed. However, the neediness of the world isn’t going to come knocking at our doors, or even be tossed out back near the trash barrels. We, in the midst of our busy-ness and fullness of our lives, must reach beyond the divide—and build a bridge of relationships—with people, organizations, places—that narrows the chasm.
So, even though we know we aren’t going to solve the problem of homelessness and hunger today when the youth and tweens prepare lunch for the people of the Common Cathedral, it at least is an effort in practicing what we have learned from Jesus: Feed and clothe my hungry sheep. These piles of coats are going to keep a lot of people warm this winter. The chasm narrows, just a little.
Even though planting 50 trees in Newton Centre isn’t going to solve global scorching, a couple hours getting your hands dirty is a reminder to honor God’s creation. A brick in the bridge is added.
Again, I ask, “really?” Only $73 buys a whole mobile health clinic to treat AIDS orphans in Uganda? A great divide can be crossed.
Abraham says to the rich man, “Child, remember….”
When we are comfortable, and extremely busy, to remember is probably the deepest spiritual challenge and practice most of us will undertake bridge the divide. Remembering takes a little slowing down. Remembering means stopping to pay attention to that chasm right under our noses, and remembering, calls us to be intentional and generous.
We are called to intentional remembering— to remember what we know, to remember what we have, and to remember the law, the prophets, and the words of Jesus: Love your neighbor. And who is your neighbor? She and he are just down the road, a little bit. You won’t have a problem finding them.
Sisters and brothers, with God’s help, let us remember, to be present, be open, be ready. The opportunities for generosity, loving, and narrowing that great chasm will be right under our noses.
Amen.
Let us rejoice and be grateful in it!
If you are with us for the first time, welcome.
If you are for the first time after a long time, welcome.
We celebrate your presence with us, as it enriches our worship together and hope that you will be touched by God’s presence in this community of believers and wanderers, seekers and questioners.
Welcome!
Right Under Our Noses
September 30, 2007
Luke 16:19-31
When living on the upper west side of New York City, my encounters with people who were homeless and/or panhandlers were often and many. There was the trio of men on the red line of the subway who would sing gospel songs in harmony for handouts. On my walk home from the grocery at 115th and Broadway there was the regular, wishing you a good day, every day, shaking his blue paper coffee cup. There were the more pathetic cases, like the occasional person who would wander the subway car, muttering to himself, drenched in the stench of his own excrement and urine, reeking so horribly that it would make you gag and hide your nose in your scarf or coat collar to filter out the offensive smells. Once, on the upper east side, on a very cold, wind-biting evening, I remember a woman, stretched out along the side of the giant Crate and Barrel near Madison Avenue, stark naked, skinny, clearly strung out on something, her body rocking against the store window showcase of gourmet kitchen tools and candles the size of a large cat and people just hurrying by, averting their eyes. I was one of those people who didn’t see her, either. She was right under my nose. And I had no clue what to do, and I was in a hurry…for something. I sucked in my breath, and kept going. Someone else who knows what to do will do something, I thought to myself. I overheard a man say the police have been called. See, someone else came through....I hurried on. The chasm was so wide between an obvious need and my important life that I didn’t even know there was a chasm. Unforgiveable.
I was haunted of that very brief scene when I first read the gospel for this morning. The story that Jesus tells is illustrates what is right under our noses, a great divide that separates us from our worlds and the Other. The multiple contrasts put forth in this masterful piece of storytelling highlight the divide with exaggerated imagery and deep questions:
The rich man (nameless), clothed in purple and fine linen,
Then, Lazarus, covered in sores and ulcers
The rich man feasts sumptuously daily, reclining at table
Lazarus, “had been thrown by the gate” (Greek translation), meaning he didn’t even get to the gate by his own volition, longed for scraps from the table
The earliest listeners of this story would have considered
That the rich man was blessed by God….
And Lazarus, unclean, sick, pathetic, was cursed by God.
(It would be hard to argue with that, even today)
In death, Lazarus is carried away by angels, to the bosom of Abraham
The rich man is buried, and is in Hades.
And the Great Chasm divides them, still, in life and in death, as their fates are reversed in life and in death (Exegetical work gratefully borrowed from Brian Stoffregen, at http://www.crossmarks.com/brian/luke16x19.htm)
So, while appreciating the fine literary merits of this tale, we still have to ask: What is Jesus getting at?
First, this story is about wealth and what we do with it. Jesus was pretty clear, along with the Law of Moses and the Prophets, along with the words from Timothy, that those who are of privilege must remember the poor. The rich are to use their wealth to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, house the homeless, and fight for the rights of the impoverished in our world and work towards economic justice. I might be slightly overstating. Or not. As good church people, we embrace this message of justice, and frankly we probably are a little appalled at the rich man’s behavior. How could he, knowing the law and the prophets, just not SEE this miserable human being named Lazarus, covered in sores, pathetically lying at the gate where he cannot even move to help himself. Only the dogs care for him by licking his wounds.
I am troubled by the rich man. I know the rich man is me. In fact, I am richer than I thought. I even checked. I went to the global rich list.com and learned that I am the 31, 974, 381st richest person in the world, in the top .53% richest people in the world. That is just in monetary calculations--I know how rich I am because of my marriage, my family, my ministry, my faith. But back to money. For $8, I could buy 15 organic apples at Whole foods or 25 fruit trees for farmers in Honduras to grow and sell fruit at the local market. For $73, I could buy a IPOD shuffle (which I did this week), or a new mobile health clinic to care for AIDS orphans in Uganda (which I did not do this week). I should have bought the mobile health clinic.
Should, should, should.
We all can do more with what is under our noses.
And we try.
And, we all can do better.
Especially me. Let’s all do better with the abundance, we have, o.k.? Let’s promise to give a little more, do a little more, advocate a little more, learn a little more. Just a little makes a huge difference (really only 73 dollars buys a whole mobile clinic in Uganda? Sign me up for at least 3!)
On the other hand, when I get through my guilt of privilege, I do know that being responsible and biblical about my wealth is a priority for me. And I know this is true for all you here today. Certainly, if any of us had dying person oozing with sores and starving from hunger, any person at Eliot would laying on our doorstep, we wouldn’t hesitate to help. You would take him to the hospital, pick up a filet mignon, baked potato and a salad with blue cheese dressing on the way, and visit him every day in the hospital. You would, because he doesn’t have health insurance, figure out a way to pay the hospital bill and pay for his prescription drugs. You would be so angry about this, you would write your congress person to do something about affordable health care in our country. You would also make phone calls, maybe even to CAN-DO or Habitat, or to your neighbor with an empty apartment in her two family home, to make sure he had a place to live when he was well enough to be released from the hospital. You would be with him as he looked for meaningful work, finding ways for him to receive vocational training or other education so that he could actually land a job. You would even serve as his reference. And you would bring him here, to church, so that he might discover the joy of being with other seekers, believers and questioners…AND if he were an evangelical, or liked a different kind of worship style with trap sets and hand-raising, you would find a socially conscious and gay friendly praise church that he could go to.
You would do that.
This I Know.
I have only been at Eliot six months, but I know that.
But this is the rub--that doesn't really happen. This is the Great Chasm. I looked out my window in the front yard. No dying people laying there. I looked out beyond the deck, by the fence in my back yard. No lurking sore infested people being licked by a pack of mongrels there, either. The problem with privilege is that it removes us from the rest of the 6 and half billion people in the world that are less privileged than we are. Our homes are glass towers, even if they are 100 year old over priced Victorians with bad insulation and 40 year old boilers that don’t really work in New England. It’s a roof over our heads, complete with a feast every night for dinner, even if it is just sodium infused Chinese take-out. To top it off, we are busy. Busy, trying to juggle working (we are a NATION of performers, we love to work, we are workaholics) or retirement (dang, we earned it!) and loving our families and staying on top of it all. For some of us, the chasm is our busy-ness.
In the story of Lazarus and the rich man, there is no hope for the chasm to even be remotely narrowed. The rich man, you see, just can’t help himself to “save” himself in life, because he didn’t choose to listen to the law and the prophets or notice what was right under his nose. Really, he had all he needed in life—and the treasure wasn’t purple silk or linen or grocery cart full of smoked salmon and gourmet chocolate. His true treasure was the law of love and the teachings of the prophets. But he forgot it, or put it on a shelf. He didn’t live in that love…and thus created a chasm between the reality of the world’s hurt and pain and suffering, right at his gate.
And even in his death, from an imaginary burning hell, he still doesn’t get it. He tells Abraham, to send Lazarus to help him out…how ironic is that? The one he didn’t even supposedly see in life, now can be useful in death…but only as a servant to cool his tongue, and as messenger to warn his living brothers (what about his sisters?). He still acts from his place of privilege. He still doesn’t really get it in spite of the reality right under his nose…or over his head, if you will. News to rich man: If people have all they need from the law and the prophets, they aren’t going to be moved by someone returning from the dead, Abraham reports. The great chasm is fixed. (Mary Luti, “Send Lazarus” in Christian Century, September 9-16, 1998, page 819)
But the chasm between our lovely lives and the needs of the world is not fixed. However, the neediness of the world isn’t going to come knocking at our doors, or even be tossed out back near the trash barrels. We, in the midst of our busy-ness and fullness of our lives, must reach beyond the divide—and build a bridge of relationships—with people, organizations, places—that narrows the chasm.
So, even though we know we aren’t going to solve the problem of homelessness and hunger today when the youth and tweens prepare lunch for the people of the Common Cathedral, it at least is an effort in practicing what we have learned from Jesus: Feed and clothe my hungry sheep. These piles of coats are going to keep a lot of people warm this winter. The chasm narrows, just a little.
Even though planting 50 trees in Newton Centre isn’t going to solve global scorching, a couple hours getting your hands dirty is a reminder to honor God’s creation. A brick in the bridge is added.
Again, I ask, “really?” Only $73 buys a whole mobile health clinic to treat AIDS orphans in Uganda? A great divide can be crossed.
Abraham says to the rich man, “Child, remember….”
When we are comfortable, and extremely busy, to remember is probably the deepest spiritual challenge and practice most of us will undertake bridge the divide. Remembering takes a little slowing down. Remembering means stopping to pay attention to that chasm right under our noses, and remembering, calls us to be intentional and generous.
We are called to intentional remembering— to remember what we know, to remember what we have, and to remember the law, the prophets, and the words of Jesus: Love your neighbor. And who is your neighbor? She and he are just down the road, a little bit. You won’t have a problem finding them.
Sisters and brothers, with God’s help, let us remember, to be present, be open, be ready. The opportunities for generosity, loving, and narrowing that great chasm will be right under our noses.
Amen.
Pour
Rev. Karla Jean Miller
The Eliot Church of Newton
John 12:1-11 (Mary washes Jesus feet )
March 21, 2010 Lent 5 Year C
Prescript
Before I begin, could we have a little chat? I really need to process something, and you are my first captive audience. Do you mind to indulge me for just a few moments?
This week has been an unusual week for me. Like many of you, I’m sure, I have been over-consumed with the mundane and emergency of daily life, from mediating an issue in an organization for which I unofficially volunteer to a serious health condition in one of the furry members of our household that required immediate surgery in addition to fullness and detail of ministry here at Eliot.
I tell you this, because in the grind of this week, especially, in the mediating of an issue that secular organization, that my faith or who I was didn’t matter to those involved. Now, I must explain to you that most of my waking life revolves ministry, thinking about God, about church, thinking about how best to facilitate (in spite of my limitations) an experience of the Holy, whether it is in planning for a Lenten series, writing words for a bible presentation, or a pastoral visit. In other words, it’s always about God. Or, at least, God is always in the mix—maybe not at the center.
This week, I had a humble—oh so humble revelation. I found myself in the middle of a situation where I was NOT Pastor Karla; and yet my faith drew me to the middle of the crisis; I put myself in a role of mediator, but I couldn’t call out the people in the conflict to draw up on their faith, to ask “What would Jesus want us to do here” because it would have been inappropriate, and when the name of God was invoked, I had to agree with the victim that it was completely uncalled for.
In short, I was involved in real daily life…where people don’t really do things because of God. And I was completely broken-hearted with the threat of litigation, which I thought was ludicrous…but others felt like it was the only answer; and I felt that I was right, and they were wrong, and yet there was a complete different world view and approach to life at play. I was in a foreign world. The REAL world, outside of Eliot walls.
And the whole time, Mary and her nard, and Jesus feet, were hovering right here (behind my right ear) and I kept thinking to myself, "What on earth can this story about a woman washing Jesus feet with perfume mean to life in the 21st century—life that deals with overly self-righteous people, who don’t give a durn about the bible, who have a different sense of morality and ethics…???"
I started thinking about your lives, all of you draining of your flooded basements and others of you having to lay off staff in your office, and maybe some of you not having enough money to pay the bills and the rest of you laying awake at night, worried about your children, whether they have friends and are safe in school or happy on their own as adults in the big world…
...and I wondered,
Who cares about a story of someone washing the feet of Jesus with perfume? It’s so NOT applicable to daily life,
And yet,
Mary continued to be here (point to the side of my head) the whole time, ignoring my questions and washing Jesus feet...and I was befuddled.
You come, on Sundays…for whatever reason—
to have a holy moment, to be touched by grace,
to lament in prayer or be washed in the music of angels…
…maybe you walk into the meeting house out of obligation because really you would rather be sipping coffee in bed with the newspaper.
You show up for some reason...
With experiences beyond mine this week,
And I wondered, what is in this story for you, for me?
The Divine ignored my question,
And Mary continued pouring out that perfume and washing Jesus feet, ignoring me too.
(Sigh.)
Thank you for listening. I feel better now.
Prayer:
Grant us the grace to hear and experience the illumination of your Word, in this day, in this place. Amen.
POUR
Lazarus, has just been raised after four days in a tomb. Now Mary and Martha, his sisters, and friends and loved ones are sharing a dinner in celebration and thanking Jesus, who has come out of hiding to see his friend Lazarus enjoying his new life.
How do they feel that night as they gather in Lazarus's home at Bethany for dinner? Perhaps Lazarus is reclining at the table, recounting what it was like being dead and how blinding the light was as he stumbled out of the tomb. He has bathed, of course, but there is still a faint scent of myrrh about him, still a few twigs of cloves stuck in his hair. The smells of freshly baked bread and of the fattened calf roasting reach the guests, and soon they're at the table. Then, while everyone is eating and talking, Mary comes in quietly, carrying her best bottle of fragrant oil. She walks over to Jesus and without a word kneels, uncorks the bottle and pours all of the oil over his feet. Jesus closes his eyes and lets the cool oil soothe his dusty, calloused, aching feet.*
We know today that it was part of the ritual of hospitality in antiquity to have servants wash the feet of guest. But what Mary does is completely unusual.
First, she performs the action herself, instead of having a servant.
Second, the only man a woman in antiquity would touch would be her husband or children, and then only in private.
Third, a woman would never allow anyone other than her immediate family to see her hair.
Fourth, the cleaning of the feet was not done with perfume - especially with the amount mentioned here which would cost a year's wages for a peasant labourer.
So why does she act in the way she does?
Many scholars and commentators conclude that as a rather wealthy mistress of the house, Mary would have had connections with the elites of Jerusalem, fully aware of the plans underway to have Jesus arrested and executed.
And she would know that the form of execution would be crucifixion by the Romans, since that is the method used when the intention is to not just kill a person but to kill what they stand for; to kill belief in them; to kill any possible continuing movement by followers. And that form of death does not allow for a proper burial with proper anointing of the body. Often the bodies of the crucified were left on the cross for scavenging birds and animals to eat the flesh, with the remains later thrown into a pit.
So Mary does what she can to anoint the body of her dear, dear friend.
Or, maybe she is abundantly grateful, because Jesus restored their lives (literally, because Lazarus death would have left them as women, destitute in that society”**
Her act is counter-cultural and extravagant.
Judas calls her out on it, and makes a valid point. Jesus loved poor people, loved justice, but this time, he ignores Judas, making a non-Jesus sounding statement: “The poor will always be with you”
And Mary continued to pour the perfume on poor Jesus’ aching feet.
And then…
She looked up at me, and for the first time speaks to ME!
(allow me a little midrash here)
“Do you get it now?
Why this story IS RELEVANT to you?”
She continues to massage Jesus feet as she says, “let me spell it out for you.”
“First, it takes a body to care for Jesus’ body.
Yes, it’s important to send money to feed the hungry, rescue the victim, rebuild the world, to get the most bang for your buck and not be wasteful.
But sometimes, honey, what Jesus in your world needs is YOU. An actual physical presence.
You know that already—other wise you wouldn’t be sending 12 people all the way to Appalachia to do home repair. Are you kidding me? You are taking a confirmation class and a mom and two seminary students. They aren’t exactly skilled carpenters or plumbers. It doesn’t matter, though, does it?
It’s the body of Christ connecting with the body of Christ. There is no substitute for that—not even cash.
Second, there is no line between secular and sacred, spiritual and everyday. It’s called LIFE. It’s your faith that moves you in situations where God isn’t the topic of the day—like this week. And by the way, it’s good for you to not be thinking about bible study all day. Let your actions speak volumes —whether it is mediating a crisis, or driving politely. Seriously.
And third, take a moment to look at Jesus. In spite of being the Light of the World and all, he does take some time out--- he chooses to slow down. Of course he COULD be out there reaching more people, throwing down some more tables in the temple, feeding more multitudes, and healing the ever present sick.
But he chooses not to, because Jesus knows that it is important to savor life. He loves a delicious long dinner at the home of his friends, and a good foot massage. Saving the world can wait—because noticing life is part of that salvation. If the One who Walks on Water can do that, well, I am just saying you can take some time some time to smell the rose scented perfume."
And then she turned back to her dear friend Jesus,
And poured a little more oil on his aching feet.
Amen.
*(All italics are a direct quote from Beth Sanders, Living By the Word : heaven scent. Christian Century, March 6 2007, unless otherwise noted)
**Italics here are direct quote or paraphrase from David Ewart, www.davidewart.ca
The Eliot Church of Newton
John 12:1-11 (Mary washes Jesus feet )
March 21, 2010 Lent 5 Year C
Prescript
Before I begin, could we have a little chat? I really need to process something, and you are my first captive audience. Do you mind to indulge me for just a few moments?
This week has been an unusual week for me. Like many of you, I’m sure, I have been over-consumed with the mundane and emergency of daily life, from mediating an issue in an organization for which I unofficially volunteer to a serious health condition in one of the furry members of our household that required immediate surgery in addition to fullness and detail of ministry here at Eliot.
I tell you this, because in the grind of this week, especially, in the mediating of an issue that secular organization, that my faith or who I was didn’t matter to those involved. Now, I must explain to you that most of my waking life revolves ministry, thinking about God, about church, thinking about how best to facilitate (in spite of my limitations) an experience of the Holy, whether it is in planning for a Lenten series, writing words for a bible presentation, or a pastoral visit. In other words, it’s always about God. Or, at least, God is always in the mix—maybe not at the center.
This week, I had a humble—oh so humble revelation. I found myself in the middle of a situation where I was NOT Pastor Karla; and yet my faith drew me to the middle of the crisis; I put myself in a role of mediator, but I couldn’t call out the people in the conflict to draw up on their faith, to ask “What would Jesus want us to do here” because it would have been inappropriate, and when the name of God was invoked, I had to agree with the victim that it was completely uncalled for.
In short, I was involved in real daily life…where people don’t really do things because of God. And I was completely broken-hearted with the threat of litigation, which I thought was ludicrous…but others felt like it was the only answer; and I felt that I was right, and they were wrong, and yet there was a complete different world view and approach to life at play. I was in a foreign world. The REAL world, outside of Eliot walls.
And the whole time, Mary and her nard, and Jesus feet, were hovering right here (behind my right ear) and I kept thinking to myself, "What on earth can this story about a woman washing Jesus feet with perfume mean to life in the 21st century—life that deals with overly self-righteous people, who don’t give a durn about the bible, who have a different sense of morality and ethics…???"
I started thinking about your lives, all of you draining of your flooded basements and others of you having to lay off staff in your office, and maybe some of you not having enough money to pay the bills and the rest of you laying awake at night, worried about your children, whether they have friends and are safe in school or happy on their own as adults in the big world…
...and I wondered,
Who cares about a story of someone washing the feet of Jesus with perfume? It’s so NOT applicable to daily life,
And yet,
Mary continued to be here (point to the side of my head) the whole time, ignoring my questions and washing Jesus feet...and I was befuddled.
You come, on Sundays…for whatever reason—
to have a holy moment, to be touched by grace,
to lament in prayer or be washed in the music of angels…
…maybe you walk into the meeting house out of obligation because really you would rather be sipping coffee in bed with the newspaper.
You show up for some reason...
With experiences beyond mine this week,
And I wondered, what is in this story for you, for me?
The Divine ignored my question,
And Mary continued pouring out that perfume and washing Jesus feet, ignoring me too.
(Sigh.)
Thank you for listening. I feel better now.
Prayer:
Grant us the grace to hear and experience the illumination of your Word, in this day, in this place. Amen.
POUR
Lazarus, has just been raised after four days in a tomb. Now Mary and Martha, his sisters, and friends and loved ones are sharing a dinner in celebration and thanking Jesus, who has come out of hiding to see his friend Lazarus enjoying his new life.
How do they feel that night as they gather in Lazarus's home at Bethany for dinner? Perhaps Lazarus is reclining at the table, recounting what it was like being dead and how blinding the light was as he stumbled out of the tomb. He has bathed, of course, but there is still a faint scent of myrrh about him, still a few twigs of cloves stuck in his hair. The smells of freshly baked bread and of the fattened calf roasting reach the guests, and soon they're at the table. Then, while everyone is eating and talking, Mary comes in quietly, carrying her best bottle of fragrant oil. She walks over to Jesus and without a word kneels, uncorks the bottle and pours all of the oil over his feet. Jesus closes his eyes and lets the cool oil soothe his dusty, calloused, aching feet.*
We know today that it was part of the ritual of hospitality in antiquity to have servants wash the feet of guest. But what Mary does is completely unusual.
First, she performs the action herself, instead of having a servant.
Second, the only man a woman in antiquity would touch would be her husband or children, and then only in private.
Third, a woman would never allow anyone other than her immediate family to see her hair.
Fourth, the cleaning of the feet was not done with perfume - especially with the amount mentioned here which would cost a year's wages for a peasant labourer.
So why does she act in the way she does?
Many scholars and commentators conclude that as a rather wealthy mistress of the house, Mary would have had connections with the elites of Jerusalem, fully aware of the plans underway to have Jesus arrested and executed.
And she would know that the form of execution would be crucifixion by the Romans, since that is the method used when the intention is to not just kill a person but to kill what they stand for; to kill belief in them; to kill any possible continuing movement by followers. And that form of death does not allow for a proper burial with proper anointing of the body. Often the bodies of the crucified were left on the cross for scavenging birds and animals to eat the flesh, with the remains later thrown into a pit.
So Mary does what she can to anoint the body of her dear, dear friend.
Or, maybe she is abundantly grateful, because Jesus restored their lives (literally, because Lazarus death would have left them as women, destitute in that society”**
Her act is counter-cultural and extravagant.
Judas calls her out on it, and makes a valid point. Jesus loved poor people, loved justice, but this time, he ignores Judas, making a non-Jesus sounding statement: “The poor will always be with you”
And Mary continued to pour the perfume on poor Jesus’ aching feet.
And then…
She looked up at me, and for the first time speaks to ME!
(allow me a little midrash here)
“Do you get it now?
Why this story IS RELEVANT to you?”
She continues to massage Jesus feet as she says, “let me spell it out for you.”
“First, it takes a body to care for Jesus’ body.
Yes, it’s important to send money to feed the hungry, rescue the victim, rebuild the world, to get the most bang for your buck and not be wasteful.
But sometimes, honey, what Jesus in your world needs is YOU. An actual physical presence.
You know that already—other wise you wouldn’t be sending 12 people all the way to Appalachia to do home repair. Are you kidding me? You are taking a confirmation class and a mom and two seminary students. They aren’t exactly skilled carpenters or plumbers. It doesn’t matter, though, does it?
It’s the body of Christ connecting with the body of Christ. There is no substitute for that—not even cash.
Second, there is no line between secular and sacred, spiritual and everyday. It’s called LIFE. It’s your faith that moves you in situations where God isn’t the topic of the day—like this week. And by the way, it’s good for you to not be thinking about bible study all day. Let your actions speak volumes —whether it is mediating a crisis, or driving politely. Seriously.
And third, take a moment to look at Jesus. In spite of being the Light of the World and all, he does take some time out--- he chooses to slow down. Of course he COULD be out there reaching more people, throwing down some more tables in the temple, feeding more multitudes, and healing the ever present sick.
But he chooses not to, because Jesus knows that it is important to savor life. He loves a delicious long dinner at the home of his friends, and a good foot massage. Saving the world can wait—because noticing life is part of that salvation. If the One who Walks on Water can do that, well, I am just saying you can take some time some time to smell the rose scented perfume."
And then she turned back to her dear friend Jesus,
And poured a little more oil on his aching feet.
Amen.
*(All italics are a direct quote from Beth Sanders, Living By the Word : heaven scent. Christian Century, March 6 2007, unless otherwise noted)
**Italics here are direct quote or paraphrase from David Ewart, www.davidewart.ca
In the Garden
Rev. Karla Miller
The Eliot Church of Newton
April 4 2010
John 20: 1-18
You never know what is going to happen in the garden do you?
You never know what you might find.
I remember as a child, my Grandma Miller had an enormous garden. Every summer, the earth she tilled and tended would yield squash and watermelon, potatoes, peas and carrots, and yes, rutabagas and celery and onions. My favorites were her raspberry bushes that were stingy with their produce. They were the objects of treasure hunts, and whenever we discovered a crimson ripe raspberry, it was like finding a diamond.
My first try at gardening was about 9 years ago, when I lived in a duplex in Western North Carolina, and I grew tomatoes in big giant pots on my deck.
I was so excited. I consulted Martha Stewart on how to prune the suckers back, and quizzed my stepfather Cal, tomato grower extraordinaire, on his best practices.
The first ripened tiny yellow pear tomatoes, were gorgeous, and tasted like glory when I popped them in my mouth, straight off the vine. Miraculous!
In New England, however, my gardening attempts haven’t been all that…exquisite.
Like I said, you never know what you are going to find in the garden.
The first summer we were here, I planted perennials—a hollyhock to remind me of my grandmother, and mint, because I had heard it grows like crazy.
Aren’t perennials supposed to come back the next summer?
I did manage to grow a yellow pepper, but when I went to harvest it, I found that a critter had beat me to it.
Don’t even GET ME STARTED on last years tomatoes.
It’s not all bad. I have some lovely Shasta daisies and Japanese Iris’ from Elizabeth Baker’s yard—and I think they are healthy because they got a good start somewhere else. The tulip bulbs I planted last fall are coming up.
Maybe, this will be my year.
You never know what you will find in the garden.
I often wonder what Mary was expecting to happen in the garden,
that first Easter so long ago.
Mary cloaked in the shadows of the night, seeks the tomb of her beloved teacher and friend. Why was she going there? This particular gospel doesn’t tell us why. Perhaps she was going to make sure the crucifixion hadn’t just been a hellish nightmare, that perhaps there would be no tomb. Denial is a stage of grief, after all….
Maybe she was so completely bereft, that she just needed to collapse in despair near Jesus’ lifeless body, the closest she could even dream to ever be with him, ever again.
I am pretty sure she wasn’t expecting an empty tomb.
When she found one, she was so surprised, she ran for back-up!
Like I said, you never know what you will find in the garden.
Simon Peter and the other disciple run a foot race to the tomb,
and what they saw when they looked inside the grave was—
A whole bunch of nothing, except the remnants of death,
Discarded grave clothes.
They go home, without a word.
It’s all very confusing, except one of the disciples “believed” but we don’t know what he believed because the text also notes that they did not yet “understand the scripture that he might rise from the dead.”
Perhaps he finally believed that Jesus was really gone. Really dead.
In any case, there was nothing left for them in the garden.
Mary, however, lingers in the garden,
Near the empty tomb,
Weeping. Thinking that someone has stolen her Jesus.
She is not ready to accept his absence.
When she peers into the tomb, instead of seeing grave clothes.
She meets angels…
Angels that somehow turn her away from the empty tomb and death,
And practically into the arms of the living Christ,
who in speaking her name,
brings her back to life with the Good News.
“He is alive. I have SEEN him.”
Wouldn’t you have liked to be a fly on the wall when she burst in upon the disciples and made THAT announcement?
It’s a great story, right?
Empty tombs and angels, gardens and running disciples and a back from the dead Jesus.
I confess, for a long time I didn’t take the resurrection seriously—I didn’t need it—because I loved Jesus—the Jesus who walked on earth, who fed poor people and touched lepers and spoke to women.
I loved Jesus who told me to treat others as myself and told stories about lost coins being found and comparing the kingdom of God to a woman baking bread.
The only reason, I thought, we had these resurrection stories was that the ancient writers of the gospels had to make Jesus out to be a super hero in the context of Greco-Roman culture in which there was a lot of competition with those other gods, like Zeus and his consorts. Resurrection? Empty tomb? A Literary trope, that was it.
However, as Barbara Brown Taylor notes, maybe the empty tomb is not the point of Easter. She writes:
Resurrection does not square with anything else we know about physical human life on earth…The resurrection is the one and only event in Jesus’ life that was entirely between him and God. There were no witnesses whatsoever. No one on earth can say what happened inside that tomb, because no one was there. They all arrived after the fact. Two of them saw clothes. One of them saw angels. Most of them saw nothing at all because they were still in bed that morning, but as it turned out that did not matter because the empty tomb was not the point...
...The point is the encounter with the Living Christ. He had outgrown his tomb, which was too small a focus for the resurrection. The risen one had people to see and things to do. The living one’s business was among the living, to whom he appeared not once but four more times in the Gospel of John. Every time he came to his friends they became stronger, wiser, kinder, more daring. Every time he came to them, they became more like him.
Isn’t this what we want as people of faith?
To become more like Jesus, to be wiser, kinder, more courageous?
My sisters and brothers, the only way only way to do that is to meet the risen Christ in the world in which we live everyday.
Frankly, I need the resurrection.
Every day I crucify others...when I curse the bad drivers in Boston, and still cut them off, when I fail to be present to an outstretched hand in the square, or don’t listen well to my spouse, when I get irritated with someone who isn't playing nice, when my heart breaks as I listen to the news, see the stray dog running loose in traffic.
Everyday I die a thousand little deaths, when I doubt myself and my ability, when I am envious at someone’s success, when I can’t let go of a bad decision, and hold on to anger and resentment.
I need the resurrection, because if there were only crucifying and dying,
there would be no point.
Indeed, the resurrection makes no sense, and it makes all the sense in the world:
Look~~~
The tulips in garden are shooting up and the daffodils are blooming in the parking lot.
Babies are born.
The sun finally came out.
The stranger at the store opened the door for me, and actually smiled.
The birds sang you awake this morning.
I am not alone.
You are not alone,
The check didn’t bounce,
And the dog still loves you,
And maybe even your family….
These are appearances of the living Lord,
And they are love,
And mercy,
Our resurrection stories in the garden of life.
Like I said, you never know what you will find in the garden…
You might even meet the Gardener.
Happy Easter.
Christ has risen,
Alleluia!
Amen.
The Eliot Church of Newton
April 4 2010
John 20: 1-18
You never know what is going to happen in the garden do you?
You never know what you might find.
I remember as a child, my Grandma Miller had an enormous garden. Every summer, the earth she tilled and tended would yield squash and watermelon, potatoes, peas and carrots, and yes, rutabagas and celery and onions. My favorites were her raspberry bushes that were stingy with their produce. They were the objects of treasure hunts, and whenever we discovered a crimson ripe raspberry, it was like finding a diamond.
My first try at gardening was about 9 years ago, when I lived in a duplex in Western North Carolina, and I grew tomatoes in big giant pots on my deck.
I was so excited. I consulted Martha Stewart on how to prune the suckers back, and quizzed my stepfather Cal, tomato grower extraordinaire, on his best practices.
The first ripened tiny yellow pear tomatoes, were gorgeous, and tasted like glory when I popped them in my mouth, straight off the vine. Miraculous!
In New England, however, my gardening attempts haven’t been all that…exquisite.
Like I said, you never know what you are going to find in the garden.
The first summer we were here, I planted perennials—a hollyhock to remind me of my grandmother, and mint, because I had heard it grows like crazy.
Aren’t perennials supposed to come back the next summer?
I did manage to grow a yellow pepper, but when I went to harvest it, I found that a critter had beat me to it.
Don’t even GET ME STARTED on last years tomatoes.
It’s not all bad. I have some lovely Shasta daisies and Japanese Iris’ from Elizabeth Baker’s yard—and I think they are healthy because they got a good start somewhere else. The tulip bulbs I planted last fall are coming up.
Maybe, this will be my year.
You never know what you will find in the garden.
I often wonder what Mary was expecting to happen in the garden,
that first Easter so long ago.
Mary cloaked in the shadows of the night, seeks the tomb of her beloved teacher and friend. Why was she going there? This particular gospel doesn’t tell us why. Perhaps she was going to make sure the crucifixion hadn’t just been a hellish nightmare, that perhaps there would be no tomb. Denial is a stage of grief, after all….
Maybe she was so completely bereft, that she just needed to collapse in despair near Jesus’ lifeless body, the closest she could even dream to ever be with him, ever again.
I am pretty sure she wasn’t expecting an empty tomb.
When she found one, she was so surprised, she ran for back-up!
Like I said, you never know what you will find in the garden.
Simon Peter and the other disciple run a foot race to the tomb,
and what they saw when they looked inside the grave was—
A whole bunch of nothing, except the remnants of death,
Discarded grave clothes.
They go home, without a word.
It’s all very confusing, except one of the disciples “believed” but we don’t know what he believed because the text also notes that they did not yet “understand the scripture that he might rise from the dead.”
Perhaps he finally believed that Jesus was really gone. Really dead.
In any case, there was nothing left for them in the garden.
Mary, however, lingers in the garden,
Near the empty tomb,
Weeping. Thinking that someone has stolen her Jesus.
She is not ready to accept his absence.
When she peers into the tomb, instead of seeing grave clothes.
She meets angels…
Angels that somehow turn her away from the empty tomb and death,
And practically into the arms of the living Christ,
who in speaking her name,
brings her back to life with the Good News.
“He is alive. I have SEEN him.”
Wouldn’t you have liked to be a fly on the wall when she burst in upon the disciples and made THAT announcement?
It’s a great story, right?
Empty tombs and angels, gardens and running disciples and a back from the dead Jesus.
I confess, for a long time I didn’t take the resurrection seriously—I didn’t need it—because I loved Jesus—the Jesus who walked on earth, who fed poor people and touched lepers and spoke to women.
I loved Jesus who told me to treat others as myself and told stories about lost coins being found and comparing the kingdom of God to a woman baking bread.
The only reason, I thought, we had these resurrection stories was that the ancient writers of the gospels had to make Jesus out to be a super hero in the context of Greco-Roman culture in which there was a lot of competition with those other gods, like Zeus and his consorts. Resurrection? Empty tomb? A Literary trope, that was it.
However, as Barbara Brown Taylor notes, maybe the empty tomb is not the point of Easter. She writes:
Resurrection does not square with anything else we know about physical human life on earth…The resurrection is the one and only event in Jesus’ life that was entirely between him and God. There were no witnesses whatsoever. No one on earth can say what happened inside that tomb, because no one was there. They all arrived after the fact. Two of them saw clothes. One of them saw angels. Most of them saw nothing at all because they were still in bed that morning, but as it turned out that did not matter because the empty tomb was not the point...
...The point is the encounter with the Living Christ. He had outgrown his tomb, which was too small a focus for the resurrection. The risen one had people to see and things to do. The living one’s business was among the living, to whom he appeared not once but four more times in the Gospel of John. Every time he came to his friends they became stronger, wiser, kinder, more daring. Every time he came to them, they became more like him.
Isn’t this what we want as people of faith?
To become more like Jesus, to be wiser, kinder, more courageous?
My sisters and brothers, the only way only way to do that is to meet the risen Christ in the world in which we live everyday.
Frankly, I need the resurrection.
Every day I crucify others...when I curse the bad drivers in Boston, and still cut them off, when I fail to be present to an outstretched hand in the square, or don’t listen well to my spouse, when I get irritated with someone who isn't playing nice, when my heart breaks as I listen to the news, see the stray dog running loose in traffic.
Everyday I die a thousand little deaths, when I doubt myself and my ability, when I am envious at someone’s success, when I can’t let go of a bad decision, and hold on to anger and resentment.
I need the resurrection, because if there were only crucifying and dying,
there would be no point.
Indeed, the resurrection makes no sense, and it makes all the sense in the world:
Look~~~
The tulips in garden are shooting up and the daffodils are blooming in the parking lot.
Babies are born.
The sun finally came out.
The stranger at the store opened the door for me, and actually smiled.
The birds sang you awake this morning.
I am not alone.
You are not alone,
The check didn’t bounce,
And the dog still loves you,
And maybe even your family….
These are appearances of the living Lord,
And they are love,
And mercy,
Our resurrection stories in the garden of life.
Like I said, you never know what you will find in the garden…
You might even meet the Gardener.
Happy Easter.
Christ has risen,
Alleluia!
Amen.
Grace Upon Grace
Rev. Karla Jean Miller
Eliot Church of Newton
January 4, 2008
John 1: 10-18
Two of the Boston Globe headlines said it all on New Year’s Day.
First:
“For many, joy this time is in ringing out the old…
Ringing out 2008!—let’s face it, 2008 caused ulcers!”
If you read through the end of the article, you would know that many people associated 2008 with anxiety. And no wonder—you know the mantra: Retirement funds shrinking, a horrible economy, violence abroad in so many places, and people not spending money because they are scared about just getting by. A local therapist noted, "This year, more than any other year in my 16 years of practicing psychiatry, I have more people telling me they are pleased to see a difficult chapter of their lives ending. I have never seen people be more anxious than they were in 2008.”
In short, the article notes, we all are glad to say goodbye to 2008, and although our expectations for 2009 aren’t necessarily sky-high, we believe things may at least be better, and we all are ready for change, desperate to start something new.
But then, the next headline in our esteemed local paper read:
“Why is Change so Hard?”
The gist of this article is one that any of us could write. The New Year is synonymous with change. Many of us resolve to do better—pay off debt, spend less money, work out, lose weight. But, after a few days or weeks, we let things go. Even successful people, at the top of their game, fail at personal change. Look at Oprah, the queen of proclamation of self-care, admits she hasn’t been caring for herself, she hasn’t been living her Best Life. Even our president-elect struggles with a cigarette habit that he would like to kick.
Now, I am sure none of you have been on your treadmills more the past couple of days than you have in the last 9 months like me. Probably, most of you haven’t ever resolved to “do better this year at…(fill in the blank).” Perhaps you chalked up 2008 to be nothing but glorious. However, if you do somewhat resonate with the Globe headlines, then today’s text might be Good News for you.
And the Word became flesh and lived among us, full of grace and truth.
We are embodied creatures. You and I. As one scholar notes: “We make the best sense of life when we understand the connection of our lives to our bodies and to the physical ground upon which we tread.” Our emotions are physical, as we have experienced this year, and even how they are explained in the Hebrew Bible.
For example:
“The nose burning hot” is an expression of anger.
“Tearing clothes and throwing earth on your head” is an expression of mourning.
In the Psalms, we see fear and anxiety and guilt expressed as “the body groaning, the heart melting, and bones out of joint.”
God’s compassion makes the body to dance and sing and collapse on the earth to sing.
We are embodied creatures, indeed.
And so for God to become human, and live among us, means that God gets what anxiety, what fear, what despair, what desolation and depression and pain all feel like. The Divine understands what the human story is all about.
The Word became flesh.
The English language doesn’t really have an exact rendering of the Greek word, LOGOS—which is typically translated as Word. In Asian cultures, Logos is rendered as Tao—the Way. “In the beginning was the the Way, and the Way was God, and the Way was God.” Another translation of LOGOS could be Story. In the beginning was the Story, and the Story was God and the Story is God…and the Story became flesh and lived among us, full of grace and truth . God knows the Story of our lives, God is the Story, embodied in Christ, and oh, because of that, we can put the stories of our worry and wonder into the great story of God’s presence with us.
The text goes on to promise:
“From the fullness of the Story made flesh, we have all received, grace upon grace.” And isn’t this true—in the past year of uncertainty, of mouth dropping open shock at the capricious greed of others, of unbelievable acts of violence and hate, not to mention the personal tragedies of our own lives, haven’t there been tiny points of grace, of hope, that made your story a little more bearable?
Grace upon grace.
For me, grace upon grace was manifest in unspectacular moments:
In embraces of comfort while grieving a loss of my beloved nephew.
In deep belly laughing while watching Saturday Night Live skits…
In the sweetness of a good conversation over coffee with a friend…
In the tears I shed even harder every time I watch the video of Christian the Lion being reunited with the couple who saved his life, with Whitney Houston singing “I Will Always Love You” in the background. (You-Tube video…if you haven’t seen it, allow me to share it with you later)
I experience those grace upon graces, feel them in my body in the ways the Hebrew writers describe.
Barbara Brown Taylor says that “for all our failure to honor them, our bodies remain God’s best way of getting to us.” The fullness of God, the grace of God is most deeply in understood in the touching, seeing, hearing and tasting God’s goodness and God’s presence made flesh among us. No wonder the Psalmist wrote, O taste and see that the Lord is Good (Ps 34:8).
So, there was grace in 2008, and yet, the future, well, what about 2009? Really. The reality of the world situation still looms. Is it too much to hope to change, when we know that change….is hard…and often we give up before we can even begin to think about being successful?
Stephanie Pausell, professor of ministry at Harvard Divinity School, grew up in the great state of North Carolina. When she was in second grade, the courts ordered her town to get serious about integration—for like many towns in the South, her town resisted “Brown vs. Board of Education” with a “school choice’ option. Faced with the court order, her town refused to open school. Choosing no school over integrated classrooms kept the schools closed for months.
In a neighboring county, for years, until the last two or so decades, there was a billboard at the county line that proclaimed, “The Ku Klux Klan Welcomes You.” (To this day, in many counties in NC, there are similar billboards) Both of these counties voted, by margins of 4 and 7 percent, respectively, for Barack Obama.
She writes, “All across the country, people are telling stories like these, stories of change you can see and even quantify…stories of courage and stories of communities gradually choosing a new narrative in which to live”
Indeed, change is possible—we have seen it in this past election, where the struggle for civil rights has been indispensably good for this country…as slow as change can be. The evidence of change is exhilarating and breathtaking, and when it is visible…it feels “like resurrection.”
Rev. Peter Gomes defines “good news” as “we don’t have to be as we are.” We don’t have to be stuck. We don’t have to play the same old tapes. We can change…personally and collectively. We can be born, again, and again with God, season after blessed season.
But part of the reason that change is hard, is that knocks us off our feet, destabilizes us, causes disequilibrium when things are different—even if they are better for us. That’s why, for the most part, effective change requires persistence. But, friends, we don’t have to be as we are. That is Good News, indeed. Thank God. And we can change.
The Word made Flesh in Jesus never stops inviting people to change. The story of God with us believes that we are embodied creatures that are “capable of radical change” Even when we choose not to accept the invitation, Jesus continues to invite us. Even when our attempts at change are falter and fail. The invitation is offered, again and again:
Come, sell all that you own, and give to the poor. Your treasure is in me.
Come, love your enemy.
Come, follow me, and I will make you fish for people.
Come, all you who are weary…and let me give you rest.
Come, and I will fill you the fullness of God,
Come, take this bread, drink this cup, and remember me.
Because I am the Word made flesh,
the Story that lives among you,
offering you grace upon grace, upon grace.
Amen.
Benediction
From the Iona Community
We stand to face the future:
God behind us in the past
Christ before us; the way ahead;
Christ beside us in this moment;
Christ beneath us in our weakness;
Christ above to shield us-
Beneath the shadow of his wings we are safe;
Christ between us to bind us in the unity of his love;
Christ in us equipping us with his all sufficient grace.
Thus armed and guided, and protected we face the New Year.
Now we arise and go forth on the journey before us,
Knowing that, where Christ leads, life is a journey home.
Therefore we travel in faith, in hope, and in love,
in the name of the Father/ Mother, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
May the blessing of God
be upon us
all this year
and into eternity. Amen.
Eliot Church of Newton
January 4, 2008
John 1: 10-18
Two of the Boston Globe headlines said it all on New Year’s Day.
First:
“For many, joy this time is in ringing out the old…
Ringing out 2008!—let’s face it, 2008 caused ulcers!”
If you read through the end of the article, you would know that many people associated 2008 with anxiety. And no wonder—you know the mantra: Retirement funds shrinking, a horrible economy, violence abroad in so many places, and people not spending money because they are scared about just getting by. A local therapist noted, "This year, more than any other year in my 16 years of practicing psychiatry, I have more people telling me they are pleased to see a difficult chapter of their lives ending. I have never seen people be more anxious than they were in 2008.”
In short, the article notes, we all are glad to say goodbye to 2008, and although our expectations for 2009 aren’t necessarily sky-high, we believe things may at least be better, and we all are ready for change, desperate to start something new.
But then, the next headline in our esteemed local paper read:
“Why is Change so Hard?”
The gist of this article is one that any of us could write. The New Year is synonymous with change. Many of us resolve to do better—pay off debt, spend less money, work out, lose weight. But, after a few days or weeks, we let things go. Even successful people, at the top of their game, fail at personal change. Look at Oprah, the queen of proclamation of self-care, admits she hasn’t been caring for herself, she hasn’t been living her Best Life. Even our president-elect struggles with a cigarette habit that he would like to kick.
Now, I am sure none of you have been on your treadmills more the past couple of days than you have in the last 9 months like me. Probably, most of you haven’t ever resolved to “do better this year at…(fill in the blank).” Perhaps you chalked up 2008 to be nothing but glorious. However, if you do somewhat resonate with the Globe headlines, then today’s text might be Good News for you.
And the Word became flesh and lived among us, full of grace and truth.
We are embodied creatures. You and I. As one scholar notes: “We make the best sense of life when we understand the connection of our lives to our bodies and to the physical ground upon which we tread.” Our emotions are physical, as we have experienced this year, and even how they are explained in the Hebrew Bible.
For example:
“The nose burning hot” is an expression of anger.
“Tearing clothes and throwing earth on your head” is an expression of mourning.
In the Psalms, we see fear and anxiety and guilt expressed as “the body groaning, the heart melting, and bones out of joint.”
God’s compassion makes the body to dance and sing and collapse on the earth to sing.
We are embodied creatures, indeed.
And so for God to become human, and live among us, means that God gets what anxiety, what fear, what despair, what desolation and depression and pain all feel like. The Divine understands what the human story is all about.
The Word became flesh.
The English language doesn’t really have an exact rendering of the Greek word, LOGOS—which is typically translated as Word. In Asian cultures, Logos is rendered as Tao—the Way. “In the beginning was the the Way, and the Way was God, and the Way was God.” Another translation of LOGOS could be Story. In the beginning was the Story, and the Story was God and the Story is God…and the Story became flesh and lived among us, full of grace and truth . God knows the Story of our lives, God is the Story, embodied in Christ, and oh, because of that, we can put the stories of our worry and wonder into the great story of God’s presence with us.
The text goes on to promise:
“From the fullness of the Story made flesh, we have all received, grace upon grace.” And isn’t this true—in the past year of uncertainty, of mouth dropping open shock at the capricious greed of others, of unbelievable acts of violence and hate, not to mention the personal tragedies of our own lives, haven’t there been tiny points of grace, of hope, that made your story a little more bearable?
Grace upon grace.
For me, grace upon grace was manifest in unspectacular moments:
In embraces of comfort while grieving a loss of my beloved nephew.
In deep belly laughing while watching Saturday Night Live skits…
In the sweetness of a good conversation over coffee with a friend…
In the tears I shed even harder every time I watch the video of Christian the Lion being reunited with the couple who saved his life, with Whitney Houston singing “I Will Always Love You” in the background. (You-Tube video…if you haven’t seen it, allow me to share it with you later)
I experience those grace upon graces, feel them in my body in the ways the Hebrew writers describe.
Barbara Brown Taylor says that “for all our failure to honor them, our bodies remain God’s best way of getting to us.” The fullness of God, the grace of God is most deeply in understood in the touching, seeing, hearing and tasting God’s goodness and God’s presence made flesh among us. No wonder the Psalmist wrote, O taste and see that the Lord is Good (Ps 34:8).
So, there was grace in 2008, and yet, the future, well, what about 2009? Really. The reality of the world situation still looms. Is it too much to hope to change, when we know that change….is hard…and often we give up before we can even begin to think about being successful?
Stephanie Pausell, professor of ministry at Harvard Divinity School, grew up in the great state of North Carolina. When she was in second grade, the courts ordered her town to get serious about integration—for like many towns in the South, her town resisted “Brown vs. Board of Education” with a “school choice’ option. Faced with the court order, her town refused to open school. Choosing no school over integrated classrooms kept the schools closed for months.
In a neighboring county, for years, until the last two or so decades, there was a billboard at the county line that proclaimed, “The Ku Klux Klan Welcomes You.” (To this day, in many counties in NC, there are similar billboards) Both of these counties voted, by margins of 4 and 7 percent, respectively, for Barack Obama.
She writes, “All across the country, people are telling stories like these, stories of change you can see and even quantify…stories of courage and stories of communities gradually choosing a new narrative in which to live”
Indeed, change is possible—we have seen it in this past election, where the struggle for civil rights has been indispensably good for this country…as slow as change can be. The evidence of change is exhilarating and breathtaking, and when it is visible…it feels “like resurrection.”
Rev. Peter Gomes defines “good news” as “we don’t have to be as we are.” We don’t have to be stuck. We don’t have to play the same old tapes. We can change…personally and collectively. We can be born, again, and again with God, season after blessed season.
But part of the reason that change is hard, is that knocks us off our feet, destabilizes us, causes disequilibrium when things are different—even if they are better for us. That’s why, for the most part, effective change requires persistence. But, friends, we don’t have to be as we are. That is Good News, indeed. Thank God. And we can change.
The Word made Flesh in Jesus never stops inviting people to change. The story of God with us believes that we are embodied creatures that are “capable of radical change” Even when we choose not to accept the invitation, Jesus continues to invite us. Even when our attempts at change are falter and fail. The invitation is offered, again and again:
Come, sell all that you own, and give to the poor. Your treasure is in me.
Come, love your enemy.
Come, follow me, and I will make you fish for people.
Come, all you who are weary…and let me give you rest.
Come, and I will fill you the fullness of God,
Come, take this bread, drink this cup, and remember me.
Because I am the Word made flesh,
the Story that lives among you,
offering you grace upon grace, upon grace.
Amen.
Benediction
From the Iona Community
We stand to face the future:
God behind us in the past
Christ before us; the way ahead;
Christ beside us in this moment;
Christ beneath us in our weakness;
Christ above to shield us-
Beneath the shadow of his wings we are safe;
Christ between us to bind us in the unity of his love;
Christ in us equipping us with his all sufficient grace.
Thus armed and guided, and protected we face the New Year.
Now we arise and go forth on the journey before us,
Knowing that, where Christ leads, life is a journey home.
Therefore we travel in faith, in hope, and in love,
in the name of the Father/ Mother, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
May the blessing of God
be upon us
all this year
and into eternity. Amen.
Taste
Rev. Karla Jean Miller
Eliot Church of Newton
September 27, 2009
Mark 9:38-50
How many of you just love to cook?
How many of you would self-identify as a foodie?
How many of you have seen Julia and Julie more than once?
I don’t consider myself a gourmet cook. Or a foodie. But I like to cook—creatively and a bit improvisationally.
For instance, if a recipe calls for mandarin oranges, and I have none on hand, I am too happy to substitute an orange bell pepper--
That’s probably why, when I offered to cook for Liz’s staff party being held at our house, she was quick to say, “oh no, no, we will get it catered.” That’s probably why, come to think of it, the last two Christmases our invited guests have been quick to INSIST they bring the turkey and fixins’.
No, I am not a foodie. But my tendency to improvise on recipes has met with some amazing tasty delights, and treacherous inedible disasters. There is more than one reason a recipe might call for mandarin oranges over orange bell peppers, but I suspect that taste is probably the main reason, and color only secondary.
Taste. If you are trying a new food for the first time, the first thing you might ask is: What does this taste like?
The sense of taste is pretty powerful—so much so that the Psalmist joyfully sings, “O Taste and See That the Lord is Good.” A metaphor, if you will, encouraging the faithful to experience the goodness and richness of God as if you were enjoying a royal banquet.
Or, otherwise.
At the pottery studio this week, I was speaking with two women. One retired, and one in her late 20’s-30s . The retired woman is an atheist, and knows I am a pastor, so almost every time we speak, she brings up religion and how she got turned off her church because they always wanted money. Church, for her has lost its taste. The woman in her late 20’s talked about being an atheist, too. She was raised Catholic, but dropped out of the confirmation process because all of her classmates were groaning how they didn’t believe any of the stuff they were being taught, but they were doing it anyway because they knew they would get a lot of money at their confirmation parties from family and friends. They were in it for the money. She dropped out. That church experience left a bad taste in her mouth.
Our text today is about taste, and balance, and how people ought to live as a community of faithful followers. The disciples were worried about themselves. They were responding jealously in their own self interest to someone who was casting out demons in Jesus name. (Note: In a previous passage before our reading, the disciples were not able to cast out demons, because they forgot to pray.) Instead of being joyful for the person who was freed from suffering and living a new life, they were worried that the agent of healing, who didn’t even know Jesus, was stealing their thunder.
In essence, they were impeding the ministry of another.
So, Jesus admonishes them. “Cut off any part of you that causes the least of these…or yourself to stumble.” Basically, Jesus is telling the disciples to look at themselves. Consider where they are at, as a community. Are you causing others to not experience the good news? Are you jealous of each other? How are you impeding yourselves from experiencing the light and healing and care of God?
“Oh, and by the way,” Jesus says, “be salty.”
Odd thought, isn’t it? Have salt in yourselves?
In antiquity, salt was one of the primary ways to preserve food. It was also used, as today, for a seasoning to make food taste good. In the Old Testament, salt was used in rituals of hospitality and covenant-making. Salt had power to keep what was precious safe, and had the power to destroy, as in the book of Judges where a warrior sowed the field of an enemy with salt to make it barren. Salt was a cleansing agent, regarded as potent against enemies, and many women performed rituals of salting their babies to ward off evil.
Salt represented Permanence. Strength.
No wonder Jesus uses salt as a metaphor for discipleship. Have salt with in yourselves, Jesus urges, be steadfast, long-lasting, distinctive, interesting, tasty—to one another, and to the world. Be different—but in an enticing way. Don’t be tasteless.
For the first time in American religious history, we have a generation of people, the children of the baby boomers, who have not been raised in the church. But, according to recent studies in American religion, many of these people identify as spiritual, but not religious. They are suspect of organized religion that has ceased to be relevant in their worlds, and doubt that Christianity has anything of value to say to their lives. Today, Church is perceived as being about exciting as white bread-and as tasteless as—unsalted popcorn. What’s worse, there are those around us, in our communities, and in our lives where Christianity has left a bad taste in their mouths.
And yet, we who are here today have tasted community, we have tasted heaven here, in church, haven’t we? Sometimes we taste great big gulps of heaven, and sometimes only the tiniest hints of the flavor of heaven—but we have tasted goodness and life and hope, haven’t we?
We have tasted heaven in covered dish suppers, and making lunches for Common Cathedral. We have tasted hope in the silence of worship, and in laughter and tears shared. Scripture is sweet, and hymns sung together are rich. Prayer nourishes. We have tasted grace in those moments you know that everything is going to be o.k. because you know God has your back, and you know you will be cared for. You have tasted hope in the times you have completely lost your faith, you don’t believe in anything, let alone God, and someone else believes for you. The power and permanence and peace of faith are tasted in coffee hour, theological debate, in youth mission trips, and even in annual meetings to pass our budgets. On our lips lingers the balanced and seasoned life of community lived in the absolute, unfailing love of God through Christ. Here at Eliot, we have tasted God. And God is good.
And yet…my mind goes back to the studio. I think about what my younger atheist colleague said: “Most of my friends grew up in the church, but we are atheists. But we long for community, but where do you find that? Some of us are having children, and we want them to have community, but where? Some people find it in church—I actually volunteer at the food pantry at the UU church on Thursdays. There is community there…but there should be something more….”
I piped up. “My church has community! And we are full of doubters, nonbelievers, seekers, believers, and questioners! It’s messy but deep and nourishing.” I was proud to be able to say that.
My friends…how do we offer the taste of community and faith to people like my potter colleagues? Those who are spiritual and not religious? Those who long for something more, but don’t know where to look for it? We know we have what some of them are looking for.
We have to learn how to describe this good taste of faith. And not keep it a secret.
On Regathering Sunday, Tony preached about this very thing—in different words. He said, But we can’t just preach to ourselves and our children. We need to find the words, the tools, the courage to carry the message to those who have not heard.
It tastes good here, doesn’t it? Sometimes we don’t know how to describe to others. But we are going to learn how to do this, together. Share what we have here at Eliot, with others. So today, I am going help you start thinking in this direction….
If worship had a taste
What would it taste like?
Would it taste wild and earthy, like blueberries, eaten straight off the bush?
If prayer had a taste,
Would it taste faint and precious, like the milky scent of a sleeping infant,
Would it taste strong and solid, like long hike in the woods?
If Eliot Church had a taste,
Would it taste like home, like the smell of fresh bread baking in the oven? Would it be salty? Or more like the mélange and variety of tastes that you get in a box of Jelly Belly Jelly Beans? Popcorn flavored, green bean flavored, pomegranate-apple flavored?
Talk about your thoughts on this with one another.
During coffee today. At home. In the car. At dinner. Please.
O Taste and See, that the Lord is good.
Amen.
Eliot Church of Newton
September 27, 2009
Mark 9:38-50
How many of you just love to cook?
How many of you would self-identify as a foodie?
How many of you have seen Julia and Julie more than once?
I don’t consider myself a gourmet cook. Or a foodie. But I like to cook—creatively and a bit improvisationally.
For instance, if a recipe calls for mandarin oranges, and I have none on hand, I am too happy to substitute an orange bell pepper--
That’s probably why, when I offered to cook for Liz’s staff party being held at our house, she was quick to say, “oh no, no, we will get it catered.” That’s probably why, come to think of it, the last two Christmases our invited guests have been quick to INSIST they bring the turkey and fixins’.
No, I am not a foodie. But my tendency to improvise on recipes has met with some amazing tasty delights, and treacherous inedible disasters. There is more than one reason a recipe might call for mandarin oranges over orange bell peppers, but I suspect that taste is probably the main reason, and color only secondary.
Taste. If you are trying a new food for the first time, the first thing you might ask is: What does this taste like?
The sense of taste is pretty powerful—so much so that the Psalmist joyfully sings, “O Taste and See That the Lord is Good.” A metaphor, if you will, encouraging the faithful to experience the goodness and richness of God as if you were enjoying a royal banquet.
Or, otherwise.
At the pottery studio this week, I was speaking with two women. One retired, and one in her late 20’s-30s . The retired woman is an atheist, and knows I am a pastor, so almost every time we speak, she brings up religion and how she got turned off her church because they always wanted money. Church, for her has lost its taste. The woman in her late 20’s talked about being an atheist, too. She was raised Catholic, but dropped out of the confirmation process because all of her classmates were groaning how they didn’t believe any of the stuff they were being taught, but they were doing it anyway because they knew they would get a lot of money at their confirmation parties from family and friends. They were in it for the money. She dropped out. That church experience left a bad taste in her mouth.
Our text today is about taste, and balance, and how people ought to live as a community of faithful followers. The disciples were worried about themselves. They were responding jealously in their own self interest to someone who was casting out demons in Jesus name. (Note: In a previous passage before our reading, the disciples were not able to cast out demons, because they forgot to pray.) Instead of being joyful for the person who was freed from suffering and living a new life, they were worried that the agent of healing, who didn’t even know Jesus, was stealing their thunder.
In essence, they were impeding the ministry of another.
So, Jesus admonishes them. “Cut off any part of you that causes the least of these…or yourself to stumble.” Basically, Jesus is telling the disciples to look at themselves. Consider where they are at, as a community. Are you causing others to not experience the good news? Are you jealous of each other? How are you impeding yourselves from experiencing the light and healing and care of God?
“Oh, and by the way,” Jesus says, “be salty.”
Odd thought, isn’t it? Have salt in yourselves?
In antiquity, salt was one of the primary ways to preserve food. It was also used, as today, for a seasoning to make food taste good. In the Old Testament, salt was used in rituals of hospitality and covenant-making. Salt had power to keep what was precious safe, and had the power to destroy, as in the book of Judges where a warrior sowed the field of an enemy with salt to make it barren. Salt was a cleansing agent, regarded as potent against enemies, and many women performed rituals of salting their babies to ward off evil.
Salt represented Permanence. Strength.
No wonder Jesus uses salt as a metaphor for discipleship. Have salt with in yourselves, Jesus urges, be steadfast, long-lasting, distinctive, interesting, tasty—to one another, and to the world. Be different—but in an enticing way. Don’t be tasteless.
For the first time in American religious history, we have a generation of people, the children of the baby boomers, who have not been raised in the church. But, according to recent studies in American religion, many of these people identify as spiritual, but not religious. They are suspect of organized religion that has ceased to be relevant in their worlds, and doubt that Christianity has anything of value to say to their lives. Today, Church is perceived as being about exciting as white bread-and as tasteless as—unsalted popcorn. What’s worse, there are those around us, in our communities, and in our lives where Christianity has left a bad taste in their mouths.
And yet, we who are here today have tasted community, we have tasted heaven here, in church, haven’t we? Sometimes we taste great big gulps of heaven, and sometimes only the tiniest hints of the flavor of heaven—but we have tasted goodness and life and hope, haven’t we?
We have tasted heaven in covered dish suppers, and making lunches for Common Cathedral. We have tasted hope in the silence of worship, and in laughter and tears shared. Scripture is sweet, and hymns sung together are rich. Prayer nourishes. We have tasted grace in those moments you know that everything is going to be o.k. because you know God has your back, and you know you will be cared for. You have tasted hope in the times you have completely lost your faith, you don’t believe in anything, let alone God, and someone else believes for you. The power and permanence and peace of faith are tasted in coffee hour, theological debate, in youth mission trips, and even in annual meetings to pass our budgets. On our lips lingers the balanced and seasoned life of community lived in the absolute, unfailing love of God through Christ. Here at Eliot, we have tasted God. And God is good.
And yet…my mind goes back to the studio. I think about what my younger atheist colleague said: “Most of my friends grew up in the church, but we are atheists. But we long for community, but where do you find that? Some of us are having children, and we want them to have community, but where? Some people find it in church—I actually volunteer at the food pantry at the UU church on Thursdays. There is community there…but there should be something more….”
I piped up. “My church has community! And we are full of doubters, nonbelievers, seekers, believers, and questioners! It’s messy but deep and nourishing.” I was proud to be able to say that.
My friends…how do we offer the taste of community and faith to people like my potter colleagues? Those who are spiritual and not religious? Those who long for something more, but don’t know where to look for it? We know we have what some of them are looking for.
We have to learn how to describe this good taste of faith. And not keep it a secret.
On Regathering Sunday, Tony preached about this very thing—in different words. He said, But we can’t just preach to ourselves and our children. We need to find the words, the tools, the courage to carry the message to those who have not heard.
It tastes good here, doesn’t it? Sometimes we don’t know how to describe to others. But we are going to learn how to do this, together. Share what we have here at Eliot, with others. So today, I am going help you start thinking in this direction….
If worship had a taste
What would it taste like?
Would it taste wild and earthy, like blueberries, eaten straight off the bush?
If prayer had a taste,
Would it taste faint and precious, like the milky scent of a sleeping infant,
Would it taste strong and solid, like long hike in the woods?
If Eliot Church had a taste,
Would it taste like home, like the smell of fresh bread baking in the oven? Would it be salty? Or more like the mélange and variety of tastes that you get in a box of Jelly Belly Jelly Beans? Popcorn flavored, green bean flavored, pomegranate-apple flavored?
Talk about your thoughts on this with one another.
During coffee today. At home. In the car. At dinner. Please.
O Taste and See, that the Lord is good.
Amen.
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