Ash Wednesday-March 6, 2019

Ash Wednesday- March 6, 2019 Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return… Ashes to ashes and dust to dust… All of us go down to the dust, yet even at the grave we make our song…. We who have buried so many loved ones here these past few months cannot help but hear the echoes of our burial liturgy in the words of Ash Wednesday today. Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return. This whole season just past we have cavorted; we have celebrated; we have eaten a lot and danced to the love train; we have, at times perhaps, felt like we could live forever. Today, we take off our masks; we stare at our own reflections in the mirror of our prayers and liturgy, and we see the shadow of death reflected in our eyes. Ash Wednesday and Lent are a time when we dwell with our mortality for a season. They are also a time when we are called to repentance. Now please note that repentance is not the same thing as penance, which is a popular practice during Lent. It is what folks do when they give up something for Lent. (This practice of penance can have a place in a healthy Lenten discipline, as long as it helps to focus one toward a re-orienting of our relationship with God, focusing on that which has become an impediment in our relationship with God, as opposed to mere self-improvement.) Repentance, which is God’s call to us during this season of Lent, means re-turning to God, reconnecting with God, reorienting our lives toward God. And it also means as the Biblical scholar Marcus Borg puts it “‘to go beyond the mind that we have’—a mind shaped by our socialization and enculturation” (Marcus Borg Patheos article March 4, 2014). When we begin this season of repentance today, we are turning away from not loving God with our whole heart, and mind, and strength and not loving our neighbors as ourselves; we are turning away from not forgiving others, as we have been forgiven and turning back toward God who loves and forgives us all infinitely. We are turning away from being deaf to God’s call to serve, as Christ served us and not being true to the mind of Christ, and we are turning back toward listening to God’s call in our lives and in our world. We are turning away from our past unfaithfulness: the pride, hypocrisy, and impatience of our lives; our self-indulgent appetites and ways, and our exploitation of other people; our anger at our own frustration, and our envy of those more fortunate than ourselves; our intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts, and our dishonesty in daily life and work, and we are turning back toward God, who dwells in each and every one of us and cherishes and loves all of God’s creation in a way that we cannot and do not. We are turning away from our negligence in prayer and worship, and our failure to commend the faith that is in us; we are turning away from our fear to be changed and our laziness and self-indulgence, and we turn toward God who kindles in our hearts the desire to be in relationship with God that is nurtured through prayer and worship and community. We are turning away from our blindness to human need and suffering, and our indifference to injustice and cruelty; turning away from all false judgments, for all our uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors; turning away from our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us; turning away from our waste and pollution of God’s creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us, and we are turning toward God, the creator and redeemer of all that is. Today and over the course of these 40 days, we are invited to be focused on repenting of all that separates us from God and from each other. But it’s not so much about wallowing in guilt for all our sins for 40 days and nights, it’s about turning away from death, from all that separates us from God and turning toward life—turning toward God, walking through this death that we so often choose for ourselves into the resurrection that God invites us to participate in. So I invite you to consider--how might you do Lent differently this year? How might this Lent be an invitation from God for you to go beyond the mind that you have and be transformed by God’s Holy Spirit to dwell more deeply in the mind of Christ? How might you let go of some of the guilt, the empty rituals, and invite God to help you turn away from what is death in your life—turning toward God, life, and resurrection? Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return… All of us go down to the dust, yet even at the grave we make our song… (Note, this sermon is a re-worked version of a sermon I originally preached in 2014.)

Last Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C

Last Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C March 3, 2019 Throughout this whole season after the Epiphany, Rev Aimee and I have been intentional about weaving a consistent theme through our sermons. For 8 weeks, we have shared personal stories in connection with the scripture readings for the day to illustrate the ways that each of us have been transformed by the manifestation of God in our lives and in our world. In doing this, it has been our hope that we would be modeling this for you, helping you to look at your own lives to be aware of the points in your faith and in your life when you, also, have been transformed by encounters with God, so that you can articulate those moments of transformation—for that is the true call of a disciple of Jesus. We are called to be open to encounters with God, to keep our eyes open; we are called to continue to be transformed by the grace of God more and more into the image and likeness of Christ. And we are called to share that story of good news, of our good news with the world (or at least with the people we come into contact with). Today, in our gospel reading, we have the culmination of the revelation of God’s glory through the person of Jesus Christ in Luke’s account of the transfiguration. Jesus has taken his three most trusted disciples up the mountain. Notice that in Luke’s gospel, the purpose of this special excursion is for them to pray. And Luke tells us that while Jesus is praying, he becomes transfigured. (Now, I haven’t had much time to research this this week, so don’t quote me on this. But I believe the Greek word that is translated as transfigured here can also be translated as transformed. So what’s the difference? We use “transfigure” in this instance to show that Jesus is transformed or changed in outward appearance but still recognizable. We see this at work in all of Jesus’s appearances after his resurrection. Those who see him initially don’t recognize him but then they do.) Luke then points out that although the disciples have been “weighed down with sleep” since they stayed awake, they are able to see Jesus’s glory and to witness this incredible event. As Peter offers to help build shelter for Jesus, Elijah, and Moses, a cloud overtakes them all and God’s voice says (presumably to the disciples): “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” Here’s what strikes me in this. This whole event only happens because Jesus and the disciples are engaged together in prayer. Prayer is the catalyst for transformation/transfiguration. Even though the disciples are “weighed down with sleep” they stay awake, and they persist in their prayer and because of that God not only allows them to be witnesses but God also speaks directly to them words of direction and affirmation for the coming days of hardship as Jesus will head down the mountain and set his face toward Jerusalem where he will be crucified. We cannot ever underestimate the importance of prayer in our faith lives—it is what creates space within us for God to transform us. And that might seem like a lot of pressure for us until we remember that the apostle Paul reminds us that we pray as a response to the prayer of the Holy Spirit already at work within us. In Romans 8:26-27 he writes: “ In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.” Think about what he is saying here! Prayer is already happening in us through the Holy Spirit’s power and initiative. We just have to make space to respond. When I was a Junior in college, I studied abroad, and I decided that I was going to come back from my semester with the answer to the question of whether or not God was calling me to be a priest. (I think I’ve shared this with y’all before.) So I prayed the same prayer-“Lord, if you are calling me to be a priest, please, let me know”-all throughout England and Europe until I’m not sure I was even expecting an answer any more. I kept praying out of sheer habit and doggedness because I needed an answer. And one day, out of the blue when I was least expecting it, God answered me, and in that moment, I was transformed not just in my own understanding of my vocation but in my whole understanding of my relationship with God. So now, we’re going to do something different. I want you to break up into pairs of two. You can get up and move around or you can stay with the person you are sitting closest to. In these pairs, you’re going to do two things. First you’re going to talk about a time when you have been transformed by prayer. It can be private prayer. It can be corporate prayer—like a church service, encountering God in the sacraments, like Eucharist. But I want you to share with one person a time when you have been transformed by prayer. And if you can’t share that, that’s ok too. Acknowledge that and speculate on why that is and what ways you might be more intentionally awake or open to how the Holy Spirit is already praying in and through you. And then the second thing (and don’t freak out about this) is for each of you in the pair to pray for the other out loud. Now really, don’t freak out—I can look at you and tell you’re freaking out, because I’m about to tell you how to do this, and I promise it won’t be hard. Go ahead and move to where you are going, and I’ll give you further instruction. So, first thing is to talk about how you have been transformed (or not) through prayer. I’m only going to give you 7 minutes to do this, so make sure that you allow enough time for both of you to share and pray.i. Then second, you’re going to pray for each other. You can do this however you want to do this, but if you are freaking out, here’s a really easy way to do this. First, ask one another what you want the person to have you pray for. Pay attention to the words they use and what they are asking for. Then as you pray, address God. It can be as simple as saying: “Dear God…” Then ask God for what the person has asked you to pray for. And say amen. If you have extra time, reflect with your conversation partner on how that felt to be the one praying for someone in their hearing and how that felt to be the one prayed for. When your time is up, I’ll invite us to proceed with the Nicene Creed. You’ve got this. i. The idea to break into pairs and pray for each other came from David Lose's post for this Sunday on Working Preacher in 2013. I have adapted it somewhat for my local context.

7th Sunday after Epiphany Year C

7th Sunday after Epiphany Year C February 24, 2019 I’m so happy to be back with y’all after a lightning-fast 8 day trip through the Holy Land last week. It was an incredibly rich and full experience that I am still processing and savoring. I had thought I might share with you about when we visited the supposed sight of where Jesus delivered the Sermon on the Mount, but alas, the lectionary has pulled a fast one and given us, instead, Luke’s version of the Beatitudes which is known as the Sermon on the Plain. Our gospel reading for today picks up immediately where we left off last week. The crowds have gathered around Jesus on a level place; they have come from all over to hear him, and they have brought their sick and their demon possessed for him to heal. Luke tells us that Jesus “lifts up his eyes” or looks up at his disciples and tells them this list of blessings and woes that is Luke’s version of the Beatitudes. Our reading for today is a continuation of that as Jesus says, “But I say to you that listen” and then he proceeds to tell his disciples (and the crowds who are listing in to his teaching of his disciples) how his disciples should deal with their enemies. And it is almost preposterous in its difficulty: “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. Give to everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask for them again. Do to others as you would have them do to you.” We’ve been talking about the upcoming Sunday readings at the Wednesday healing service every week, and what struck the group this week is how Jesus’s instructions to his disciples on how to deal with those who persecute them is counter to how we human beings seem to be hard-wired. So how can we possibly accomplish it? Thankfully, the lectionary has also given us a snippet of the story of Joseph and his brothers from Genesis as our Old Testament reading for today. This is toward the end of Joseph’s story. You will recall that Joseph was most beloved by Jacob his father of all his brothers, and he had the gift of interpreting dreams which had been given to him by God. What Joseph did not have, at that point in the story, was wisdom or humility, and he proceeded to tell his already jealous brothers that he had a dream which showed him that he would be raised up higher than all of them and that they would eventually worship him. So the brothers did what most jealous siblings would do. The sold him into slavery in Egypt. While serving as a slave there, Joseph was falsely accused by his master’s wife and thrown into jail. And that could have been the end of it all right there. But while Joseph was in jail, it came to Pharaoh’s attention that Joseph could interpret dreams, and since Pharaoh had been experiencing a rash of troubling dreams, he called upon Joseph to interpret them. Joseph divined that Pharaoh’s dreams meant that Egypt was about to have 7 years of plenty followed by 7 years of famine, and he instructed Pharaoh to start collecting the food and resources from the years of plenty to see them through the years of famine. Our reading for today picks up two years into the 7 years of famine, when Jacob’s sons have come to Egypt to seek assistance because they are all starving in Canna. Joseph revels himself to his brothers in our passage for today, and rather than offering them some well- deserved retribution, Joseph humbly forgives them and tells them how their actions, though meant for evil, have been a part of God’s plan to bring about good for all of them. It’s an astonishing moment when we think about all that has happened to Joseph and how he had been so haughty in relationship with his brothers before. And there is only one explanation for how Joseph could have reacted the way that he did. That is that he had been transformed by God’s grace. In our gospel reading for today, Jesus offers a refrain that our New Revised Standard Version translates as “what credit is that to you?” "If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” The Greek word that the NRSV translates as “credit” is charis which actually means grace. So what Jesus is actually saying is “what grace have you?” or “what grace is there in that?” This three-fold mention of charis or grace points us back to the nature of God revealed in the person of Jesus; it reminds us of God’s characteristic of grace that we, as followers of Jesus are called to model. It reminds us that it is only through the grace of God (and not through any power of our own) that we become transformed.i I shared with you before of a difficult time I had in the life of my last church. During that difficult season, the vestry had a service of reconciliation when we were invited to share one thing that we regretted during that season of conflict. We sat in a circle and went around, each person being vulnerable and expressing regret over things that each of us had done. When it got to be my turn, I shared a regret of something that I had done. And then came the turn of the woman next to me, who had been my biggest adversary in all the conflict. Her response to me of her regret was, “I regret that you did that, too.” And then she looked to the next person to go, her turn clearly being over. Rather than becoming vulnerable as the rest of us had and naming her own regret, she weaponized my regret against me. I felt like I had been punched in the stomach, and I opened my mouth to verbally eviscerate her, the words already forming there in my mouth and in my heart. But then I closed my mouth and sat in silence. For months after that, I wondered at her sheer audacity to use my regret as a weapon against me. But then later, I began to wonder on a deeper level, why I had not spoken those harsh words already bubbling forth from my heart into my mouth. I believe it is because I had been praying for that woman and her husband every day for months, not because I was holy or good but because I was desperate and didn’t know what else to do, how else to survive. And what I learned in that is that you cannot pray for an enemy daily, remembering them before God as a fellow child of God day after day after day without being transformed. I didn’t respond in anger (the way that really I wanted to) that day, because God was working to transform me through God’s grace, and God was, already, bringing about good from an evil situation. Your invitation this week is to pray daily for someone who has hurt you, someone you might consider your enemy. It won’t be easy. If you find yourself struggling with how to pray for them then you can do a couple of things. First, ask God to give them all that you would most desire in your life. Or second, you can just imagine placing that person in the hands of God and surrounding them with warm light. As we were talking about the readings this past Wednesday, Reverend Aimee shared with the group that she had listened to a podcast on conflict recently. She said the message of the podcast boiled down to two options that each of us have during times of conflict. We can be right, or we can be at peace. Which will you choose? i. The translation of the Greek and other inspiration of this paragraph are taken from http://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2019/2/19/grace-in-action-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-epiphany-week-7

4th Sunday after the Epiphany Year C 2019

The 4th Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C February 3, 2019 Last weekend, I got to make a quick trip to Jacksonville to see the musical Les Miserables. This was probably my 5th time to see Les Miserables because it is truly my favorite, and I discover new ideas and emotions every time I see it. One of the most intriguing characters for me in Les Mis is Inspector Javert, a policeman who spends years pursuing the main character Jean Valjean trying to bring him to justice. Javert is cold and relentless in his pursuit of Valjean, who served 19 years in prison for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his sister’s family and then broke parole. But what the audience knows from the very prelude of the show is that Valjean has had a conversion experience and becomes transformed in the way that he is in the world. Because of mercy that is shown him by someone else, Valjean becomes someone who embodies mercy and forgiveness—both asking and giving it, and he gives his life to taking care of an orphan child in the attempt to fulfill his vow and his debt to her mother. Valjean also has become transformed in his very person, changing his name and becoming the town mayor and a successful businessman. It isn’t until Valjean has the opportunity to kill Javert, but Valjean lets Javert go that Javert falters in his understanding of Valjean and the way of the world. Javert’s highest pursuit has always been bringing Valjean to justice, but when Valjean shows him mercy, Javert cannot reconcile this transformation in his worldview and he actually commits suicide. Last week, I preached about how the purpose of the church is to provide space within which people can be transformed. And I heard several stories over the course of the week (from you and from random people I encountered out in the world) about transformation. This week’s gospel, which is a continuation of last week’s gospel, has invited me to shift the focus somewhat and to ask the question “what happens when we don’t allow space for transformation—in our lives, in our church, in our world?” Jesus has returned to his hometown; he has gone to synagogue where he has read the scroll of the prophet Isaiah: “‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,/ because he has anointed me/ to bring good news to the poor./ He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives/ and recovery of sight to the blind,/ to let the oppressed go free,/ to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.’ And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." Which is where our reading picks up for today. At first the people marvel, but then things quickly turn ugly when Jesus starts speaking some hard truths to the people who have known him the best, the longest. And they rise up as an angry mob and prepare to throw him over the cliff in the anger. I don’t know about y’all, but I get it. I have been both the victim and the perpetrator of unwillingness to allow space for others to be transformed. When I was in discernment about becoming a priest, my rector put together a committee of people who had known me most of my life: our family physician, my high school guidance counselor, my long-time Sunday school teacher. It was mostly a good experience, but one of the women kept getting frustrated with me that I didn’t or wouldn’t answer the questions the way that she thought I should. She was unable to be with me in the space where I was, after having been transformed by time away at college and working with people in poverty in the inner city. The committee submitted their report, and it wasn’t until I met with the bishop that I learned that while the rest of the committee approved my moving forward in the process, that one woman had refused to recommend me for the priesthood. I was shocked and dismayed, and the kindly bishop smiled and said to me, “Oh, don’t worry. I dated her in college, and I know all about her. She won’t hold you back from becoming a priest.” Not too long ago, I was complaining to my husband that someone we had known in seminary, who had not been a very nice person in seminary, had moved up in the hierarchy of the church. And I was saying all sorts of nasty snide comments about this person. David looked at me lovingly and said, “You know, I’ve changed a lot since seminary. Maybe this person has too.” This week’s gospel reading reminds us of the inclusive nature of God’s embrace and how God often uses the unexpected, the outsider, the outcast to bring about the fulfillment of God’s purposes, to bring about transformation. Your invitation this week is to consider in what ways you are unwilling to encounter transformation—in your life, in particular relationships, in this church, in the world. [We see this unwillingness to encounter transformation in the other running rampant in our political parties and our national discourse right now.] I invite you to ask yourself in your time with God this week and as you are going about your days—do I allow space to be transformed by God? Do I allow space in this relationship for this other person to be transformed by God? What opportunities might I be losing or squandering by not allowing space for transformation? And when the opportunities present themselves, as they will, may you be open and undefended and curious.

Epiphany 3C_2019

3rd Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C January 27, 2019 In my opinion, it is the purpose, the true work of the Church to create structures and opportunities for each one of us to be transformed into the image and likeness of Christ. Let me say that again. Years ago, when I participated in the Cooperative College for Congregational Development (which is the sister program to our Diocesan Church Development Institute, which we have a team from St. Thomas participating in now), I learned about a model that shows the different sources of transformation in the life of a congregation. Imagine, if you will, a circle. One the outside of the circle are three different components. First--Study and learning which includes the Biblical witness and personal experience and application. Second—Action which includes stewardship, evangelism, and service. And then third is life in community which includes conversation, food, and silence. But at the very center of these three equal areas, at the center of the circle is worship and prayer because that is the heart of Christian community that feeds and powers all the rest. In our readings for today, we have two rare pictures of worship during biblical times. First, in Nehemiah, we see the children of Israel returned home to Jerusalem after being in exile in Babylon. And as a part of the rebuilding process, they hold a worship service where all the people are reintroduced to the Law given by God to Moses—the heart and soul of their faith. Then in the gospel reading, we have Jesus participating in a worship service in the synagogue in his hometown. He is handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, and he unrolls it and reads aloud: "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." “And [Luke tells us] he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, ‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’" Thus, Jesus offers his understanding of his mission to those who have known him longest in the middle of a worship service. (And while everything seems all hunky-dory this week, just wait for the rest of the story that we will have in next week’s gospel.) Transformation is hard. And it’s not something that we readily do on our own. If I’m really honest, I’ll confess that I don’t really want to be transformed into the image and likeness of the Christ whose mission is “to bring good news to the poor. …to proclaim release to the captives/ and recovery of sight to the blind,/ to let the oppressed go free,/ [and] to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.” That’s not really part of my agenda, even though I know it should be. Which is why worship is so important that it is at the center of the model, at the heart of a healthy Christian community. And it is why we as the body of Christ need to be in worship together regularly—weekly, even, if possible. We see this being played out in the portion of Paul’s letter to the Corinthians this week—a community that was full of all sorts of strife. Paul is reminding them that they are the body of Christ and like a body that they have many members. It takes being knit together over and over and over again through worship together for them to function as a healthy body. When I was in high school, one of my brothers got a rock tumbler for Christmas. Do y’all know about rock tumblers? Well, I didn’t. It was this smallish machine that had an opening where my brother put all these ordinary looking rocks. And then he added some water and probably some salt, closed up the little door, plugged it in, turned it on and left it. And the rock tumbler stayed on in our formal living room for at least a month. And it tumbled and jumbled the rocks together over and over again in that machine, until finally, when the month was over and my brother opened the door, out spilled these beautiful polished rocks. They had knocked all the sharp edges off of each other during their time together in the rock tumbler. It probably wasn’t a particularly comfortable experience for the rocks, but it was certainly transformative. That is why we need to come to worship every week. It is because in and through worship of God together week after week, we are like those rocks in the rock tumbler. We knock all the rough edges off each other, and we are polished by the Holy Spirit to become more and more in the image and likeness of Christ. So this week, I invite you to realistically consider your practice of attending worship. If you need to, look back at your calendar for the last month, the last two months… Have you been in church enough to be polished and shaped in the rock tumbler that is our common worship? Sit with God in this and offer to God how you feel about your practice. Ask yourself before God what, if anything, holds you back? Can you imagine what might happen in your life, what rough edges might get smoothed over, if you made the commitment to God and to yourself to be here weekly for just a month? In closing, I offer to you an excerpt from “a blessing for one who is exhausted” by the late Irish priest John O’Donohue that sums up for me the ongoing gift that weekly worship and daily prayer offer me: “You have traveled too fast over false ground; Now your soul has come to take you back. Take refuge in your senses, open up To all the small miracles you rushed through.”

2nd Sunday after Epiphany-Year C

2nd Sunday after the Epiphany Year C January 20, 2019 I have a confession to make. There were many times that I, as a relatively new priest, would say to my colleagues: “I’d rather do a funeral over a wedding any day.” (I think if there are times in our lives when God just laughs and laughs at us, and maybe even says kindly, “Be careful what you wish for” that this was one of those times for me.) But weddings are often so complicated—so fraught with heightened (and often unrealistic) expectations. There’s usually drama, often family drama; and if the couple is especially young, the sense that they have absolutely no idea what they are getting into, and that they are spending too much energy focusing on the wedding and not enough energy focusing on the marriage. But then something changed, and I started doing weddings for older people—people who had been divorced, people whose spouses had died and who had miraculously found love again, people who were past the first blush of youth and getting married for the first time who had worried at many points along the way that they had missed the window and probably would not ever get married. And it was these couples who helped me see past the wedding drama, the family arguments, the ridiculously high expectations and the blissful ignorance to recognize that weddings at their best are symbols of God’s new creation. In our readings for today, we have not just one but two passages about weddings. In the gospel reading, we see Jesus’s first act of his public ministry in John’s gospel which is the changing of water into wine at a wedding in Cana. This miracle becomes one of seven signs in John’s gospel, whose purpose is to reveal the person of Jesus. This first sign is a manifestation of God’s abundance. The second passage about a wedding that we heard today is from the Old Testament reading: Isaiah 62:1-5. This section of Isaiah is known as 3rd Isaiah. Scholars have determined that the lengthy book of Isaiah was written by at least three different writers over three different time periods. The first part of Isaiah deals with Israel’s breaking of the covenant and God’s abandoning them to be taken into exile in Babylon. Second Isaiah focuses on the hope for the return from exile in Babylon back into Israel. And Third Isaiah considers what happens after they go home again. And this portion of Isaiah for today is interesting because it does not start with the “happily ever after.” Rather it starts with the call by the prophet to God to make things right. In fact, the prophet offers lamentation on the peoples’ behalf, demanding that God make amends for forsaking God’s people, that God set things right. The prophet acknowledges that these people have known suffering, and that all is not yet put right, even though they have been restored to their homeland. But then the prophet speaks on behalf of God, assuring God’s people that they are going to receive new names: “You shall no more be termed Forsaken,/ and your land shall no more be termed Desolate;/ but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her,/ and your land Married;” This is significant because any time in the Bible, when someone is given a new name (think Abram to Abraham; Jacob to Israel; Simon to Cephas or Peter; Saul to Paul), it is a sign that God is doing something new in the life of that person. God is bringing about a new creation in that person’s life. In Isaiah’s passage for today, God is renaming God’s people and signifying that God is doing something new here, bringing about a new creation, and the new names also signify a change in relationship between God and God’s people, signifying a new commitment to the people on God’s part. The passage concludes with the prophet’s assurance to God’s people that God delights in them, and that God rejoices over them like a bridegroom rejoices over the bride. During the season after Epiphany, we celebrate, remember, and look for the ways that God has been and continues to be manifest in our lives and in our world. In walking with people who were going to be married who had suffered loss (either through divorce or death or long-frustrated hope), I learned about how God works in us a new creation. It is the gift of those who have known lamentation who once again receive God’s delight. I, too, have tasted this loss and delight. I was forced out of the church that I served before I came to St. Thomas. It was the work of a small group of people, and it became a long, drawn-out, public conflict that was incredibly painful to me, my family, and so many others in that church. I was called to that church as priest-in-charge, and on the outside, the conflict was about whether or not the vestry should call me as rector, but as with most conflicts, there was so much more under the surface. Finally, on a Monday in April, the vestry voted not to call me as rector. And that was the most heartbroken I had ever been in my life, and this after months of nastiness and heartbreak. On the next day, a Tuesday, I interviewed via Skype with the St. Thomas search committee. I didn’t know it at the time, but I have since some to realize that was the beginning of God’s work of new creation in my life, in my vocation, and in the life of this church. And not a day goes by when I am not grateful for that gift of love and life and delight again after that season of hardship, heartbreak, and rejection. So this week, I invite you to look for ways that God continues to be manifest in your life and your world. Think about a time in your life when you knew loss, heartbreak, or change and how the Holy Spirit brought new life, new love; how God began a new creation in your life. And then talk to someone about it; share with someone the good news of God’s delight in you. In closing, I’ll pray over you the blessing that I have been using and will continue to use throughout this season of Epiphany: May Christ the son of God be manifest in you, that your lives may be a light to the world. Amen.

First Sunday after Epiphany Year C

First Sunday after the Epiphany-Year C January 13, 2019 Thus says the Lord, he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. These words from the portion of Isaiah that is known as 2nd Isaiah are being spoken by God to the children of Israel after they have been taken into captivity in Babylon. We don’t know the state of the people, but we can imagine it. They have been forcibly removed from their homeland. They have been told repeatedly by the prophets that they have forsaken their covenant with Yahweh and because of their sinfulness, Yahweh has allowed for them to be vanquished and exiled. They don’t know what the future holds; they are overwhelmed and unprepared for where they find themselves; and they are very, very afraid. Twice in these seven verses, God reassures God’s people that God is still with them, urging them twice in this passage alone: “Do not fear.” But these words of God—“do not fear”—are not empty words in this passage. They are backed by the promise of God for redemption: “I have redeemed you.” Now, this means something totally different for us hearing these words today than what they would have meant to the original hearers. One scholar puts it this way: “To be redeemed according to Israel’s law means to be bought out of human bondage by one’s kin…[so] when God redeems Israel, God asserts close kinship, family relationship with them.”i So in this passage from Isaiah, God is telling the people in exile, “do not be afraid. I have claimed you as my family and bought you out of slavery; I am with you, and everything is going to be all right.” This past week, I watched the Netflix movie that lots of folks have been talking about: Bird Box. It’s an interesting exploration about fear and relationships. In the movie, Sandra Bullock plays a woman named Mallory, who is trying to raise two young children under some very unusual circumstances. A global situation has occurred in which normal people who are going about their lives suddenly and inexplicably commit suicide. The survivors identify the fact that there are some sort of mysterious force, creatures, (we aren’t really sure what) at work, and when most people see them, their eyes change and they are provoked to madness/suicide. The survivors cope by covering their windows and staying inside, and they discover that when they do have to go outside, if they blindfold themselves, then they stay safe. (In this instance, what they can’t see, can’t hurt them.) It’s an interesting take on fear, specifically fear of the unknown, and how self-enforced blindness can occasionally help but mostly hinder us in trying to deal with frightening situations in our lives. The other interesting aspect of the movie is that it points to how fear affects our relationships. Mallory and her boyfriend Tom have very different philosophies about how to raise the two young children. Tom wants them to help the children cultivate hope. But Mallory’s philosophy is to make sure that they survive, and it is her philosophy that wins out because the children do not even have names. She calls them “boy” and “girl” and they call her Mallory (even though one of them is her biological child). She is so focused on their survival that she doesn’t name or claim either of them. For me this week, this movie was in sharp contrast to what God is doing for God’s people in Isaiah, and it was a helpful reminder for me of how fear can distort our relationships, but how in God, we find our true belonging. And if the Isaiah reading isn’t enough to remind us of this, this week, we have Jesus’s baptism by John in the Jordan in Luke’s gospel, where God affirms that Jesus is God’s beloved. And we hear echoes of our own baptism in that--when we were “sealed by the Holy Spirit in baptism, and marked as Christ’s own forever.” It’s easy to remember all this, sitting here in our lovely, safe church, when all is well in our lives. It is a whole different matter to remember all this, to trust in God’s promise that we do not need to be afraid because we are already a part of God’s family, during the hard places in our lives: the death of a loved one, the news of the diagnosis or even the potential for a diagnosis, the child who has gotten into trouble and seems beyond the realm of your help or even your knowledge of how to help. In those times and in those seasons, perhaps it is more helpful for us to remember past times of fear and God’s faithfulness in our own lives. Back when I was a brand new priest and a relatively new mother, I became convinced that I was going to die soon. There was no rhyme or reason to it, no rationality. I just had this feeling that I was going to die. I spent a lot of time thinking about all that I was going to miss in my child’s life. (Jack hadn’t even been born yet.) And I was so sad and so scared. One day, I was driving on the highway in a torrential rainstorm, and I thought, “Well, this has got to be it. This is how I’m going to die.” And I was so afraid. But then I had an epiphany. I had been dealing with an elderly parishioner who was clearly dying but who refused to go on hospice. I had been trying to convince her that hospice would help her, and I was frustrated because she was spending so much energy fighting and denying that she was dying. And I realized that this woman, whose life to me had seemed to be almost over, had just as much passion to keep living as I did. And I was able to feel compassion for her then in a way that I hadn’t before. (You’ll be happy to know that I did not die. After that epiphany, I made it safely to my destination, and I no longer had the feeling that I was going to die.) This week, I invite you to remember a time in your life when you have been afraid and to think about how your fear affected your relationships with God and with others. How was your fear resolved? What did you learn about yourself, about God, about others? At the end of the movie Bird Box (spoiler alert), when Mallory and the children reach a place that seems safe, she gives them each a name, and then she tells them that she is their mother. May you remember this week and always that God has claimed you as God’s beloved, a member of God’s family; and that you have absolutely nothing to fear. No matter what happens. i. Exegetical Perspective for First Sunday after the Epiphany by Kathleen M. O’Connor. Feasting on the Word Year C Volume 1 ed. Bartlett and Taylor. Westminster John Knox: 2009, p 221.