Last Sunday after Pentecost-Christ the King year A

The Rev. Melanie Dickson Lemburg Last Sunday after Pentecost-Christ the King Year A November 26, 2023 A number of years ago, I attended a conference that was put on by TENS—The Episcopal Network for Stewardship. The speaker talked about how our understanding of generosity is deeply connected with our first memories of money and this, in turn is deeply connected with our understanding of who God is. The speaker asked us to recall our first memory of money, to reflect on what it taught us about generosity and how it impacted our understanding of who God is and to share that in our small group setting. My first memory of money began with my paternal grandfather, who also happened to be a Methodist minister. Pop was a growly, gruff, manly-man who was known to be a successful boxer in his youth. My brothers and boy cousins were all slightly terrified of him as he would often growl at them, “Boy, I’m gonna bite your ankles.” And they never really knew if he was serious or not. But I was the first granddaughter, and so I knew him differently. And one day when I was staying with my grandparents, Pop took me in his car to the bank where he opened a savings account in his and my names. (I still have the little bank book that they gave us where we wrote our deposits.) And over a period of time, Pop would save up the quarters that he emptied from his pockets every night; we’d deposit them in our bank account; and after we had saved enough money, we made a withdrawal to buy me a used piano that we could have in our home that I could practice on while I was taking piano lessons. As an adult revisiting this memory, I was struck by the fact that I didn’t have to do much of anything to participate in my grandfather’s generous act of saving up his quarters. I didn’t contribute anything except by riding with him in the car to the bank, and yet, I felt like I was a full-participant in the endeavor of saving quarters to get my piano. This memory gives me a tiny glimpse into what my relationship with God is like. How all I really have to do is (barely) show up, and God invites me to be a full participant in God’s generosity. Today is the last Sunday of the church year, the last Sunday after Pentecost, also known as Christ the King Sunday. It’s also the first Sunday of our church’s annual giving campaign which is titled Generations of Generosity. Eleanor Foster, the senior warden and I, chose this campaign because it is a way to tell the stories of those who have come before us, in our lives of faith and in the life of this congregation, as we approach the conclusion of our centennial year-long celebration. Each week for the next three Sundays, you will be invited to contemplate questions to help you reflect on the generations who have helped nourish and shape your faith, on what it means to live lives of generosity, and to tell those stories as a part of our common life. This will culminate on December 17 with a storytelling event, where we will share a video of many of you sharing your stories about how you have been nurtured by this faith community and your hopes for its present and future. In our gospel reading for today, we have the third in a series of three parables that Matthew’s gospel gives us in Jesus’s final hours. The first parable which we read two weeks ago is the parable of the wise and foolish bridesmaids in which Jesus is inviting us to live a mindful, joyful life. Last week, we had the parable of the three slaves who were given talents by their master and is an invitation by Jesus for us to live a daring, fruitful life. And then this week, we get Jesus’ last public teaching in Matthew’s gospel, the parable of the last judgement, in which Jesus invites us to live a generous, compassionate life. It’s tempting to read this parable as Jesus showing us that we can earn our place in heaven, or that our place in God’s kingdom is a reward for righteous behavior. But notice that the Son of Man says to the sheep, “Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world…” which shows that those who live lives of compassionate generosity are invited to join in the creative work that God has already done, as a free gift from God, an invitation to participate in God’s creative work and in God’s generosity; that when we practice our own compassionate generosity in our dealings with our fellow humans, then we are already active participants in God’s kingdom of eternal life, even here and now. i. Your invitation this week is to consider our questions for small group discussion: What is your first memory of money and how is that connected to your understanding of God? What important lessons have your learned from the members or events of a previous generation at St. Thomas? How has the influence of past generations affected how we have evolved as a congregation? Is the vision for how we live together as the body of Christ changing? In what ways? What stories does our church have that we should preserve and share? What is your vision of this church for future generations? i. https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2020/11/16/the-least-of-these-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-reign-of-christ-the-king-sunday

25th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 28A

The Rev. Melanie Dickson Lemburg 25th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 28A November 19, 2023 What kind of life does God want you to live? Or, what does it look like for you to participate in the Kingdom of God right here, right now? Our gospel reading for today is the 2nd in a set of 3 parables in the late chapters of Matthew’s gospel. Jesus has made his triumphal entry into Jerusalem. He has taught in the temple, fought with the Jewish religious leaders, and he tells this series of three parables immediately before he once again predicts his death in two days. We heard the first of the three parables last week—the parable of the wise and foolish bridesmaids, who get into a fight about having enough oil in their lamps to light the way of the late-arriving bridegroom. We have our parable for today, about slaves who are entrusted with talents from their master, and then next week, we’ll get the third parable in this series—the parable of the Great Judgement, when people will be separated before the judgement seat of the Son of Man based on how they treated people in extremis. With increasingly more urgency, Jesus is trying to teach his followers and us about what it means to participate in the Kingdom of God here and now. He’s trying to get people to ponder what kind of life God wants each of us to live individually and together as a community. The first parable (from last week-the one about the bridesmaids) shows that God wants us to live a mindful, joyful life. Today’s parable shows us that God wants us to live a daring, fruitful life. And next week’s parable (which, spoiler alert!, is the grand finale) shows us that God wants us to live a generous compassionate life.i. I asked our Wednesday congregation to reflect on a time when they took a risk, stepped out in daring that resulted in a more fruitful spiritual life. And we shared lovely stories about how people stepped out in faith differently to take a risk, how God called them forward in their lives out of their comfort, and how their spiritual lives have been forever shaped by that experience. All of the stories acknowledged, in some way, the vulnerability that their daring, their risk required. Because with the risk of doing something new there is always the very real possibility of failure. Now I’m someone who really doesn’t like to fail. And so what jumps out at me in today’s parable (besides some of the significant problems with the whole scenario of asking slaves who are powerless to step into a role that they haven’t been given clear direction around and haven’t been prepared for and then punishing the one who fails) is just how enslaved to fear the one slave is—how his fear of failure and punishment keeps him from thriving. And then he ends up failing and being punished anyway. A few weeks ago, I went to a conference at Kanuga as a part of my continuing education and formation. But unlike most continuing ed conferences I attend, this one wasn’t church sponsored. It wasn’t on church leadership or conflict or any other helpful tools for my ministry tool-box. This was a purely secular conference that is titled “Life is a Verb Camp.” I signed up because two of my favorite writers—Carrie Newcomer who is a poet and songwriter and poet and essayist Ross Gay—were listed as the keynote speakers. So, I took at fairly safe risk (I mean, it was at Kanuga, so how weird could it be, right?) and I went all by myself. The goal of the gathering is to create an annual, camp-like experience for adults to help nurture courage, creativity, compassion, and community, and, I’m not going to lie, it certainly had its weird moments. But the founder, a writer named Patti Digh told us that she invites poets to be the keynote speakers every year because “poets help us see the world differently.” And I found this to be so very true. There is no way I could have anticipated the gifts I received from this small risk of attending this new, slightly strange gathering. I’ve started writing poetry again. I used to write poetry all the time in my younger years, but the more sermons I wrote, the fewer poems poured forth from me. And with that writing has come a deepening in how I look at the world around me; it has brought a new intentionality to my experiences and encounters and a reflectiveness that requires the slowing down of my spirit. It has definitely been a stretching of my spirit and a deepening in my relationship with God and with others. So, your questions this week to consider are “What kind of life does God want you to live? What does it look like to participate in the Kingdom of God here and now? Reflect on a time that you took a risk, stepped out in daring, that resulted in a more fruitful spiritual life for you. And look for opportunities either this week or into Advent to step out a little in risk, in daring, in faith.” And since I try not to ask you to do things that I’m not willing to do, I’m going to close with a poem that I’ve written recently. It’s about a time when I took a risk here with y’all, and you met me exactly where I needed to be met, and how I saw it transform all of us. An Ode to the Church by Melanie Lemburg She sat curled small on a bench behind the open door of the church. Are you sad, I asked. And she nodded. Would you like a hug? She did. And clung to me like the poor motherless child she was. Would you like more hugs? She nodded. Well, watch this! And I put my faith in my flock filing out of church. Poor Kurt was our first victim. I opened my arms wide and he hugged me, maybe a little reluctantly. Her eyes luminous, she mirrored and hug after hug rained down on her- manna in her wilderness. And suddenly Charlotte stood before us on the arm of her sister. (Charlotte’s super-power is hugging.) Full body-arms pulled tight in a squeeze of delight-enough to lose yourself. We have never been more the church, the bride, the body of Christ, than on that day when we transfigured the holy handshake line into a holy hug line together for the motherless child in each of us. i. Much of this reading of these three parables together was inspired by this week’s Salt Lectionary commentary: https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2020/11/9/be-daring-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-twenty-fourth-week-after-pentecost

The Sunday after All Saints' Day 2023

The Sunday after All Saints’ Day The Rev Melanie Dickson Lemburg November 5, 2023 Today, the church is given the option to transfer our observance of All Saints’ Day to the Sunday following, which we are doing. We’ll renew our baptismal vows, because this is one of those Sundays the BCP says are especially appropriate for baptism. We’ll remember the saints and the faithful departed who have influenced our lives or faith. And we’ll name those members of this portion of the body of Christ who have died in the last year in the Eucharistic prayer. Plus, there’s the beatitudes for our gospel—what is known in Matthew’s gospel as Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. It’s a lot of different threads to knit together. A couple of weeks ago, one of our Wednesday congregation reference the beatitudes in her comments for that week, and she said something like, “The beatitudes are the path of our becoming.” (I’ve carried that around with me in my soul, occasionally rubbing my fingers over it like one of those polished rocks with messages on them that you can carry around in your pocket.) The beatitudes are the path of our becoming. It reminds me of a saying that we learned about baptism back in my seminary days. That is “baptism is becoming who you already are.” Baptism is becoming who you already are. We are all of us on this path of becoming together--created by God to be the best version of ourselves. But sometimes the world trips us up. Sometimes we trip over our own feet. The saints are those who walked before us or walk alongside us and inspire us in the different ways that they have grown into their belovedness, in how they continue to become better versions of themselves through their relationship with God. If the beatitudes are the path of our becoming, then what might they have to teach us about how God is calling us to deepen in our faith, to grow further into who God has created us to be? (And who has God created us to be? Each of us is made in the image and likeness of God, created as an outpouring of God’s love and made to share that love with others. You were made in the image and likeness of God. You were created as an outpouring of God’s love, and you were made to share that love with others.) One way that the beatitudes can be translated that may help us unlock the invitation of these so familiar words is to read them as “you are on the right path…” You are on the right path if you mourn, for you will be comforted. You are on the right path if you hunger and thirst for righteousness for you will be filled. You are on the right path if you are merciful, for you will receive mercy. You get the picture. And what if we expanded on what these simple, complex words and ideas capture to try to make them a bit more tangible by writing our own in keeping with the spirit of what Jesus is teaching? You are on the right path if you allow your heart to break wide open at the news of the world and refuse to let it harden back for you will find compassion there. You are on the right path if you don’t allow pain to unmake who you are holding onto the best of yourself for you will find respite. You are on the right path if you question for you will invite (and find) meaning. You are on the right path if you decide that if you will err, you will err toward mercy for you will find mercy in the erring. You are on the right path if you stay in touch with your gratitude even when you are suffering for you will find joy. You are on the right path if you look for peace and lift it up around you for you will embody peace. We’re going to take some time today to contemplate, and I’m going to give you two options on how to think about this. The first option is to continue contemplating this path of becoming that Jesus lays out for us in the beatitudes. What words in the beatitudes capture your attention today? Where might God be inviting you to deepen in your becoming in this moment on your path of faith? Or, you can think about the path of becoming that you have witnessed in one of the saints of the church or in someone whom you love who has entered the communion of the saints or it can even be one of God’s faithful saints who live and walk among us now. What has their path of becoming taught you about the life of faith? How might you be called to emulate that on your own path of faith?

21st Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 24A

21st Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 24A October 22, 2023 Enemies abound and loyalties shift. In the gospel reading, we see two long-time enemies-the Herodians and the Pharisees- teaming up against their common enemy—Jesus of Nazareth. Eventually, these two enemies will join together with another common enemy—the Romans, the occupying oppressors of their people, the foreign invaders—to entrap and kill Jesus. But before that happens, Jesus remains unflappable in his purpose, proclaiming that the Kingdom of God has come near and all are invited to participate, and he tries to remind them of what it means to be made in the image of God, as God proclaims at creation for each of us. He offers them the chance to remember what it means to be made in the image of God and the invitation to order their lives accordingly. Enemies about and loyalties shift within the story of the Children of Israel, Moses, and God. Moses has left them alone, gathered together at the foot of Mount Sinai where he has gone to the top to meet with God face to face and to receive the 10 Commandments. The people grow anxious in Moses’ absence, restless, and they create a statue of a golden calf to reassure themselves and to worship, fracturing their relationship with God through their choice of raising up a false idol, proving themselves to be enemies of God instead of those who belong to God. God reveals to Moses that the people have become God’s enemy by committing what is, essentially, a capital crime, and God makes plans to destroy God’s people and to found a new nation for God and Moses. Moses argues with God, trying to convince God to spare the people, and then Moses goes down the mountain and invites those who still belong to God to join him as they put to death by sword 3,000 men who had turned from following God. Moses then goes back up the mountain to try to convince God to take them back and to go with them as they leave Sinai and head into the promised land. And we see that at least one image of God is to relent from punishing, to lean into mercy, to be willing to be changed and shaped by relationships. And then there’s Jesus. As enemies abound and loyalties shift around him just days before his crucifixion, he doesn’t fight back, not really. He models the image of God in his persistent peace, in his unwillingness to go to war, in his willingness to give himself over into the hands of his enemies where he will be humiliated, tortured, and executed. And then he forgives them. All of them. Every single one. Enemies abound and loyalties shift in our world. War has broken out in the Middle East. Terror seems to triumph. It is oh, so very tempting to make this about us and them, demonizing enemies and heroizing friends. It is oh so tempting to build our own golden calf to safety, to security, to right versus wrong and good versus evil as innocents are harmed over and over again by the powerful. When we are really honest, we recognize just how alarming it is to realize how close we stand to the line between those who act as God’s beloved and those who act as God’s enemies. What does it mean, in this moment, for each of us to embrace that we are made in the image of God? What does it mean for us to embrace that truth, even for our enemies? How have we strayed in our actions, stepped over the line and become the enemies of God instead of the beloved? What are ways that we can walk the way of peace in this present moment? To look for peace around us, to draw it into ourselves and embody it, and to try to send God’s peace out into the world? Let us pray. (BCP p 833-A prayer attributed the St. Francis): “Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.”

20th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 23A

20th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 23A October 15, 2023 A letter to Lily Lynn Calver upon the occasion of her baptism. Dear Lily, Today is an exciting day for you and for us, your community of faith. Today, your parents and your godparents are taking an important step on your behalf in your life of faith. Today we all are saying yes to the fact that God has already claimed you as God’s beloved; we are reinforcing what God has already proclaimed over you, that you will always have a place of belonging in the Kingdom of God, that God has created you to be in full and joyful relationship with God, with God’s people, and with all of God’s creation. Today we say yes to all of that for you, and we also promise that we will help you remember that belonging, that belovedness as you grow here in your life and in your faith. Today, we will reaffirm our own belonging and belovedness alongside you. We will do what we can to remember our own baptism and the promises that we made or that were made for us on how we would try to live as God’s beloved. Today we hear the echo of the words that were said over each one of us as I say them to you: “you are marked as Christ’s own forever.” And we feel the truth of that love of God deep in our bones, a love that has shown through Jesus’s death and resurrection that God’s love is stronger than absolutely anything, even death. We remember that being marked as Christ’s own forever means that there is nothing that any of us can do that will put us outside of God’s love. And yet, even on this glorious day, our gospel reading gives us glimpses of violence and horror. It’s a story that Jesus tells in the temple in Jerusalem just days before his own death, a story that is meant “to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.”i It’s a story that leaves me with so many questions: Why do the original guests say that they will attend this royal wedding banquet but then refuse to go? Why is the guest who is at the banquet not wearing the appropriate clothes? What are the ways that each one of us rejects our own belonging in the Kingdom of God? And how might our baptismal vows serve as reminds to us of how to live more fully into our belonging? It’s hard to fathom for you now, sweet Lily, so beloved by your family, so cherished by this faith community, but just like each of us, at some point, you will taste what it feels like to not belong. Sometimes we are put in that position by others; but much of the time, we choose to reject our own belonging. Maybe it’s because we don’t feel worthy? Maybe it’s because we give ourselves over to deliberate distractions from the love of God. We choose other gods to worship or create idols because it’s easier than being in relationship with God and each other. We fall into petty conflicts like Euodia and Syntyche, and we forget the common work that God calls us to do together—to spread the good news of God’s love, to help extend the circle of belonging beyond our midst and out into a needy and hurting world. In so many ways, we reject our belonging and the belonging of others over and over again. So, we gather here to remember. To be forgiven of our rejection and to forgive. To taste that belonging again at God’s altar. And to be sent out into the world for another week to try to live our lives as those who belong to God, as God’s beloved. Our epistle reading for today gives us a glimpse on one practice that we can employ in between Sundays, to try to help us stay grounded in our being as God’s beloved, those who belong to God. It is the spiritual practice of rejoicing, of giving thanks. When my children were little, we had a nightly bed-time ritual of naming three things for which we were grateful. And even on the days when I was feeling exhausted and not particularly grateful, I knew that my children would ask me to name those three things, and so I would pay attention. And often that paying attention to the places in my day where I could find a small taste of joy was enough to remind me of my belonging in the heart of God. Today, sweet Lily, we, your family, promise to help you learn how to rejoice, to help you remember your belonging when you fall away from it. In order to do that, we have to practice it in our own lives as well. We encourage one another to be reconfirmed in our own belonging through our own baptism and to practice rejoicing daily in intentional ways. Today, sweet Lily, I am thankful for you, for the family who cherishes you, for your sweet baby assurance of your belonging in this community already, and that we will be able to walk this path alongside you as you live and grow. Your sister in Christ, Melanie+ The Big Question this Week: In our baptism, we say yes to God’s call to us as God’s beloved, and we pledge to live our lives as those who belong to God, marked as Christ’s own forever. Consider the ways that you have recently rejected your own belonging in the heart of God. Name three things for which you rejoice or are grateful. Try making this a daily practice this week at the end of each day. i. This is what Jewish New Testament scholar Amy-Jill Levine says is what Jesus’ parables are meant to do.

17th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 20A

17th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 20A September 24, 2023 This week, I’ve been thinking about complaining. Our [Old Testament and Gospel] readings for today are chock full of complaining, and after I read these readings for the first time this week, I started to pay attention to how often I offer or listen to complaints in my life. I was reminded of an idea that Richard Rohr had in his book Falling Upward that has stayed with me since I read it years ago. The idea that Rohr poses is that when we complain, what we complain about says more about ourselves and the state of our own spiritual life than it does about whatever we are complaining about. In my quest this week to understand complaining, I listened to a podcast about it. The podcast was titled The Hidden Brain and the episode was “How to Complain Productively.” In the podcast, a psychologist talks about a study that he did on bus drivers in England. And what they learned in this study is that we most often complain to people who we think will support us in our complaint. (And if we don’t find that support initially, we’ll move on in our complaining until we find a different person who will agree with us.) We then often can get caught in a complaining loop with that person that creates a sort of echo chamber. And when we get caught in that complaining loop, the study revealed that our anger goes up and our forgiveness and our hope goes down. So, what’s the answer? The psychologist suggested that we need to reframe the situation that we’re complaining about—see it from a different angle. Often curiosity can help us in that endeavor. Sometimes we can do this by ourselves, or sometimes we need the help of a sympathetic listener who can help us reframe.i In our reading from Exodus today, we see the Children of Israel wandering in the wilderness, and they are complaining that they don’t have enough food: “If only we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread; for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.” (It’s a legitimate complaint, albeit perhaps overly-dramatic.) But Moses is not a particularly sympathetic listener: “For what are we, that you complain against us?” … Your complaining is not against us but against the Lord.” But he does help reframe the complaint—"don’t complain to me! Take it up with God!” Now it’s easy to think badly of the Children of Israel about how they are bunch of whiners, but just think for a minute about how they have fled slavery in Egypt and are now wandering around in the wilderness. They are understandably anxious; they probably feel pretty powerless, and the one thing that they can do is complain. (And that’s probably just the tip of the iceberg of what their complaining reveals about their spiritual lives in that moment.) And interestingly enough, God responds to the peoples’ complaining in a sort of divine eavesdropping and offers to provide food for the people as long as they follow God’s instructions on how to gather it. So God reframes the complaint, reminding the people that this same God who has brought them out of slavery in Egypt is with them in the wilderness and still provides for them, and as a part of that relationship, they need to do what God asks of them. The story ends with the peoples’ complaining replaced by curiosity when they ask about the manna: “what is this?” It’s interesting to me that in this story, the peoples’ complaining is rewarded with response by God and an invitation into a deeper relationship with God. In the gospel reading for today, Jesus tells a parable that comes right on the heels of Peter’s complaint (in Matthew 19:27): “Look, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?” Jesus helps reframe Peter’s complaint by telling our parable for today, a parable about workers complaining about the generosity of the landowner and how they aren’t getting their fair share. When the all-day workers complain to the landowner, he pushes back and reframes the complaint saying, “‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree with me for the usual daily wage? Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?’” In both of these stories, the complaint gets re-framed within the context of God’s providence and God’s radical generosity. And interestingly enough, the lesson doesn’t stick for long. Just after this passage in the gospel, we see the disciples begin to fight about who is the greatest among them and who will sit at Jesus’ right and left hands when he comes into his kingdom (thanks for that, James and John’s mamma!). And we see next week in Exodus that the people once again start complaining, and this time it’s because they don’t have enough water. So, what’s the invitation (the big question) for us in all of this this week? I invite you to reflect on what you’ve been complaining about recently. What might it reveal about your spiritual life right now? Have you complained to God about what is bothering you? How might the Holy Spirit be inviting you to reframe the issue you are complaining about to see it in new light? i. https://hiddenbrain.org/podcast/how-to-complain-productively/

15th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 18A

Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 18A September 10, 2023 A few years ago, my husband David and I were stuck in a not-particularly-healthy spot in our marriage. The bishop recommended a book for us to read that’s by Dr. John Gottman and is titled The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work. Gottman and his wife Dr. Julie Gottman have spent years researching the typical patterns of relationships in their “love lab,” and this book is a result of those years of work and research. I appreciate Gottman’s premise around conflict in his book and it’s one that I take when doing pre-marital work with couples who I’m going to marry. It isn’t a question of when you’re going to have conflict in your most significant relationships; instead, the important question is how. Conflict is an opportunity to grow and to learn more about each other and ourselves. Gottman also weaves a thread throughout the whole book that is a reminder that in our significant relationships, we need to spend time and effort building those up so that in the difficult times, we can approach conflict in ways that will work to continue to build us up rather than drawing us apart. In the book, Gottman lists several “keys to managing conflict” in significant relationships that are worth mentioning here before we dive into a closer look at the gospel. 1. Negative emotions are important. Gottman writes about how in our most significant relationships, we need to know that “when you are in pain, the world stops, and I listen.” It’s important to try to listen for what is under the negative emotions and to have conversations in ways that encourage healing rather than creating more hurt. 2. Noone is right. What? That can’t be right. Gottman quotes his friend Dan Siegel who says, “There is no immaculate perception.” All reality is subjective, and so in all conflicts, the reality usually falls somewhere in the middle of the two sides. 3. Acceptance is crucial. In our significant relationships, we have to start from a place of acceptance of who the other is before we try to navigate any kinds of requests for change. 4. Focus on fondness and admiration. There are systems that we can cultivate in our closest relationships that help us nurture fondness and admiration for the other. They can help us mellow about each other’s faults and they help us tackle issues from the foundation of knowing that each of us is loved and accepted, “warts and all.” i. In our gospel reading for today, Jesus is responding to his disciples’ question earlier in the chapter about who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Jesus brings forth a little child to show them and then goes on about not putting stumbling blocks in front of these little ones. (Matthew likes to talk a lot about these little ones.) Jesus then goes on to tell the parable of a shepherd who has 100 sheep and when one is lost, he leaves the 99 to go off and find the one lost sheep, and he tells them that it is God’s will that not a single “one of these little ones” should be lost. Then our reading for today picks up—about what to do if you are wronged by someone. First, you must recognize your own negative emotions and how those have been impacted by another person, and you own those. Then you go directly to that other person to try to be reconciled. How many of you have ever done this before? It’s really, really hard, and it requires you to be so very brave. Most of the time, we don’t do this very first step, right? We either try to avoid whomever or whatever has hurt us, or we talk to other people about whatever has happened to us, and it’s usually the people who we know will agree with us. We gang up on each other, and we become entrenched in thinking that we are right and the other person is wrong (as opposed to the Gottman perspective that no one is fully right). But when we go directly to the person who we have a problem with, it shows that we value that relationship, that we trust them to try to work things out with us, and when it works, then ultimately addressing that conflict makes that relationship stronger. ii And I think two keys to those difficult, one on one conversations has to be that first, we go into them with the main goal being trying to repair a relationship that is important to us, and that second, we are willing to walk into those conversations with the understanding that no one is really right in this situation. Just think about how that might change how we have these conversations when we are attempting to repair relationships! Because that is what is at the heart of what Jesus is trying to teach us and his disciples this week. He’s trying to teach us about the lengths that we should go to try to repair relationships. But what happens when it doesn’t work? Because, let’s face it, we all have experienced times when we haven’t been able to reconcile our problems with someone. Jesus makes it very clear that estrangement is not a good option saying, “let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.” And what did Jesus do with Gentiles and tax collectors? He ate with them and continued to try to teach them the way of life of his good news. But we all know that sometimes, that just doesn’t happen. And those times when we are not able to be reconciled leave scars on our hearts and our souls. (In fact, when I asked the Wednesday group about a time when they had experienced accountability and reconciliation in a significant relationship or a church, only one person was able to speak about a reconciled relationship, and many more of us reflected on the failed reconciliation attempts and how painful that was for us.) Our gospel reading for next week will see Peter asking Jesus how many times he must forgive someone who has wronged him, so I’ll give you a bit of a spoiler for next week by saying that Jesus draws Peter’s attention through a parable to the importance of both unwavering forgiveness and mercy. In those times when we feel that reconciliation is failed, it’s important to recognize that in the Kingdom of God, nothing is ever lost. These moments of hurt can become for us opportunities to ask for God’s healing, to ask God to help us learn things about ourselves that can continue to benefit us and other significant relationships, and also to ask God to help us open our hearts to examining what reconciliation really means and looks like? What if reconciliation was less like the absence of conflict or peace and was more like growth in ourselves and our relationships? Then that can change how we look at what might seem to be old failures and see them in new light. Many of you know that I was forced out of my last church. It was an incredible painful example in my life of when conflict goes completely awry, and I felt for a long time that my relationship with that church could never be redeemed. But I don’t believe that’s true anymore. I’ve talked about how my relationship with you has healed some of the woundedness in me from that last experience. I also believe that God gave me the courage that I would not have been able to summon on my own to show up here willing to love you and let myself be loved by you. It’s miraculous when I look back on it now and was certainly an infusion of the Holy Spirit in and among us all. And while I won’t ever be a part of that former community again, I’ve come to realize that isn’t what reconciliation looks like for me in that relationship. Instead, reconciliation has meant the Holy Spirit revealing to me important truths about myself—about how no one was right in that conflict, about how there are things about myself that need to shift to support and strengthen relationships that are important to me such as the importance of compromising more and less intractability on my part and the importance of showing up with gratitude to help strengthen relationships so that the foundation of trust and appreciation is already laid when misunderstandings and conflicts do arise. Think about a time when you were not able to be reconciled in a significant relationship. What might God still be offering to teach you about yourself through that? Where might God be inviting you to grow? How might reconciliation look differently in that situation than what you hoped for or expected? i. Gottman. John M. The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country’s Foremost Relationship Expert. Harmony: New York, 1999, 2015, pp156-159 ii.