Christmas Eve 2018

Christmas Eve 2018 “The weary world rejoices.” I was scrolling through Facebook several weeks ago, and these words jumped out at me from one my oldest friend’s pages. She’s an artist, and she had posted a number of her Christmas items for sale. And that is the one that, like an itch, caught my attention. “the weary world rejoices.” How do I know that line? (In my defense, this was before I was really listening to Christmas music.) So, I will confess, I eventually had to google it typing: “the…weary…world…rejoices” and search. And what I saw first, took my breath away. It wasn’t the title of the famous song to which these words belong. What I saw first was the line just before this one; it’s musical mate, if you will. And when I saw that line, I couldn’t help but sing it: “A thrill of hope; the weary world rejoices.” (I’m sure you’ve all figured this out by now, but the line is from O Holy Night.”) I reached out to my friend to see if she had any of the prints left, but she didn’t. And so I thought that was the last of it. But then, on the 3rd Sunday of Advent, Reverend Aimee referenced this very line in her sermon as she preached about messengers. And since I’ve learned over the years, to pay attention to those snatches of song that get stuck in my head, I realized that this verse of this song--“A thrill of hope; the weary world rejoices”—kept being sung in my soul by the Holy Spirit, who prays in and through us before we can even begin to think about praying; and therefore, it was, for me, either a message or even, perhaps, a messenger. But what on earth did it mean? What’s the message? How to figure it out? Well, like any sane person, I decided to listen to Nat King Cole’s version of “O, Holy Night” over and over and over again, to try to discern the message. (You’ll be happy to know that I did spare my family from this, by only listening to it over and over and over again when I was in the car by myself.) But nothing was revealed. So, then I went to the story of Jesus’s birth in Luke’s gospel to see if it could give me any clues as to the message of this persistent verse: “A thrill of hope; the weary world rejoices.” And there, I certainly found an abundance of the “weary world” that helped me to connect with the “weary world” of today that we find ourselves in. This story is located in a particular place and in a particular time. In this process of being registered, people are traveling from great distances and descending upon Bethlehem. And we can relate to busy travel at certain times of the year, can’t we? How many of you had to get on an airplane to get here tonight? How many of you drove more than an hour to be here? How many of you will drive more than an hour some time in the next week? Mary and Joseph are caught up in this great wave of travel, and when they get to Bethlehem, there is no place for them. Now, sometimes we modern people make the assumption that they can’t get a room in the inn because they are poor, but I’m not sure that is correct. How many of you have ever had to evacuate for a hurricane or other sort of natural disaster? Have you experienced all the hotels being full in a certain area and so you have to look further afield? And in this weary world in which Mary and Joseph find themselves, they are at the mercy of political forces that seem so far beyond their control. (We know something about that, too, don’t we?) And so they hunker down and have the baby in less than ideal circumstances, because babies come when they will, weary world or not. Then the shepherds get involved. Now, they really are homeless, living in the fields with their flocks. They are so poor they are really beneath the notice of the registration process. But suddenly, the glory of the heavenly hosts breaks into their weary world to tell them that the savior of the world has been born TO THEM this night, and they should go see him. “Do not be afraid [the angel says]; for see-- I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. And with “a thrill of hope”, they journey from the fields into Bethlehem, where they find the savior of the world who has been born to each one of them just as the divine messengers said they would. Whatever journey has brought you here this night, whatever weariness the world holds for you, know that the good news holds true for you tonight—as true as it was for those shepherds keeping in watch in the fields all those many years ago: “Do not be afraid; for see-- I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord.” The Trappist monk, Thomas Merton, said it this way: “Life is this simple: we are living in a world that is absolutely transparent and the divine is shining through it all the time. This is not just a nice story or a fable, it is true.” Tonight, and every night, may you encounter a thrill of hope as you live in this weary, transparent world through which the divine is shining all the time. May you be open to seeing it; hearing God’s messengers who proclaim it to you; and may you help others to experience this thrill of hope at the love of God which shines forth in this weary world this night and always.

Advent 4C

Advent 4C December 23, 2018 I’ve been thinking about the Magnificat this week, as our 4th Sunday of Advent will tumble quickly into Christmas Eve. The famous song of Mary, which has been set to so many different types of music and sung throughout the centuries is almost benign to me in its familiarity. When you really sit down and think about it, the Magnificant is an amazing statement that was sung by a teenager; Mary was probably about 13 or 14 when she was chosen by God as the one to be the mother to Jesus. And her vision for what the kingdom of God will look like in and through Jesus’s birth is one that can still speak to us, even today. This past summer, at the middle school session of camp at Honey Creek (where at least four of our St. Thomas youth were present), the 12-14 year olds there, were invited to re-write the Magnificat to reflect the concerns of modern day teenagers. It’s an interesting exercise to think about how Mary would say it, if she had it to do over again as a teenager, today. I was curious as to what they wrote, so I asked my friend, who was one of the spiritual directors for that session to send it to me, and as I read it, my curiosity was quickly replaced with awe. Just as Mary has taught us throughout the centuries, her Magnificat continues to speak, and for me, has taken on new life in the words of our teenagers who also wrestle with living more fully into the lives of faith to which God calls them and helping to be more fully a part of the kingdom of God. I’m going to read to you The Middle School Magnificat. And I invite you to take a copy and spend some time sitting with this, as you prepare for the annual celebration of Jesus’s birth two days from now.   The Middle School Magnificat Honey Creek, Camp St. Peter II, July 2018 My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; For he has looked with favor on his lowly servant. From this day all generations will call me blessed: The Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his Name. He guides those who are misled and protects the wounded. He brings happiness to those who have been judged, and he opens the eyes of those who cast judgment. He has scattered the intolerant; he has educated the close-minded and provided acceptance and equality to the downtrodden. He has welcomed the oppressed. He has made it so we can express ourselves without fear of being picked on or ashamed; he has removed the masks of the insecure. He has dis-empowered the bullies, but rescued their victims; he has raised up the kind. He has cleansed the world of violence and brought peace. The promise he made to our fathers and mothers, To Abraham and Sarah and their children for ever. This is what we pray for to be born into our hearts and our world at Christmas. May we have the courage of Mary and our teenagers to say: Amen! Come, Lord Jesus!

Elaine Hodgkins' funeral homily

Elaine Hodgkins funeral homily December 16, 2018 Martha said to Jesus, ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.’ Two tiny words in these two sentences are so very important today as we celebrate the life of Elaine Hodgkins and commend her to God’s care and keeping. Martha is encountering Jesus who has come too late to heal her brother and his friend Lazarus. And this expression of her faith in Jesus is also a true and authentic cry of one in mourning that is not often heard said aloud. The authenticity is found in the power of the tiny word: “If”… If only this. If only that. What might have happened differently; possibility that is now ended, cut off, cut short by death. Elaine Hodgkins had a variety of relationships with the people gathered here in this church today. She was the soul-mate to Phil; one who shared his expectations, his disappointments, his hopes and his dreams, and it was in her marriage to Phil that she finally found joy. She was a faithful communicant of this church, finding her community in and among this choir. She was an artist, working in a variety of different media—pastels and oils, photography, scrapbooking, and quilting. She was a mother and a grandmother, and her relationship with each of her children was as different and varied as they are, but all complicated (and dare I say? Challenging). She was fiercely independent, and she didn’t put up with a lot of nonsense. I found her to be really smart: an interested, interesting, and engaging conversationalist. All of us feel the burden of that “if” in different ways today: some perhaps in unresolved expectations; others in the face of a long-term and lingering illness which took a sudden turn toward hospice and Elaine’s death. But there’s another tiny word in today’s gospel passage that offers us the good news, even on this day, when “if” seems to loom so large. The word is “but.” Martha says to Jesus: ‘Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask of him.’ If the “if” in Martha’s statement is frustrated hopes and dreams and expectations, if the “if” is Good Friday, then the “but” in Martha’s statement of faith is Easter Sunday. The “but” is Jesus’s resurrection from the dead, which we also remember and celebrate this day. Jesus’s crucifixion is all of the worst that humanity and this world had to offer; it is broken relationships and frustrated hopes and dreams; it is disease of mind, body, and spirit; it is the times when we could and did not love as we should have loved. But… Jesus’s resurrection from the dead is God’s way of saying, “But…”. It is God showing, once and for all, that God can and will redeem all of our worst. God can and will redeem and re-create relationships, even as God recreates us in our bodies in eternal life. Jesus’s resurrection shows us, once and for all, that God’s love is stronger than absolutely anything; stronger than old age, disease, and infirmity; stronger than our broken and challenging relationships; God’s love is stronger than heartbreak and disappointment. God’s love is stronger than anything, even death. So whatever “if” you may bring with you here this day, as we remember the unique soul that is Elaine and commend her to God’s care and keeping, know that in the kingdom of God, there is always a “but” to go with that “if.” And that but is that in God, all things can and will be redeemed and made new.

2nd Sunday of Advent Year C

Advent 2C December 9, 2018 I’ve always liked to think of Advent as a season for nesting. It’s like the season in the life of a woman about to give birth when she is torn between times of a quiet listening and inward looking and times of frenzied activity of preparation—trying to get the home ready for the baby’s arrival. For me, Advent is the spiritual equivalent of this. (I often have to remind myself of this when I find myself doing seemingly crazy things during Advent that are the spiritual equivalent of a 8 and a half months pregnant woman climbing a ladder to try to clean the ceiling fans.) I was struck this week by two different readings. The first is the Old Testament reading from the prophet Malachi. Now, I can’t remember the last time I read the book Malachi—probably seminary. It is short-only 4 chapters. It’s placed as the very last book in the Old Testament. It is written by an unknown person. (The name Malachi means “my messenger,” which is the chief theme of the book.) It is written to the very diverse and restored community of Israel about 100 years after they have been returned from exile. The writer’s chief concern is with upholding covenants: the covenant between God and Israel; the covenant between God and the priestly class (aka the “sons of Levi”); and the covenant between husband and wife in marriage. The writer accuses the people that all these covenants have been and continue to be violated; he promises God will send a messenger to prepare the way for God’s coming and to purify all, so that they may be once again pleasing to the Lord. Change is a-comin’, the writer of Malachi promises. Most of us feel both excitement and apprehension when we know change is coming. Close your eyes for a moment and thing about what are you most excited about in your life, in your faith right now? What are you most apprehensive about? Advent is a time to dwell in both of those emotions—excitement and apprehension—and to try to be open to what may come, what ways we may be changed. The second reading I was struck by this week is a poem by Mary Oliver titled “Making the House Ready for the Lord.” Dear Lord, I have swept and I have washed but still nothing is as shining as it should be for you. Under the sink, for example, is an uproar of mice - it is the season of their many children. What shall I do? And under the eaves and through the walls the squirrels have gnawed their ragged entrances - but it is the season when they need shelter, so what shall I do? And the raccoon limps into the kitchen and opens the cupboard while the dog snores, the cat hugs the pillow; what shall I do? Beautiful is the new snow falling in the yard and the fox who is staring boldly up the path, to the door. And still I believe you will come, Lord: you will, when I speak to the fox, the sparrow, the lost dog, the shivering sea-goose, know that really I am speaking to you whenever I say, as I do all morning and afternoon: Come in, Come in. This Advent, can you imagine your soul as a house that has been cleaned, but could probably, always, use more cleaning out, more purifying. What in your soul or in your life is the Uproar of mice? What are the squirrels who have gnawed their ragged entrances? What is the raccoon who limps boldly past sleeping dogs and cats? And what are the sleeping dogs and cats? How do your excitements and your apprehensions fit into these characters in your soul that is a house awaiting the Lord’s coming?

1st Sunday of Advent Year C

Today’s offering is more of a meditation, my own prayers woven with the Old Testament reading from Jeremiah as we begin this new season of Advent and new church year. If you resonate with any of these prayers, then I invite you to take them and pray them throughout the coming week. Let us pray: O Come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily…to us the path of knowledge show and teach us in her ways to go. Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel! The days are surely coming, says the Lord, This past week, I have felt besieged by the false urgency of Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Giving Tuesday. Do this now! Hurry, get this deal today only! Give to your beloved charity today to help us reach our goal. Jeremiahs hope for the days that are surely coming is a helpful reminder to me that there are really only a few things that have to be done today. O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily… help me to see and dwell with the longing behind the urgency and the explosion of Christmas all around me without succumbing to it, and may it resonate sympathetically in my soul. When I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. My friend found 3 perfect little figs this week on her fig tree on her birthday, even though it is no longer the days for figs. And she thanked God for them. O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily… help me to wait and watch during these days, during this season, for small, quiet, unexpected gifts from unexpected places, for promises to be fulfilled that I do not even know to expect. In those days and at that time I typically feel so much pressure in this season leading up to Christmas; I often feel the burden of all the extra planning and decorating, baking and buying that are layered upon ordinary, everyday responsibilities. O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily… help me to create space for it all; to find joy in preparing even as I find joy in waiting and watching. I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David; and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. I have my own ideas about what constitutes justice and righteousness. Sometimes this is at odds with other people around me and their ideas of what constitutes justice and righteousness. How might I be shaped if I address God in my prayers this week as “The Lord is our righteousness”? O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily… reveal to me how your true justice and righteousness appear unclouded by my own selfish and small and wayward ideas. In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will live in safety. Everywhere I look there is so much fear. In myself, in my friends, and neighbors. Even in the Church. So many of us are afraid of what we might lose—safety and security, dignity, prosperity. I long for all this for myself, for the members of my family, for all whom I love. I believe every person longs for this. O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily… help me to pray and to work as diligently to preserve safety and security, dignity and prosperity not just for myself and those I love but for all people, and for all of your creation. And this is the name by which it will be called: "The Lord is our righteousness." What is the truth of these mysterious words: The Lord is our righteousness? What would the fulfillment of that promise look like in my own life, in the life of my family, in our community, our church and our world? O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily… through the gift of your Spirit, grant me the courage to be open to this mystery, this truth. O come, thou Wisdom from on High, who orderest all things mightily…to us the path of knowledge show and teach us in her ways to go. Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel!

26th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 28B

26th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 28B November 18, 2018 Those of you who are “friends” with my husband on Facebook will recognize this story that he shared two years ago and then again this past week. “In Crown Heights, there was a Jew, Yankel, who owned a bakery. He survived the camps. He once said, ‘You know why it is that I’m alive today? I was a kid, just a teenager at the time. We were on the train, in a boxcar, being taken to Auschwitz. Night came and it was freezing, deathly cold, in that boxcar. The Germans would leave the cars on the side of the tracks overnight, sometimes for days on end without any food, and of course, no blankets to keep us warm,’ he said. ‘Sitting next to me was an older Jew – this beloved elderly Jew - from my hometown I recognized, but I had never seen him like this. He was shivering from head to toe, and looked terrible. So I wrapped my arms around him and began rubbing him, to warm him up. I rubbed his arms, his legs, his face, his neck. I begged him to hang on. All night long; I kept the man warm this way. I was tired, I was freezing cold myself, my fingers were numb, but I didn’t stop rubbing the heat on to this man’s body. Hours and hours went by this way. Finally, night passed, morning came, and the sun began to shine. There was some warmth in the cabin, and then I looked around the car to see some of the other Jews in the car. To my horror, all I could see were frozen bodies, and all I could hear was a deathly silence. Nobody else in that cabin made it through the night – they died from the frost. Only two people survived: the old man and me… The old man survived because somebody kept him warm; I survived because I was warming somebody else…’ Let me tell you the secret of Judaism. When you warm other people’s hearts, you remain warm yourself. When you seek to support, encourage and inspire others; then you discover support, encouragement and inspiration in your own life as well. That, my friends, is ‘Judaism 101.’” In the letter to the Hebrews, we see a sermon to a discouraged congregation. The preacher is addressing a congregation that is suffering from decline; he is addressing a flock who is “tired and discouraged about the way evil seems to persist in the world. As a result the congregation has begun to question the value of being followers of Christ. Attendance at worship has begun to falter, zeal for mission has waned, and the kind of congregational life that is rich with love and compassion has begun to dissipate.”i He is addressing a people who are weary and longing for the not yet to be realized and fulfilled. The preacher continues to re-iterate the sacrifice that has already been made by Christ, and in the reading for today, we finally get to the part where we get the answer to the question: “so what?” So what if Christ is the once and future priest in God’s church, offering once and for all a sacrifice for the sins of all? What does that have to do with us? He writes, “Therefore, my friends… let us approach with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who has promised is faithful. And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching.” Two things strike me about this today. First, as followers of Jesus, we are called to “hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering” because we can trust in the never-failing goodness of God, even when it does not always seem so. Our annual giving campaign this year is titled Celebrate St. Thomas: Hope grows here. What does it look like for us as a community and for us as individuals to “hold fast to the confession of our hope without wavering”? This seems to me to be an essential component to hope growing here today, tomorrow, and many years into the future. Second, as followers of Jesus, we are called to “provoke one another to love and good deeds…encouraging one another.” The word for “provoke” here is literally translated as to agitate. Now, this may seem foreign to some of us. We don’t want to come to church to be agitated. But in true Christian community, we hold each other accountable; we are called to agitate each other toward being more loving and working more good deeds. We are called to encourage one another. But in no place does it say that we have to be so nice to each other that we don’t engage one another, especially when we are going astray. This doesn’t mean that we go spoiling for fights. But it does mean that we speak the truth in love when we see individuals disrupting the body of Christ that is the church and actively working against the hope of God’s faithfulness in which we have been called to live and to which we have been called to testify. In Yankel’s story about how he survived on the train car to Auschwitz, it was through Yankel’s work to agitate the old man, keeping him warm, that kept both men alive in the freezing box car. This work kindled the fire of Yankel’s faith, helping him hold on to hope, and it warmed both him and the old man, physically and spiritually. Who might you be called to warm, to agitate a bit this week, and in doing so warm and re-ignite your own hope? i. I had cited this passage in my sermon in 2012 on these propers. At that time, I was not able to identify the source, but it is not original to this sermon, nor was it original to me in 2012.

25th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 27B

25th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 27B November 11, 2018 At first glance, our gospel reading for today seems like a preacher’s dream come true. Here we find ourselves at week three of our annual giving campaign: Celebrate St. Thomas: Hope Grows Here; and what does the lectionary give me to preach on but the story of the poor widow who gives absolutely everything she had to support her church. But unfortunately for me, there are more layers to this story that complicate its application in our annual giving campaign season. Jesus is clearly condemning “the church” or the institution of the temple and those who benefit from the ways in which it is corrupt. The Hebrew Scriptures are pretty clear that God expects God’s people to take care of those who are vulnerable, to take care of the very widow who is dropping her last two coins into the treasury. So, it is hard to tell if Jesus is using the story to commend her faith or to condemn the very institution that she supports. This past week, I listened to the Jesuit podcast Pray As You Go for today’s gospel reading. And, as usual, the Jesuits had a more thoughtful twist on this gospel. Here is what they said. “In the unremarkable action of a nobody, a poor widow without even a name, Jesus sees a great mystery: the mystery of God. Take a moment now to look back over the last month or so, to call to mind some small, unspectacular act of self-giving which you may have seen without fully registering it… in your family life, at work, in the street, or something you heard about on the news.” “Now let that person be present to you in your memory. Look at their face. Hear their voice. Allow the reality they represent into your heart – to touch you deep down, to move you, perhaps to invite you…” “When we open our hearts to the best side of human nature, strong feelings are often stirred – maybe a desire to be generous ourselves, or maybe quite the opposite, feelings of fear or doubt about ourselves. Whatever has been stirred within you in the last few minutes, take it to God now, speaking as you would to a friend about what you feel, what you desire…”i There are two different ways to think about the action of the widow in the gospel reading. One way is to see her “small unspectacular act” as an act of sacrifice—of giving away something that she would surely miss. The other is to see her “small unspectacular act” as an offering of herself, a way of giving that helps her to live out her faith within the community. When we talk about stewardship, we are talking about the latter option. We are talking about examining our lives and asking in what ways can we give offerings of ourselves to God and each other in thanksgiving and in joy and in hope that God’s future will be brought to fulfillment in this place through our small unspectacular acts of self-giving. Do y’all remember the definition of stewardship that I have talked about off and on in my year and a half here? “Stewardship is all that I do with all that I have after I say ‘I believe.’” Stewardship is small, unremarkable acts of self-giving that well up from our faith and our hope, from our gratitude and our joy. So this week, I invite you to prayerfully consider what those small, unspectacular acts of self-giving will look like in your own faith life in connection with how you give money away. I invite you to consider moving deeper into faithfulness in your giving, which will look different for every different person or family. One concrete way to do this is to consider where your pledge or giving to your faith community fits into your budget. I once had a parishioner who told me his life and his faith were changed when we looked at his bank account during the annual giving campaign one year and he realized that he gave more to his two golf club memberships than he did to his faith community. And it doesn’t have to be golf—it could be eating out, going on vacations or weekends away. I invite you as an exercise in your faith to spend some time imagining what small, unspectacular act of self-giving might you make in your giving to God through the mission and ministry of St. Thomas in the coming year. For some it may mean being more intentional in how and when you give, either through a pledge or through some sort of regularity. For some it may mean examining how you spend money and asking yourself if that truly reflects your faith priorities. For some, it may mean encountering and offering to God strong feelings that this raises in us—both the desire to be more generous and the fear and doubt about how we will do that. As you engage prayerfully in what may be challenging work, may you rest in the awareness and the assurance that the mystery of God can be found in small, unspectacular acts of self-giving; and that God loves you; God has created you good; and God blesses you. Always. i. https://www.pray-as-you-go.org/home/ November 10/11, 2018

The Sunday after All Saints' Day--2018

The Sunday after All Saints’ Day November 4, 2018 Last month, when I came back from traveling to Mississippi for my grandmother’s funeral, I returned to Savannah with a treasure. While I was home, I found a number of old savings bonds that I had received as a teenager from my great-aunt, who we called Retsie. Retsie, whose given name was Margaret (where I got the Margaret in Melanie Margaret Dickson Lemburg and also Mary Margaret Lemburg) was my father’s mother’s sister. She was a retired school teacher who never married, and she was a close to me as a third grandmother. (When my middle brother Jonathan was born, I stayed with Retsie, who lived right across the street from us.) I spent many hours of my childhood with Retsie. She never did drive, so we would walk to the Krystal down from her house and visit the Woolworth’s. Retsie lived frugally, and she had a very structured routine into which she would fold me when I came to visit. But she would also take trips around the world with her girl friends, and she would bring me back souvenirs from distant lands. With her I learned about order and also about a different kind of feminine independence. In my teenage years, Retsie began giving me savings bonds for special occasions. I learned to set them aside, and then I forgot about them for 20 years. Just recently I heard that the Government is going to discontinue savings bonds, and I remember I had these. So I retrieved them, and I took them down to the bank to see if they were still valid. Well, it was quite an ordeal to get these bonds cashed, and as I stood there while the teller worked, I thought about Retsie, about how much I missed her, even though she’s been dead 16 years. I thought about all I had learned from her, and I realized I knew exactly how I was going to use the money from those bonds she gave me so long ago. I was going to use it to help fund my trip to the Holy Land early next year. Today we celebrate the Sunday after All Saints’ Day, one of the 7 major feasts in the church year when it is especially appropriate to have baptisms. Our readings for today name the ever-present reality of death, and the acknowledgement that when those who we love die then we are left to mourn. (I once planned a funeral with a son who was burying a parent who chose today’s gospel reading for the funeral because it was important for him that Jesus, too, mourned when those he loved had died). Grief is not unchristian, our prayer book reminds us. Rather it is a part of the way that we love in this life, and it is an acknowledgement that when we lose those we love we are forever changed. This past week, I read a meditation by the Franciscan priest Richard Rohr that was talking about divine love. And in that meditation Rohr writes, “all human loves are an increasingly demanding school preparing us for an infinite divine love.” He continues, “Today we recognize this school as the only real training ground for “All the Saints,” and it can never be limited to those who have fully graduated. As the entire New Testament does, we must apply the word “saints” to all of us who are in kindergarten, primary school, middle school, high school, college, and doing graduate studies. Love is one shared reality, and our common name for that one shared reality is “God.”i The New Testament talks about “saints” 20 times, and it’s not talking about stained-glass people living perfect lives of faithfulness that we could only dream about. Saints, in the New Testament, refer to “God-lovers.” One of our old, beloved hymns puts it, “they loved their Lord so dear, so dear, and his love made them strong.” Saints are those God-lovers, both in our own lives and in the life of the body of Christ who walk with us a ways in the school for divine love, who teach us about God through the way that they love God and the way that they love us. So, in the light of our human loves being a school for the divine love for each and every one of us, our baptismal vows give us the frame-work within which to learn, over and over again through the course of our entire lives. As we renew our baptismal vows today and maybe even spend some time with them in reflection over the coming week, we can ask ourselves the following questions. “How are we loving God and others in our lives?” “How can we love God and others even more?” “When do we fail to love God and others?”ii Now, after the sermon ends, I invite you to come forward and light a candle for the saint or the saints that you remember in your life today. Remember them for how they helped you learn to love God and to love others through their love for you; and as you light your candle from the Paschal candle, may you hold fast to the hope that death is not the end but a change, that we are all knit together in the communion of the saints, even now, and that we will all feast together again at God’s table, where we will dwell forever in the light of the undying, unending, unyielding love of God. i.Richard Rohr’s meditation for November 1, 2018: https://cac.org/self-giving-2018-11-01/ ii. These questions came from the article Learning to Love God and Love Others Well on All Saints Day by Emily Watkins on November 1, 2018 at http://www.growchristians.org/2018/11/01/learning-to-love-god-and-love-others-well-on-all-saints-day/

23rd Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 25B

23rd Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 25B October 28, 2018 I want to start with a quick Q&A today. What is the worst, most unhelpful thing someone has said to you when you were suffering? How about one of these… “I know just how you feel.” “It’s for the best.” “Keep a stiff upper lip.” “At least...” “You should or shouldn’t” “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle” “It’s God’s will.” “Suffering is good for you. It builds character.” (That’s what they used to say to us in seminary…) How many of you have had someone say one of these things to you? I won’t ask you how many of you have been the well-meaning friend who said one of these to someone else who was suffering, but I suspect none of us is immune from having done this either. In light of all this, the book of Job may have been written for us. Now, I know what you’re thinking because I’ve thought it too: “Ugh, Job! I hate that book! Why on earth would anyone want to preach on that?” Well, friends, I don’t really know the answer to that. All I know is that I (and the other two preachers who have been in this pulpit over the last three weeks) had managed to successfully avoid engaging the book of Job for the last month, but today that success has come to an end. So let’s talk about Job. We’ve heard four different passages from this book over the last four Sundays. It’s a book of the bible whose time setting is deliberately ambiguous beginning with the line: “There was once a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job.” The beginning goes on to tell us that “Job was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil.” But of course, don’t you know, there has to be drama. At the heavenly convocation, the adversary engages in a bet with God saying: “Does Job fear God for nothing?” Have you not protected him and everything he has and have you not blessed all the work of his hands so that his possessions increased? “But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.” And God takes the bet, and tells the adversary that Job is now in his power but he can do anything except to stretch out his hand against Job and harm him physically. So the adversary wreaks all kind of disaster on Job: his oxen and donkeys are stolen by the Sabeans; the fire of God falls from heaven upon all his sheep and burns them up; the Chaldeans make a raid and carry off all his camels; a great wind blows upon the house where all Job’s children are eating together and all of them are killed; and all of his servants (except three messengers) are killed in all these simultaneous disasters. Job responds by tearing his robe, shaving his head, falling on the ground and saying: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb and naked shall I return there; the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” So the adversary goes back to God and says that’s all fine and good, but I bet if you let me harm his body, he will still curse you to your face, and God says, ok, give it a try. So the adversary inflicts loathsome sores all over Job, from his head to his foot. Job’s wife encourages him to curse God and die, but Job responds to her: “You speak as any foolish woman would speak. Shall we receive the good at the hand of God, and not receive the bad?” (And that’s just the first two chapters of the book!) The next 29 chapters of the book consist of round after round of debate and rants between Job and his “friends.” They are debating the notion that is prominent in scripture of retributive justice: “that God so orders the world that everyone receives reward or punishment commensurate with his or her behavior, thus maintaining a morally coherent environment that encourages ethical responsibility.”i In other words: good things will happen to good people and bad things will happen to bad people. In our world view, we refer to this as “karma.” Finally, after Job has questioned and ranted about God’s justice and demanded an audience with God, God shows up in a whirlwind and instead has some questions for Job: “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?” This goes on for a while, and then Job, having received the audience requested from God answers God meekly with our reading from today: he tells God that he had heard of God but now he has encountered God directly, and he seems to be transformed by this encounter. God tells Job he needs to pray for his awful friends, and after he does, God restores everything to Job in even greater abundance, including giving him 10 more children. I don’t know about y’all, but part of the reason that I have always struggled with Job is because this happy ending rings hollow for me. And maybe that is the point. When we experience great suffering, it changes us, and no matter how hard we might try, we can’t just wish our way back to the way we were before. The lesson that this difficult book has taught me in the wrestling with it this week is that when we try to explain or even understand suffering in our world and God’s part in it, we fail. God is good and the mystery of God’s fullness as well as the way that our actions (both good and bad) affect us and each other will always be unfathomable to us in this life. Sometimes things happen and there is just no explanation, just no reason. But Job and Jesus show us that God does not abandon us, even when it feels like it, even when we are at our lowest. God is present and suffers with those who suffer. The Facebook “On This Day” feature revealed to me a post I shared three years ago titled When the Going Gets Tough… by Katrina Kenison. It gets to the very heart of what we are called to when the going gets tough, either when we are suffering or when we are called to sit with someone else who is suffering. Rather than offering one of those easy, empty sayings that none of us appreciate hearing, here is a different way: “When the going gets tough may I resist my first impulse to wade in, fix, explain, resolve, and restore. May I sit down instead. When the going gets tough may I be quiet. May I steep for a while in stillness. When the going gets tough may I have faith that things are unfolding as they are meant to. May I remember that my life is what it is, not what I ask for. May I find the strength to bear it, the grace to accept it, the faith to embrace it. When the going gets tough may I practice with what I’m given, rather than wish for something else. When the going gets tough may I assume nothing. May I not take it personally. May I opt for trust over doubt, compassion over suspicion, vulnerability over vengeance. When the going gets tough may I open my heart before I open my mouth. When the going gets tough may I be the first to apologize. May I leave it at that. May I bend with all my being toward forgiveness. When the going gets tough may I look for a door to step through rather than a wall to hide behind. When the going gets tough may I turn my gaze up to the sky above my head, rather than down to the mess at my feet. May I count my blessings. When the going gets tough may I pause, reach out a hand, and make the way easier for someone else. When the going gets tough may I remember that I’m not alone. May I be kind. When the going gets tough may I choose love over fear. Every time.”ii When the going gets tough, may God be with you, and may you know the strength of God’s presence. Amen. Throntveit, Mark. Exegetical Perspective for Proper 24 from Feasting on the Word Year B Vol 4: WJK, 2009, p. 175 https://onbeing.org/blog/when-the-going-gets-tough/

Rebecca and Jason's Wedding Homily

Rebecca and Jason’s wedding October 13, 2018 I was struck by a common theme weaving through the readings that Rebecca and Jason have chosen for this holy day. It’s the theme of blessing. In the reading for Tobit, Tobit and Sarah pray together to bless God and then to ask God’s blessing to be upon their union. The Ephesians reading offers God’s blessing to its reader/listener. And of course the Beatitudes are the quintessential passage of blessing in the gospels. This common theme shouldn’t be surprising, perhaps, because, after all, isn’t that what we are gathering together to do today? (It even says it on the front of the bulletin. It is the “celebration and blessing of a marriage.” But there is something surprising about all of this. That is the unexpected nature of the blessings that these scriptures talk about. Tobit talks about the blessing in marriage of finding a helper. He also asks God that they “may find mercy and grow old together.” The unexpected blessings in Ephesians are that the readers/listeners may be “rooted and grounded in love” and that they may be “filled with the fullness of God.” And then the gospel reading is all about unexpected blessings—how those whom the world would scorn for their suffering or their littleness are actually the ones who will be blessed by God. Jesus teaches that God’s unexpected blessings will be found in times of mourning, persecution, and peacemaking. Today, Rebecca and Jason, you will make your vows to one another before your gathered community of faith and your family and friends. And you will kneel before God to receive God’s blessing upon you both and upon your marriage. We will ask that God will pour out the abundance of God’s blessing upon y’all—defending you from every enemy, leading you into all peace. We will ask that your love for each other may be a seal upon your hearts, a mantle about your shoulders, and a crown upon your foreheads. We will ask God to bless you in your work and companionship; in your waking and sleeping; in your joys and your sorrows; in your life together and in your deaths because your marriage will encompass all of those things and more. But the thing that I want you to remember today, and especially in all the days to come, is that I invite you every day to look for the unexpected blessings that marriage brings you. Look for the ways that the other is a helper to you and for the ways that you can be a helper to the other. Pay attention to the ways that you both find mercy together. Seek out the blessing of your love in times when each of you individually and both of you together mourn. And listen for the ways that God blesses you in your peacemaking-out in the world and in your life together. What a joy it is for us to share this day with you. In the days and years to come, may you find God’s mercy and much joy and may you grow old together. Amen. Amen.

20th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 22B

20th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 22B October 7, 2018 “Sometimes the issue isn’t the issue.”i I was reminded of the truth of these words this past week, as I gathered with colleagues from around the diocese to learn about conflict management. In fact, I would go so far as to say that most of the time, in conflict situations, the issue isn’t really the issue. Those of you who are familiar with organizational development theory will remember the diagram of the iceberg. And those of you who know the story of the Titanic will remember that it wasn’t the part of the iceberg that they saw above the water that did the damage to the Titanic. What they saw wasn’t the issue. It was what was under the water that sunk the Titanic. The Lutheran pastor David Lose starts his blog post this week with that line: “Sometimes the issue isn’t the issue.” And he’s talking about the gospel passage for this Sunday. Our gospel for today is one passage in a series of passages where Jesus has been specifically teaching his disciples about discipleship. Then, Mark tells us that the Pharisees come to where Jesus is teaching in public and they seek to test him by asking him about divorce. Jesus answers them with a question, and then responds that the law was written “because of [their] hardness of heart.” When they are alone, Jesus’s disciples question him further about what he has said, and he elaborates further. And then we see him become indignant with his disciples when they try to keep people from bringing children to Jesus for his blessing. Now there is much that has been written about Jesus’s stance on divorce in this passage. It is certainly difficult to hear in our modern context, where I doubt there is anyone here in this church who has been untouched by divorce in some form or fashion. And I will remind you that in Jesus’s time, women and children were property, and the Jewish law said that a man could divorce a woman “if she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her…” (Deuteronomy 24:1-4) And in Palestine, women were not even allowed to sue for divorce at all. (If you struggle with this scripture, and want to talk to me more about it, then I hope you will call me.) But I want us to remember that “sometimes the issue isn’t really the issue.” The issue here isn’t really about divorce. Sure, that’s what the Pharisees bring up to try to trap Jesus. But the issue here, Jesus is saying, is really hardness of heart. The Pharisees have it. The disciples have it. We have it. And we can see the opposite of hardness of heart in the open-heartedness of the children and the people who bring them to Jesus for his blessing. It is our hardness of heart that leads to our sin and our broken relationships with each other. It is for our hardness of heart-to protect us from ourselves-that God gave us the law. And it is for our hardness of heart that Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead, transforming all of creation and us through the power of God’s love. We are saved, over and over again, from our hardness of heart through the grace of God in the Holy Spirit working in and among us, in our lives, in our world. This past week, one of my colleagues and I were talking about how we had seen God this past week in our conflict management training. He observed that we were all asked to bring a conflict to talk about, so we all came with these conflicts, some of which were clearly very painful situations for the individuals involved and the churches. We learned some tools to use to assess them, and we prayed about them together, and we talked about them together, and we created action plans. Then we laid our conflicts and our action plans on the altar at the closing Eucharist where they were --all of them--blessed. Where we came with these messes that we were feeling frustrated about, and probably a fair amount of hardness of heart, we left finding both ourselves and the situations transformed by the Holy Spirit’s gift of new ways of seeing and a good dose of hope. Sometimes the issue isn’t really the issue. If you find yourself in conflict with someone else, I invite you to take a step back and to consider if there might be more to the matter than first meets the eye. Then, I invite you to remember that the only person you can control is yourself. I invite you to ask the Holy Spirit to remove from you your hardness of heart and to help you be more open-hearted. And then pray for the person with whom you are in conflict, or pray for the one you consider to be your enemy. Ask God for that person to receive all the good things that you would want for yourself. God wants us to be in relationship with God and with each other; God’s grace can and will transform us if we will have it. i. http://www.davidlose.net/2018/10/pentecost-20-b-the-issue/

18th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 20B

18th Sunday after Pentecost- Proper 20B September 23, 2018 What does it mean to be the greatest? This question resonates across the centuries from the disciples’ quarreling to our own day. From a pop song called The Greatest (which I threatened some of our youth that I would rap in the sermon today), to the popular movie The Greatest Showman to the political slogan “Make America Great Again,” our culture seems to be obsessed with greatness. So, this gospel reading for today is really difficult for us because we know, deep down in our hearts, that just like the disciples, we don’t really get it either. Jesus has, for the second out of three times in Mark, taken himself and his disciples away from the crowds, so that he can tell them about his impending death and try to help prepare them for when he’s gone. But they just can’t get it. We see they are so confused and afraid that they cannot even formulate questions for him about what he is trying to teach him. They try to fill that void of confusion and fear by arguing over who is greatest. Instead of the self-sacrifice and service and courage that Jesus is trying to teach them about, they become fearful, close-minded, and self-absorbed. So Jesus sits down with them (which is the posture that Rabbis would take when teaching), and he tells them: “Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” And then he brings in a child, the lowest of the low in that society, and tells them this is what they must be: vulnerable, powerless, and dependent. Jesus is telling his disciples and us that as his followers, we must look out for the nobodies; we must be the nobodies. This is the counter-cultural definition, both then and now, of true greatness. It’s interesting because I think that a desire for greatness is often a reaction to our being in a position of vulnerability, of insecurity, of suffering. (All the examples from above came out of this place—the song The Greatest comes out of failure in love; the movie The Greatest Showman comes out of childhood poverty and insecurity; MAGA…a desire for employment, stability, and working together to meet the American dream…) It seems to be our default as humans to seek to be the greatest, especially when we are feeling vulnerable. Last week, I read an older blog post by the Quaker teacher and writer Parker Palmer titled Heartbreak, Violence, and Hope for New Life. Palmer starts his blog post by sharing the following Hasidic story: “A disciple asks the rabbi: “Why does Torah tell us to ‘place these words upon your hearts’? Why does it not tell us to place these holy words in our hearts?” The rabbi answers: “It is because as we are, our hearts are closed, and we cannot place the holy words in our hearts. So we place them on top of our hearts. And there they stay until, one day, the heart breaks and the words fall in.” Palmer goes on to talk about how violence is what happens when we do not allow ourselves to feel suffering. When we try to avoid pain, we fall into practices that do violence to ourselves and to each other. Palmer writes, “Sometimes we try to numb the pain of suffering in ways that dishonor our souls. We turn to noise and frenzy, nonstop work, or substance abuse as anesthetics that only deepen our suffering. Sometimes we visit violence upon others, as if causing them pain would mitigate our own. Racism, sexism, homophobia, and contempt for the poor are among the cruel outcomes of this demented strategy.”i We see this happening in the gospel reading for today. The disciples are anxious and confused and upset as Jesus is trying to tell them about his impending death. And rather than dealing with their own pain, they turn to arguing about which one of them is the greatest. And we do the same thing, don’t we? But it isn’t as easy to identify in our own lives, in our church, in our greater common life, even in our country. A few years ago, I had an encounter that helped me identify some of these issues in my own life. It’s an important reminder for me today. I was driving home from Wednesday night programming one evening with the kids when I discovered that my van’s gas tank was completely empty. Since I had already passed the gas station, I dropped the kids off at home and went back out for gas. This was around 7:30 at the end of a long day. When I got to the gas station, all the pumps had people at them, and there were more people waiting. I got more and more frustrated as I watched people maneuver and cut in front of others to get to the open pumps, and so finally, I went to one of the pumps on the back of the lot and pulled up behind a woman to wait until she was done. As I waited with my window rolled down to enjoy the beautiful night, I watched this woman be completely engrossed in her cell phone as she pumped her gas. The truck in front of her left, and she was still pumping, but I couldn’t get around her car to get to the open pump. So I waited. Finally, the woman’s gas was finished, and she slowly close up her gas tank, never taking her eyes off her phone screen. I waited a couple of more minutes as she stood there looking at her phone, and she realized that she had to push the button if she wanted a receipt. (“Please, don’t want a receipt,” I said to myself, but alas it was not to be.) She continued to be consumed with what was on her phone as her receipt printed, and she slowly pulled it and made her way into her car, maneuvering herself into the driver’s seat while not taking her eyes off her phone. (At last, I thought, I will get my gas and get home to eat supper and put my children to bed! I put my car into drive with eager anticipation.) But it was still not to be. The woman turned on her car, and sat there looking at her phone. At this point, my curiosity about this woman and her obsession with her phone had turned into acute irritation. But what to do? I didn’t want to be rude (because I had just talked at church that night about how I try not to drive like a jerk because I have a church sticker on my van), but this woman had been obliviously blocking two pumps for a while now, and I didn’t want to wait any longer. So I hung my head out my open window and yelled nicely, “Would you please pull your car forward?” I got nothing except curious and startled glances from the people at the other pumps. (Who is this crazy woman in the van trying to talk to other people at the gas pump?!) So finally, I just couldn’t stand it any longer, and I did it. I honked my horn. And what do you think happened? The woman jumped-startled when I honked, and then she put her phone down so that she could have both hands free to make rude gestures at me in her rear view mirror. Then, FINALLY, she drove off. Well, I was livid! How dare she make rude gestures at me when she had been so self-absorbed that she had been blocking not just one but two pumps while a bunch of other people waited?! I pulled down the row to the first open pump where the gas attendant was walking over to empty the trash can. I said to her, full of my righteous anger, “did you see that woman blocking two pumps while she was on her phone?!” and the gas attendant said to me tiredly with her bag full of trash, “Honey, they all be like that. Every day.” As I stood there in my collar and pumped my gas, I thought about the gas attendant, what she said, what her life must be like having to deal with that level of self-absorption day in and day out. And I realized that, even though she didn’t mean it this way, when she said “They all be like that. Every day.” Her “they” also meant me. And I knew, in that woman I had encountered someone that Jesus meant when he said we are called to see the nobodies and to care for them, and I was simultaneously chastened and hopeful that I could be better, could do better. I had been so full of my own self-importance that I hadn’t even really seen this gas attendant who had to deal with people puffed up on our own greatness, people like me and the cell-phone obsessed woman day in and day out.ii How are you called to see the nobodies in your life and world? How are you called to care for them? How are we, as followers of Jesus, called to be nobodies in a culture obsessed with greatness? i. Palmer, Parker. Heartbreak, Violence, and Hope for New Life. April 15, 2015 https://onbeing.org/blog/heartbreak-violence-and-hope-for-new-life/ ii. This story was first used in my Proper 20B 2015 sermon.

Claire Harrison's funeral homily

Funeral homily-Claire Harrison September 20, 2018 One of Claire’s gifts is that she could find joy in small things. She found joy in her cats. She found joy in dressing up. She found joy in a nice shade of bright, red lipstick. Claire found joy in sitting near the wine table at Wednesday night supper (and she always remarked on how good that little sip of wine was that she would get when I would take her communion in the nursing home, so I’d always make sure to fill the small cup full); and oh, how she loved to go out to eat! She found joy in birthday parties put on for her by her friends, and she found joy in Christmas presents from her sister. Perhaps one of her most joyful moments was when John and Tara got married at the nursing home, so that Claire could be there for the wedding—she talked to me about that often. It is a gift to be able to find joy in small things, especially since Claire’s life has not always been joyful. In fact, it has been especially difficult in these her final years. She faced many challenges, but she was always able to hold on to these small sources of joy. We gather today to give thanks for Claire and her life, and to celebrate that she is no longer suffering, that she has been received into the dwelling place of God, prepared for her by Jesus who loves her. The reading from Revelation has a vision for what heaven will be like for us, the faithful: “[God] will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.’ And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’” What a wonderful gift for Claire and for us all, to be made new once again! So today, we remember that death is not the end, but a change. And we give thanks that Claire has been received into the kingdom of God where there is no more pain or sorrow or suffering. In fact, she is, even now, feasting at God’s heavenly banquet! And don’t you know that her joy is now complete, and she is sitting at the table near the wine!

17th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 19B

17th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 19B September 16, 2018 Our gospel reading for today is the mid-point of Mark’s gospel, and it is also a crossroads for Jesus. In the first half of Mark’s gospel, Jesus spends all his energy on “creative resistance against death-dealing forces”. He is healing the sick, casting out demons, feeding hungry people… Our reading for today shows Jesus shifting focus. Today we see Jesus predicting his death for the first time out of three. We see Jesus looking toward the cross and sharing that those who follow him will walk a similar path. This week, I encountered a couple of different ideas that I will share with you today. The first is a lectionary commentary that had this to say about the gospel reading. “St. Augustine (and many theologians after him) often spoke of sin as a form of being curvatus in se, “curved inward on oneself” - the implication being that God’s redemption helps us unfurl and open up. It’s a helpful image for conceiving what Jesus is getting at when he speaks of “losing” and “saving” our lives. What’s the “for-the-sake-of-which” that animates our days? Are we living for ourselves, trying to save ourselves? Then we’re curved inward, like an empty fist. Are we living for each other, for the neighborhood, for the good news of God’s love and mercy? Then we’re curved outward, like an open, loving hand. But please note: the idea here is not to demean ourselves, or damage ourselves, or masochistically seek suffering for its own sake. Those are parodies of Jesus’ teaching, 180 degrees off the mark. Truly living for the sake of the Gospel means recognizing God’s love for each one of us, including ourselves. And think of how much stronger, how much more flexible, capable, and beautiful is an open hand, rather than a closed fist, tightly grasping at nothing!”i The second is the Lesser Feasts and Fasts commemoration for this past Wednesday that we marked at our weekly healing service. It was the feast day of John Henry Hobart who was bishop of New York in the early days of our country and our Episcopal Church. The collect for the day reads: “Revive your Church, Lord God of hosts, whenever it falls into complacency and sloth, by raising up devoted leaders, like your servant John Henry Hobart whom we remember today; and grant that their faith and vigor of mind may awaken your people to your message and their mission; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.” Our meditation for the day from the priest Sam Portaro had this to say about Hobart and the collect: “The collect for the commemoration of John Henry Hobart is a prayer for the revival of the church, a prayer to rouse us from ‘complacency and sloth,’ words we do not like to associate with ourselves. Yet we are complacent; if we did not like things the way we have them, we would make bolder moves to change them. And we are slothful; we do not exert ourselves on behalf of our faith with anything like the energy we can put forth for the things in our lives we deem worthwhile.”ii This brings me back to a question from the first passage: “What’s the ‘for-the-sake-of-which’ that animates our days?” Is it our work, our family, our children’s extracurricular activities, our vacations? Is it our college football team? Is it our status, our wealth, our reputation? Is it our church? What would our true faith look like; what would our relationship with God through God’s son Jesus Christ look like if we put as much energy into our life of faith, as we do into all these other things? Your invitation this week is ask yourself, what is your ‘for-the-sake-of-which’ that animates your days? Do you put as much energy into your relationship with God as you do other areas? Then invite God to show you the areas of your life where you are curved in on yourself and for God to show you the ways that you can become more curved outward. i. http://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2018/9/11/crossroads-salts-lectionary-commentary-for-seventeenth-week-after-pentecost ii.Potaro, Sam. Brightest and Best… John Henry Hobart September 12th. Cowley.

16th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 18B

16th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 18B September 9, 2018 This is a difficult gospel passage for us today. Our lectionary gives us two seemingly unconnected healing stories in Mark’s gospel. First, we have Jesus’s encounter with the Syro-Phoenician woman. Jesus is fresh off a challenging encounter with the Pharisees (which we saw in last week’s gospel reading). They are challenging him because his disciples do not follow the Jewish dietary laws. And Jesus counters with the fact that the Pharisees are a bunch of hypocrites who put more emphasis on following human traditions than having their hearts be aligned with God’s teaching. At this point in Mark’s gospel, Jesus is exhausted, and he goes on retreat to the remote area-the region of Tyre. But his rest and retreat do not last long as word gets out he is there. Mark tells us that the Syro-Phoeneciann woman bursts into the house where Jesus is staying. She is Greek which means that she is both a foreigner and a Gentile. And she has burst uninvited into this houses to confront Jesus and demand healing for her demon-possessed daughter. Commentators on this gospel interpret what happens next in the story in two different ways. Jesus is a real jerk to the woman, calling her a dog and refusing to heal her sick child. One way commentators interpret this is to say that Jesus knew how the woman would react, and so he provokes her with the harsh language and the challenge to her request—pushing her to demonstrate her faith. The other way of interpreting this encounter is that Jesus is tired. He’s digging in and sticking to his guns about what he believes is his mission—to minister to the “lost sheep of Israel.” And he rests in the cultural norms and religious expectations of his day—that he didn’t need to help this woman or her child because they are not Jews. This second interpretation is actually the more challenging (and because of that, I think, the more interesting interpretation) because Jesus seems to be doing to the woman exactly what he criticizes the Pharisees for in the verses just before this encounter. And yet, the woman persists, and Jesus changes his mind and heals her daughter. Just like God changes God’s mind when faced with compelling arguments from Abraham and Moses against God’s chosen course of action against God’s wayward people, Jesus changes his mind, expands or opens his understanding of his mission when faced with the arguments of the foreign, Gentile woman But that’s not all! Our lectionary gives us a second story this week-the story of the deaf man with the speech impediment who is brought to Jesus for healing. Jesus takes the man apart from the others, and he heals the man by touching him, using Jesus’s own saliva, and commanding the man: “Ephaphthah” which means “Be opened” in Aramaic. This story is important to read with the first story because we see Jesus acknowledging how his own faith, his own sense of his mission has changed as a result of his encounter with the woman. Jesus, himself, has been opened. And that’s really the nature of faith, isn’t it? Being opened. None of us, not even Jesus, ever arrives at the fullness of our faith in this life. Our whole life-long, faith journey is the process of being opened by God and to God, through encounters with the sacraments, with God’s grace given through the Holy Spirit, and through encounters with each other. There’s an individualistic component to this. We can ask ourselves this week: “Are there any areas in your life, or in your faith, where you need to allow Jesus to come and open, perhaps areas that you shut long ago?”i But there’s also a corporate (church-wide) component to this being opened as well. I sometimes listen to a lectionary-based preaching podcast called “Pulpit Fiction.” One of the two hosts is a United Methodist minister, and in this week’s episode, he talked about the long-standing Methodist ad campaign: “Open hearts; Open minds; Open doors.” He said that some people in the Methodist church critique this slogan because they say that the church isn’t truly open to all people. And the minister said that he sees Jesus’s words “Open up” or “Be opened” in conjunction with this saying-not so much as adjectives but as verbs—as a prescription of what we are supposed to be doing—working to actively be open. He then shared a prayer for illumination that his church uses prior to the reading of scripture every week: “Holy Spirit, open our hearts to the story of your love. Open our minds to new ways of knowing you. Open our doors to whom all you would welcome. Amen.”ii Now, lest we start thinking too highly of ourselves as Episcopalians in this, let me share with you a couple of details. The first comes from an article that the bishop sent all the clergy of the diocese this week. The article is by Dan Hotchkiss and is titled Five Lies We Like to Tell About Church Growth. The very first “lie” is that friendly churches grow. Here is what Hotchkiss writes about this: “Declining churches often marvel at how many visitors show up once and don’t return. ‘But we’re so friendly!’ Like most lies we tell ourselves, this one has a grain of truth in it: a visitor who gets a friendly greeting is more likely to return. But most church consultants know that the more vehemently leaders say their church is friendly, the more likely it will feel quite cold to visitors. When people say, ‘Our church is friendly,’ generally they mean ‘My friends are here.’ Visitors to ‘friendly’ churches see the backs of people’s heads—heads gathered into tight, impenetrable groups of friends. Churches that excel at hospitality are more apt to give themselves a B+ or C– in the friendliness department—and appreciate that hospitality takes effort.” I’ve heard this described as the difference between being a friendly church and a church of friends. A church of friends is the phenomenon that Hotchkiss writes about, when visitors only see the backs of peoples’ heads. This is something that we need to be attentive to, asking ourselves often if we are truly a friendly church or if we are being, instead, a church of friends. The second detail is a reminder of the Welcome survey I preached about a few months ago. We left copies in the narthex and church office and asked people to fill it out and turn it in, and we gave you a little over a month to do this. We had 13 of those surveys turned in, which tells me either a. we don’t like to fill out surveys or b. we aren’t very interested in assessing how welcoming we are. So how do we as a church live more deeply into this call of Jesus? To “Be opened.” At this beginning of a new program year, what are ways that we as a church can be opened—expanding our understanding of our mission and ministry, growing deeper in our faith together to opening to those who are different than us—different faiths, different socio-economic classes, different skin colors, different political parties? Let us pray. “Holy Spirit, open our hearts to the story of your love. Open our minds to new ways of knowing you. Open our doors to whom all you would welcome. Amen.”iii i. From Pray as you go podcast for September 9, 2018 ii. From Pulpit Fiction episode for September 9, 2018 iii.From Pulpit Fiction episode for September 9, 2018

Funeral Homily for Tina Norris

Funeral homily-Tina Norris September 7, 2018 If there is one single word that keeps coming up as people reflect on the wonderful gifts that Tina Norris had, then if would be “an angel.” An Historic Savannah Newsletter article from July/August of 1983 that was written about Tina as one of the tour guides for the Historic Savannah Foundation begins: “Mrs. Jack Norris-Tina-is one of those perfect sort of guides: knowledgeable, kind, friendly, and understanding-‘an angel’ says one of her colleagues.” And the article concludes with “…we are sure that Tina’s tour recipients hope that Tina will continue tour guiding for at least ten more years. Heaven surely must be missing an angel!” And even before that, Tina was nominated for the Wings in Heaven Award through Woman of the Year in Atlanta. Her family shared with me the delightful nominating form that reads “Why I consider the Candidate worthy of [the] Award: Because she is always pleasant. Because she has a ‘voice with a smile, and a suggestion of daffodils in the springtime.’ Because she is efficient without annoying anyone with her efficiency. Because we need more people like her.” She was an angel. But here’s the thing about angels. We often only think about angels as celestial beings who hang out with God. But the very word angelos is actually a job description. Angel means messenger. Angels are messengers of God. They tell people of God’s favor. They remind people, over and over again, to not be afraid of the work that God is doing in the world. Tina lived her life fully rooted in God’s love, and she loved well. She loved her family. She loved her friends. She loved her church. She loved Savannah. She loved sitting on her screened porch and drinking wine (she loved wine!) with her family and friends. In those ways, Tina was an angel, because she was a messenger to us of God’s love and of how to live this lovely life fully, with joy, delight, and kindness. We are so thankful for her presence in all of our lives. And we will miss her loving, light-filled presence in our lives most dearly. We gather today to mourn her loss, to celebrate her life, and to remind one another that even now, Tina is at home with the God that she loved, and she is feasting at God’s heavenly banquet. (I do hope God got the memo because apparently Tina, as a long-time caterer, had very strong opinions about how cucumber sandwiches should be made…) And we gather today to remember the hope of our faith: that death is not the end but a change; that our Lord Jesus Christ has gone before us, showed us the way to our eternal dwelling place in God’s kingdom, a kingdom where there is no sorrow nor sighing but only life everlasting. We remember that God has shown us, through Jesus’s resurrection from the dead, that God’s love is stronger than absolutely anything-even death. And we give thanks. We give thanks to God for the gift of Tina and for the message that she lived of God’s love for her and for each and every one of us. We will miss her; and we will see her again. (Close with the 2nd collect.)

15th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 17B

15th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 17B September 2, 2018 A couple of weeks ago, I started asking you to begin thinking about how we are going to observe Labor Day as a community today. I invited you to begin thinking about a symbol that you could bring, a symbol of your labor-either how you make your living in the world, how you make money or how you spend your leisure, how you spend your free time. Hopefully, you have remembered and brought this symbol with you because today, at the offertory, after the collection plates have gone past you, I’ll invite you to bring your symbol forward and lay it on the altar or at the foot of the altar. Why, you may wonder, are we doing this today? Or you may even be thinking those five words that are frequently heard together in Episcopal Churches: “We’ve never done this before…..” Our epistle reading for today provides a clue as to why we are doing this today in conjunction with the secular holiday of Labor Day. “Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.” All that we are and all that we have comes from God and through God’s generosity. This is what it means when we use the word: Stewardship. You may recall the definition I shared with you last fall that came from Terry Parson’s the former stewardship officer of the Episcopal Church: “Stewardship is all that I do with all that I have after I say, ‘I believe.’” The letter to James also reminds us that we are not just to be recipients of God’s gifts, or as James puts it “not merely hearers” of the word; but that we are to be stewards of God’s gifts, people who use those gifts in the service of God and others—or as James puts it “doers of the word.” What we do with the gifts God gives us matters; it is a part of our discipleship. We already acknowledge this every week, even though you may not think about it directly, during the part of the service known as the offertory: when we bring our gifts of bread, wine, and money to the altar. Liturgical theologians Charles Price and Louis Weil put it this way. “In placing on the altar bread, money and wine, the congregation offers itself and its world. Money represents the work of the congregation. As in every sacrificial act of time immemorial, a part stands for the whole. We give part of what we make. That part stands for ‘ourselves, for our souls, for our bodies.’ Symbolically we offer the bread to be the body of Christ. But the underlying reality of the action is that we offer our lives individually and corporately to become the body of Christ in the world. We acknowledge that what we offer to God is, in a certain sense, but [God’s] all along, given to us in trust as stewards of [God’s] creation.” (Liturgy of Living by Charles P Price and Louis Weil) So, today, we are intentionally offering this aspect of ourselves—the gifts God has given us to make our labor or our leisure. We are thanking God for these gifts, and we are offering them back to God’s service, so that we may become the body of Christ in the world. As we make this offering, this week and every week, we show our gratitude by singing (the doxology: Praise God from who all blessings blow. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him above ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.) or by quoting scripture (“All things come of thee, O Lord, and of thine own have we given thee.” That’s I Chronicles 29:14). We are giving thanks to God, and we are offering to use these gifts in the world to be the body of Christ. So this week, I invite you to lay your symbol on God’s altar in thanksgiving. And then, as you use your gifts, through Labor or leisure in the world this week, remember the doxology, and ask yourself if you are using your gift to be Christ’s body in the world-as a doer of the word, and not merely hearers.

14th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 16B

14th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 16B August 26, 2018 The other day, I was walking back from a service in our chapel, and I listened to the people walking ahead of me talk about difficult topics of faith, like why does God allow sickness. They each talked about ways they had wrestled with this hard topic, and the ways that they had made their peace with it, as a part of engaging their faith. In our gospel reading for today, we have the culmination of the five weeks we have spent in Chapter 6 of John’s gospel. The chapter starts with the feeding of the 5,000, and the people are so impressed with Jesus’s miracle, that they follow him, asking for more. This inspires from Jesus a long chapter’s worth of teachings on how he is the bread of life, much like the manna that was given to their ancestors in the wilderness. And like their ancestors, the people begin to grumble and complain at Jesus’s teachings. As a result, Jesus seems to get more and more graphic in the language he uses, and it is more and more offensive to his hearers. First, it is “the Jews” or the leaders of the religious establishment who take issue with the teachings. And in today’s reading, we see that even Jesus’s disciples are not immune. “This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?” many of his disciples begin saying, and Jesus says to them: “Does this offend you? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But among you there are some who do not believe.” The writer of John’s gospel tells us that “because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.” Now, these aren’t just members of the crowd who followed Jesus after they witnessed the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand. These are disciples, who had seen something in Jesus and had already given up much to follow him. They come to a cross roads in their faith, in the face of this hard teaching, and they choose to turn back rather than to go forward. This provokes Jesus to say to the 12, who still remain: “‘Do you also wish to go away?’” And John tells us that “Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.’” It is a beautiful sentiment on Peter’s part, and there almost seems to be some sort of redemption in it, that even though Jesus has gone from being so popular and followed by so many to being deserted because of his radical teachings that are hard for people to stomach, at least he still has his 12 most faithful followers. But listen to the last two verses of chapter 6, which our lectionary cuts off for today: “Jesus answered them, ‘Did I not choose you, the twelve? Yet one of you is a devil.’ He was speaking of Judas son of Simon Iscariot, for he, though one of the twelve, was going to betray him.” And we know that not only does Judas, one of the 12 betray him, but also, just about everyone else deserts him, too. This teaching is difficult; who can accept it? In the life of faith, sometimes the way forward is smooth and easy, but at other times, things get difficult. Our lives bump up against the hard teachings of Jesus, and we, like the disciples, find ourselves standing at a crossroads. Do we continue on the way forward and continue to follow Jesus, or do we turn back and seek an easier path? In the gospel of John, the Greek word that our passage for today translates as belief (pisteuo) is used almost 100 times. And this word doesn’t just mean an intellectual sort of belief or thinking. It means placing confidence in, entrusting oneself to, even choosing a path and following it through. C. S. Lewis hints at this in his book Mere Christianity when he writes, “There will come a moment when there is bad news, or he is in trouble, or is living among a lot of other people who do not believe it, and all at once his emotions will rise up and carry out a sort of blitz on his belief… Now Faith, in the sense in which I am here using the word, is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods. For moods will change, whatever view your reason takes. I know that by experience.” Our lives of faith are all made up of times when we felt that the teachings were too difficult, and so we turned away, turned back and of times when we stayed true to the course of belief that we had set to follow. As I look back over my life of following Jesus, I am struck by the fact that it is the difficult times that I remember most, and it is because I followed the path before me, even though I could have turned back. Even though that way led to heartbreak and failure, much like Jesus’s way led to the cross, even in those difficult times, I was sustained by God in ways that were uncommon from other easier times in my life. I invite you this week, to reflect upon the difficult times in the life of your faith, when you chose to follow the path of belief forward rather than turning back. Think about the ways that the Spirit gave you life in those times, or is giving you life now, if you find yourself in a difficult season. Ask yourself, “When, in the life of my faith, have I felt really alive? When have I felt the Spirit giving life to me?

13th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 15B

13th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 15B August 19, 2018 When I was visiting my parents earlier this summer, my mom recommended a book to me. Its sensational title is How Not To Die, and it is written by Michael Greger who is an M.D. Greger starts off by telling the story of his grandmother, who at the age of 65 had been diagnosed with heart disease, suffered multiple heart surgeries until there was no more they could do, was wheel-chair bound in constant excruciating pain and was told that she had about 3 weeks to live. The grandmother managed to get herself across the country to California, where she participated in a new study where the patients were all fed whole-food, plant-based diets and started exercising, and as a result, Greger’s grandmother went on to live 31 more years and die at the age of 96 after living a full and active life. Greger uses a large amount of scientific studies and data to write about how a whole-food, plant-based diet can not only prevent and treat the 15 leading causes of death in our country, but it can also reverse conditions such as heart-disease, cancer, diabetes, strokes, and Alzheimer’s. He also references research that supports the premise that this kind of way of eating can prolong life by repairing parts of our DNA that wear down naturally as we age. In some ways, it’s not exactly revolutionary. Since childhood, many of us have been taught “you are what you eat.” Jesus is essentially telling us the same thing in our gospel reading for today. He’s telling us both “you are what you eat” and “how not to die” spiritually. This is our fourth week in a row (out of 5 total) that our lectionary has given us passages from this particular section of John’s gospel, where Jesus says, again and again, “I am the bread of life.” As we have walked through Chapter 6 over the last few weeks, we have seen Jesus moving to more and more graphic language, culminating in our lesson for today where he says such shocking things as: “Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.” One thing that is important to remember is that John’s gospel is the latest written gospel of our 4. It is written to a particular Christian community who are struggling with persecution in ways that the earlier gospel writers’ communities were not. And John’s community is also unique in its particular frustration in their expectation that Jesus was coming back sooner rather than later. Finally, John’s gospel is unique in that it does not include the story of the institution of the Last Supper. (We see in Chapter 13 the story of Jesus’s last night, in which he washes his disciples’ feet, but there is no story of the Last Supper.) So, this chapter of John’s gospel, Chapter 6, is essentially John’s way of connecting this struggling, worn-down, and persecuted community and pointing them to the Eucharist. These words would have been as familiar to them of the echoes of their weekly table liturgy as they are to us. John’s Jesus is telling the struggling, suffering community “how not to die,” but instead of talking about physical nourishment, he is talking about spiritual nourishment. I have to confess to you all that I was wonderfully and painfully convicted by a line in Rev. Aimee’s sermon last week. She was talking about the connection between the Jews who were listening to Jesus and the Children of Israel who received manna in the wilderness and how both groups were united in their complaining. And she said, “Complaining wins out over believing.” Ouch! Just before we started the first service, I was talking about how I didn’t think our house sale that was set for that week was going to go through, and boy, was I complaining. But in the midst of that same week, David was called to be the new priest at St. George’s--a huge, exciting thing for him and for our family. But the first thing I did was to complain. How many times in a given week do we choose complaining over faith, consternation over hope? It is a symptom of our heart disease, that only the bread of life can repair. One of my earliest memories of church is being a very young girl, kneeling at the altar rail with my hands outstretched and preparing to receive the bread from the woman priest who was coming down the line of the altar rail. As I watched her approach and looked at the people on either side of me, I became very excited because I was getting something special that was also the exact same thing everyone else around me was getting. I was excited to be both holy-set apart and belonging-exactly like everyone else. I also knew a little girl, who would sneak a piece of her communion wafer back to her pew and nibble on it throughout the rest of the service. When her mother learned what she had done, she would fuss at her, and tell her that she needed to consume it all at the altar rail, but it does seem natural to want to take time and savor the mystery and the gift, even taking it with us when we leave this place. What if, today, you approach the altar with the wonder of those two children, knowing that Jesus is giving you himself, the gift to begin to reverse your spiritual heart disease? What if as you stretched out your hands, you invited faith over complaining, hope over consternation in whatever part of your life feels the most dead or dying to you right now? And then, take a little piece of that life out with you into the world this week, so that everyone you see or encounter, even the ones who make you angry or persecute you, becomes the person kneeling next to you at the altar rail, also offered the gift and the mystery of God’s love in and through Jesus the bread of life. How not to die. It’s actually Jesus’s invitation to us this week and every week.

Funeral Homily for Dick Wilson

Dick Wilson’s funeral homily August 5, 2018 Every week as he was leaving church, Dick Wilson, who would usually be close to the end of what I like to call “the holy handshake line”, would come up to me. He’d take my hand, and I’d lean in and give him a kiss on his cheek. And he’d look at my face with that sweet smile of his and say, “How’s my favorite priest?” And I would smile back and answer, and after a brief conversation, we would both go on our way. My story is hardly unique. Over the last week, I’ve heard so many stories from you all about your friendships with Dick—his special nicknames for you, the many times you played golf or went fishing with him, the times he taught you or your children or grandchildren Sunday School, the times he came to watch you at your swim meet, the times you were touched by one of his impromptu speeches either in church or in social gatherings, the times you spent with him as his family at his and Mary’s home. So, it will come as no surprise to any of you, that Dick’s gift was one that is best articulated in a sort of old-fashioned word, and it’s not accident, I think, that this word is also found in the marriage vows. Dick’s gift was to cherish people. He had a gift not just for loving people, but for also letting them know that they were loved. It will also come as no surprise to you, I think, to learn that Dick planned this service in a very thorough and detailed way. He picked the hymns and the readings, and it is important to note that in his choice of the Lamentations reading, Dick has given us all one last gift. Listen to the beginning of it again: “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. ‘The LORD is my portion,’ says my soul, ‘therefore I will hope in him.’ The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him.” Dick was able to love others, to cherish us, because he had already known love. He knew the steadfast love of the Lord which never ceases. He abided in that, basked in, even, all of his days for 96 years. Dick was able to share God’s love for us because he knew it, tasted its joy afresh every day And so today, even as we mourn the loss of this lovely man in our lives, in our community of faith, we give thanks for Dick’s life and witness. And we remember and hold fast to the faith that Dick Wilson lived: that God’s love is stronger than anything, even death, and that in and through Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, through that gift of God’s love, at death our lives are changed, not ended, and we will all feast together once again at the table for the family of God. We will be reunited once again, all together, in God’s steadfast love which never ceases. So today, let us mourn. Let us give thanks. Let us love and cherish one another. And let us commend Dick to the care and keeping of the Lord he knew and loved.

11th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 13B

11th Sunday after Pentecost-Proper 13B August 5th, 2018 There are many things about parish ministry that surprised me in the early days of my ordained life, and there are many things that continue to surprise me, even after 14 years. But one of the ones that fits into both of those categories is the holiness of funerals in the life of a parish. Before I was ordained, I knew intellectually that funerals would be hard for everyone involved, parishioners and preacher alike; but I didn’t understand how hard they would be—burying someone who we all loved and who had been an integral part of the body of Christ in that particular place. But I had no idea about the gift that funerals could give a community. Now, don’t get me wrong, they are still very difficult. I have never had what I would call an “easy” funeral. But there is a certain rightness I feel in being the preacher at the funeral of someone who lived life well in our particular community of faith, someone who contributed his or her gifts to the building up of the kingdom of God in a particular place. I have the privilege of getting to name the gifts of that particular person in the funeral homily and to lift them up on behalf of the gathered church, their faith community, in thanksgiving. It is a huge responsibility and also a huge gift for which I am most grateful. Later today, we will join together for the funeral of Dick Wilson, a faithful member of our church. In that homily, I will talk about Dick’s particular gift. You don’t need me to articulate it; if you knew Dick well, (and even if you didn’t), you probably had the opportunity to see his gift at work in this community. And I’ll give you a spoiler alert for the funeral homily later today: Dick’s gift is that he cherished people. And even if you wouldn’t necessarily articulate it in that way, I suspect that’s what you were thinking as you sat there in your pew, Dick loved well, and in the way that he loved, he made all of us feel loved. I’ve spent a lot of time over the last few days thinking about gifts. I got to participate in a pilot group of a spiritual gifts workshop yesterday with a handful of our parishioners. We learned about a sampling of the variety of gifts that God bestows on people. We uncovered or unwrapped which of those gifts had been bestowed on each of us, and we have been challenged to grow in the ways that we both nurture and offer our gifts to this community and the world. Our epistle reading for today, the portion of the letter to the Ephesians which has echoes of the beginning of our baptism liturgy, is a reminder that, as another writer has put it “our Creator has embedded gifts in each person…and that every person is called to participate in God’s ongoing and creative and healing work on earth…Our deepening relationship with God, both as individuals and as entire communities, is a gradual process of becoming aware of the great gifts we have been given and the tremendous trust that our Creator has placed in us by calling us to be partners in this wondrous work of God.”i The Ephesians passage articulates a list of gifts as a starting point for discernment. (But this list is not, by any means, exhaustive.) It reminds us that all these gifts are a part of Christ’s own onetime and also ongoing gift to the church and to individuals, and that the purpose of these gifts is that they be used “for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ.” We are called to use our individual gifts and the gifts of our whole church, so that we all may grow more and more into the image and likeness of Christ. The medieval German mystic Meister Eckhart wrote, “Every creature is a word of God and is a book about God.” What does the book of your life say about God? What are the gifts God has given you specifically, and how have you been using them? Uncovering or unwrapping our spiritual gifts is a lot of work. One member of our group yesterday shared with us this image: imagine that you open your front door to discover a beautifully-wrapped, gigantic present on your door step. Do you think “boy, that’s just too big for me to deal with” and then close the door? Or do you start to unwrap it to see what’s inside, maybe asking for help to drag it inside the house? If you are interested in starting that process as you ask yourself “what does the book of your life say about God?” then I encourage you to talk to one of the participants from this pilot workshop. Rick Lantz was the leader, and those who participated were Margaret Minis, Sandy Champion, Steve Calver, and Charlie Barrow. My prayer for all of us this day is that we may live and use our gifts as fully as Dick Wilson lived and used his, so that everyone in our church may know the taste of our own unique gifts when we, too, pass on into the eternal life that God has waiting for us. i. Trumbauer, Jean Morris. Created and Called: Discovering Our Gifts For Abundant Living. Augsburg: Minneapolis, 1998, p 18.