Father Snort

The way of Jesus is the way of vulnerability and reconciliation. With Jesus, we get to be 100% who we are, including all of what makes of ashamed, and we are told that we are still worthy of love and belonging. We are reconciled and nothing will separate us from God's love. That means we get to be vulnerable with those we love and let our true selves show, warts and all.

When Jesus was transfigured on the mountain, he brought only his three closest friends / disciples. He brought only those he knew he could trust with the revelation of his truest, inmost self.

I can imagine Jesus being anxious about how his friends would react, thinking that they might run pell-mell down the mountain or be totally freaked out by him from then on. They were a bit freaked, wanting to build a booth for Jesus, supposedly so he could stay up there, and they could visit from a safe distance.

Jesus wasn't having it, however, and came on down the mountain with them, telling then not to share what they had seen. They had to be ok with Jesus not only as their carpenter/rabbi friend, but as the Son of God as well. That was something he could share only with his closest friends at the time, and they could accept it, see his true self, and still love him.

With reconciliation, we have the same vulnerability Jesus did, exposing our inner self which we often hide from others, exposing our misdeeds and our shame, hoping that they do not make us unlovable. Then, with reconciliation, we find that we are absolved and reconciled. We are still lovable.

We are not defined by our sins. We are defined as God's beloved children, worthy of love and belonging. Our sins get in the way of our relationships, but they do not define us.

Admitting our faults to God, and admitting our faults to others who are trusted enough to hear them is a vulnerable act, and one that frees us from our shame so that we can live not as the sum total of our sins, but as the beloved people we are.

The sacrament of Reconciliation of a Penitent is offered in the Episcopal Church as well. It is offered to all as a helpful way to speak out loud one's sins in a totally confidential conversation. Then the person gets to hear the words of God's forgiveness proclaimed by a priest. While we know in our heads that God forgives us, our hearts often need to hear the words spoken by a human being. Then the priest lays the conversation on the altar and gives it to God, never to be brought up by the priest again.

In whatever form it comes, the vulnerability of reconciliation is a huge part of our life as Jesus disciples. Jesus knows we are a mess, and he declares us beloved.

Jesus' fame spread for his healing, but when folks gathered around looking for him, Jesus told his disciples that he wanted to go on to the surrounding region of Galilee to preach the gospel there also, for that is what he had come to do.

The beginning of my call as a priest involved reading the Bible and seeing time and again how the religion of Israel eclipsed the God and the Kingdom of God which the religion was meant to connect people to and help them live. I noticed the same thing with Christianity, ways in which love of "church" as institution got in the way of people's discipleship of Jesus and living out the Kingdom of God. Then, two weeks ago, Bishop Doyle in his address to Diocesan Council said that for too long the church has been clergy led with lay support. He wants to see a church that is lay led with clergy support. Those words spoke directly to my call.

We are to live out our lives as Jesus' disciples though service, evangelism, and reconciliation. The structures and institution of the church is here to help us in this way of life, not to do it for us.

True service means not only charity (largely crisis care), but serving with, building people up through mutual service, relationship, and digging deep into the causes of need, not just band-aids on the symptoms.

True evangelism in not standing on a street corner with a bullhorn. That's what crazy people do. Evangelism means invitation into conversation, sharing the deep parts of ourselves with others. Conversation does not mean conversion. We share intimately our faith in order to know others and to be known by them. They are not required to adopt our faith. We invite others to worship with us, to share in our way of life, to introduce them to Jesus. If they believe, then great. If not, then they can still belong as we connect on the deep heart to heart, bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh level.

True reconciliation means sitting down with our enemies, the people whose beliefs we abhor, those who have hurt us, and truly listening to them. Reconciliation means seeking to know them also on the heart to heart level. Reconciliation means also learning how we have hurt the other. Doing so is painful. It cuts us, and we bleed, but as we saw in the cross of Jesus, reconciliation requires blood.

Service, evangelism, reconciliation, a church that is lay led with clergy support. In these ways we live into Jesus' mission to go into Galilee and preach the gospel, for that is what he has formed us to do.

Jesus taught with authority and cast a demon out of a man in the Synagogue. In the cosmic struggle between light and dark, he was obviously on the side of light (even though he wasn't yet known as the Word of God which spoke creation into existence). He was a powerful force for light, and yet his detractors began to spread as fast as his admirers.

Religious leaders feared him because he threatened the norm. Folks may have followed him instead of them, and so they responded out of fear.

Faith is not the way of fear. Faith is the way of boldness and daring. It took boldness and daring for the man with the unclean spirit to enter the Synagogue. He was unclean and so shouldn't have been there, but he came seeking healing from Jesus.

When we see people enter our churches who are unclean, sinners in need of healing, folks without faith, the fearful response is to have them leave so that we don't get dragged down by their unbelief or wayward living.

The faithful response is to say "come, welcome". If sinners can't come seek healing in the church, where can they go? "Come and be healed by Jesus, even as we are being healed by Jesus."

Another fearful response we have in the church is our response to other churches. We often don't minister together with other churches, afraid of their differences, afraid that members from our church may like them better, or afraid that one of us is doing things wrong. That is how the scribes and the Pharisees responded to Jesus.

A faithful response is for us to work together. Jesus can bring greater healing through us when we work together as one church, when we respond with boldness and daring.

The first part of creation that wasn't good was that the man was alone. We were made for deep down "bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh", heart to heart connection. Without it, creation is not good.

Johann Hari believes that disconnection is a root cause of addiction. While drugs play a big part, people with poor or no deep connection to others are more likely to become addicted to drugs, and folks with deep connection to others are more likely to recover from addiction. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/johann-hari/the-real-cause-of-addicti_b_6506936.html). He writes:

"The rise of addiction is a symptom of a deeper sickness in the way we live -- constantly directing our gaze towards the next shiny object we should buy, rather than the human beings all around us."

If ever there was a time to fish for people, it is now. Jesus came to heal our disconnection from God and our disconnection from each other. He called us to bring that good news to other and to fish for people.

What does that look like? Do we invite people to church? Do we connect with friends on a deep, heart to heart level? Do we share our faith with others? Yes to all.

We're not seeking to change people, but to connect with them. If someone isn't a Christian, but is your friend, invite that person to church...not to convert them, but to share with them something important to you, to connect with them on the "bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh", heart to heart level. Let them belong, even without believing.

Jesus came to heal our disconnection, not to force or coerce us, but to heal us.

Paul said to glorify God with our bodies, and he said not to join our bodies to a prostitute. We literally should not take another human being and turn them into an object for our visual arousal and physical pleasure.

Paul was likely also referring to the prophetic idea of chasing after other gods as chasing after prostitutes. One such "god / prostitute" is that of perfection.

We are constantly bombarded by airbrushed images of physical "perfection", an ideal body type that mostly doesn't exist. We are shown these images over and over so that we will pale by comparison and feel badly enough about ourselves to buy stuff to try to make ourselves look like airbrushed perfection.

We also try to appear or be perfect in other aspects of our lives. All of this perfection is a lie, and a prostitute we are chasing, rather than loving our bodies for what they are and what they can do, glorifying God in our bodies: we work, we play, we go through daily life, and our bodies should be loved for allowing us to do these things.

Nathaniel fell into this perfection trap when thinking of the Messiah. He wanted something of a super hero. Jesus, however, was not Captain America. He was a Jewish carpenter from Nazareth.

Jesus was also "Shekhinah", the indwelling presence of God. Jesus is the connection of humanity (and of all creation) to God. Jesus connects us to God. He does not connect some idealized, non-existent, airbrushed version of us to God. He connects us to God, as we truly are.

We aren't perfect. We don't have it all together. God doesn't expect us to. God didn't come among us as Captain America, but as a comparatively lame kinda guy...a regular carpenter. He connects regular our regular old selves to God, our beloved, marvelously made selves.

Baptism is like a second chance, a new start, and it brings us into a life of new starts which God offers as we continually do the wrong things, learn from those missteps, and try again to live well. These second chances, however, should not be taken lightly or wasted.

When we intentionally turn our lives back toward a harmful way we had been living, we are turning our backs on God's forgiveness and God's second chance. When we do so, there is often hell to pay...not eternal damnation, but hurt and damage in this life.

Living in the way of Jesus, on the other hand also has a cost. While God's forgiveness and second chances are freely given, the cost is how we live afterwards. While not very catchy, I'd say there's "heaven to pay." The cost of baptism, of following Jesus, is intentionally living as he taught, intentionally living so in such a way that if something is harmful to self or others, we won't do those things. We live the Kingdom Way, God's life of light and love.

The Epiphany of Jesus which we celebrate on January 6th is not really about the three magi or the gifts they bring. The Epiphany of Jesus is, surprisingly enough, about Jesus. When the magi visited Jesus, Jesus was revealed as Lord of Jew and Gentile, of all people. That's no surprise to us, but it was in Jesus' time.

For us, Jesus is Lord of all, regardless of race, political affiliation, gender, etc. When we come together to worship on Sunday; when we encounter Jesus in the scripture, prayers, and bread and wine; when we encounter Jesus in each other; we encounter Jesus as Lord of us all, and we can't have that encounter on the golf course, or in a fishing boat, on in your living room.

Jesus is in all of those places, and we can have spiritual encounters in all of those places, but only in communion and in community are we joined together by the Holy Spirit and manifest as Christ's body. In community, we are bound together in our disparate backgrounds, into the Body of Christ.

Epiphany is a big deal. Rejoice and be glad in it.

When Jesus was born, God became human and united himself to us forever. He was truly human, a real baby, just like us, and while I love the song "Away In A Manger", Jesus likely did cry that night. Perhaps Mary sang him a lullaby to help rock him to sleep.

Parents sing lullabies to their children as they drift off to sleep to tell them, "I love you; be at peace; all is well." Jesus is like God's lullaby to us. God is telling us, "I love you; be at peace; all is well, and I will love you forever."

When Mary was told by the angel Gabriel that she would bear God's Son in her womb, she responded with peace and trust. The story seems otherworldly...most of us would likely freak right out. In truth, Mary's world was every bit as violent and terrible as ours. Her world also had love and beauty, as does ours.

Mary's response reminds us of what our response can be. We too have Jesus living within us, within our bodies. That makes a difference in how we treat our bodies, and how we treat other people's bodies.

Jesus living within our bodies also tells us how much God loves us and how important we and our bodies are to God. Living into that reality, that Jesus lives within our bodies, we can respond as Mary did, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord, let it be with me according to your word."

When I was in middle school, my mom went away for a week's vacation, and while she was away, my dad and brother and I let things slide a bit around the house. We ate dinner in front of TV every night, and then we had a bit of cleaning up to do to prepare for Mom's return. We weren't afraid she'd not stay if the house wasn't clean. We loved her and wanted to honor her as she came home.

That's part of what's going on with John the Baptist in the baptism he gave and in our lives as we are baptized. We're preparing with joy for Jesus' return. We could be spotless or messy, but without Jesus, we are empty. Just like the house could have been messy or perfectly tidy, but without mom, it wasn't our home.