St. Mary’s Episcopal Church

Several years ago, Michael and I were helping to move his godfather out of his house into an apartment. His wife had recently passed away, and he no longer wanted to live in the house they had shared for so many decades. They both had an assistant who had been helping them in their later years, and he was Tongan. So William, which was his name, asked two of his brothers to come and help with the move. On that day, I was in the living room packing some boxes, and the brothers came in the living room carrying a table. They get to the front door and stop. One brother says to another, wait, we should cover this with something. Hearing them, I grabbed a blanket that was within an arm’s reach, tossed it to them and said, use this. They caught it, looked at me, and then wrapped the table up in it and took the table out to the van.

Later that day, as we were unpacking things in the new apartment, William said to me, with a slightly accusatory tone, you didn’t tell me you speak Tongan. I don’t, I said. But my brothers said that you heard what they said and responded to them. I said again, I don’t speak Tongan, but William didn’t really believe me. What I distinctly remember that day was that they were speaking in English. That was what I heard, except that, in fact, they were speaking Tongan.

We hear in the reading from Acts that the Disciples were gathered in the Upper Room when the sound came from heaven, like the rush of a mighty wind. Tongues as of fire rested on each one of them as they were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they began to speak in other tongues. At the same time, the Jewish people had gathered from every nation, we are told, for the Festival of Weeks, and heard the sound, a sound like that of a violent wind. They were bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. They were amazed and wondered how is it that each of us hear in our own language? Everyone was confused and looking for a common sense explanation. Some tried to dismiss the entire event by saying the people were drunk. But Peter quotes the prophet Joel to emphasize the power of the Holy Spirit in this event.

Witnessing the presence of the Holy Spirit is difficult when we measure reality by what we can see, touch, taste, or smell. The world is a practical and material world. We understand best those things which we can confirm by sight or by grasping with our hands. Of course, this is important because we have been created to engage our physical world in this way, but throughout his ministry, Jesus was moving people toward a deeper and fuller understanding of what it means to be human in the way that God intended. Our human flourishing, the fulfillment of God’s creative desire in and through our humanity, is meant for the lifting up and healing of human community. Because through this, we are fulfilling God’s call for the world.

Imagine the experience of that first Pentecost Day. The sound, as we are told, was like a violent wind. It must have been frightening to hear such a sound. And then the Disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit and began speaking as the Holy Spirit gave them speech. Now it is very likely they had been sitting together in prayer before this happened. And in prayer, they were opening themselves up to God’s wisdom. Perhaps they were wondering and asking in their prayers to understand what they were supposed to do, now that Jesus Christ had ascended to God. And the Spirit descended on them with undeniable force and overwhelming presence. No language was foreign, because each heard what was said in their own tongue.

If there is one essential message in this Pentecost story, it is that we are not as different from one another as we think we are. We are not the stranger we assume we are. We are not the foreigners we fear we are. Our needs are not so different from the needs of others. We are more alike than we are different. Even when it comes to understanding each other, the language we speak is like thin tissue paper between us, easily broken through by the Holy Spirit who is moving us toward one another rather than away. Peter reminds the Disciples and the multitude gathered of the prophet Joel’s words: God declares I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and daughters shall prophesy. Your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams. Yes, even on my men servants and my maid servants in those days I will pour out my spirit, and they shall prophesy. And it shall be that whoever calls upon the name Lord shall be saved. No one is beyond the reach of God. No one. Everyone who seeks this life will receive the Holy Spirit.

So the question for us this morning is, can we handle this? Can we believe and receive this enormous gift of the Holy Spirit? Or perhaps a better question is, do we want this gift? I’m going to guess that everyone here has some desire, however tentative, to be received into the presence of God, to be filled with the Holy Spirit. This hunger comes from an inner knowing that we are made for something bigger, something deeper. And that something is not measured by our worldly means. In fact, it is not measurable at all. The Holy Spirit is fully available and eternally present to us, and it is absolutely beyond our control.

Our confidence should rest in knowing this, that the Holy Spirit has been given to us by God, just as Jesus promised before he met his earthly death. That same Holy Spirit draws us together across our perceived differences. In mysterious, yet undeniable ways, the Spirit demonstrates again and again that we are made for community, for relationships that heal, for transforming a stranger into a friend, for trusting that we can understand each other in ways that transcend language.

In a few minutes, I will confirm and receive members of this Body of Christ, and your brothers and sisters from across the way from St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church. We will pray together to help them find their way into the presence of the Holy Spirit. And there will be silence. During that silence we are praying together for the presence of the Holy Spirit to be upon these people, so that they may be filled with the life and love and hope of that same Holy Spirit.

May this Holy Spirit be upon this Body of Christ, so that you might dream dreams and see visions, all in the fullness of God’s grace and mercy.

AMEN.

Today is the Seventh Sunday of Easter, the last Sunday of the Easter season before we begin the Pentecost season next week. We are in the period of time between the Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit. But even though we are in this Easter season, the Gospel reading today, and, in fact, the Gospel reading for the last several weeks, have been taking us back to Holy Week. It takes us back to Maundy Thursday and the period of time between the Last Supper and the Garden of Gethsemane. In this time frame, which was probably only a couple of hours, Jesus washes the Disciples’ feet, and then has a really long speech, although it was interrupted a few times by the Disciple’s questions. And then there is a long prayer at the end of the long speech. The whole thing takes five chapters, which is almost one quarter of the entire Gospel. It indicates the importance that John placed on these last words on Maundy Thursday, the final teachings and final prayer that Jesus had for the Disciples. Jesus, in essence, is saying this is the most important stuff. I am about to go, and when I do you need to make sure you remember these things.

So what are these things? One of them, the most important, is love. From the beginning to the end of this section of the Gospel, Jesus keeps coming back to love: God’s love for us, our need to respond and reciprocate, and love for each other in this world. It is, in the end, all about love. That is the central message of Jesus’s life and his teachings.

Also in this section, Jesus is concerned that the Disciples will be in despair after he is gone, and he wants to offer them comfort. One of the things he offers them, as we heard last week, was peace. My peace I give to you. As we have talked many times in the past, that peace is not just the absence of violence. That peace is a sense of wholeness. Jesus is concerned that when he is gone the Disciples’ lives might be ruptured; they might feel incomplete. So he gives them his peace, his shalom, his wholeness to make sure they are whole and complete without him.

Jesus also promises that they will be together again someday. He tells them he is going so he can get ready for them, and that they will be there someday and be reunited. He also says you are not going to be alone. I am going to give you the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, the Advocate to be with you. God will still be with you even when I am not here. Jesus also comes back to some of the most important messages of his teachings, like joy and truth and life and hope; about doing good and bearing fruit in this world by serving and caring for others.

Today’s reading is the very end of this section of the Gospel, at the end of the final prayer. In this section Jesus is talking about unity. He wants, he hopes, he prays that the Disciples will be unified, and he prays and hopes for unity in this world. Why does he want unity? That is an obvious question: unity is good. It is a truism. Unity is good. How can you argue against that? It is a major theme in literature and movies. Almost any movie has a theme of unity: Lord of the Rings and Bug’s Life are about unity. Together we are more than the sum of our parts. It is a basic and simple message.

However, there is a danger in unity. There is a way in which unity can become malformed, and that is when unity becomes uniformity. When unity isn’t about uniting who we are, but us changing to become all the same, that is not the kind of unity Jesus is talking about in the Gospel. What he says in the Gospel is that the unity he wants for the Disciples and for all who come after them is a unity rooted and grounded in love. When unity is rooted and grounded in love, that means it is going to honor and respect the differences that we hold. That is a true unity, when we are united across our differences rather than forced into cookie cutters. That cookie cutter vision of unity, which is the vision of unity that is out there, is a totalitarian vision of unity. But Jesus’s vision of unity is love. Unity that offers dignity and respect to every single person, because every single person is worthy of dignity and respect. Why? Because every single person is made in God’s image. It has nothing to do with what we have done to earn that dignity or respect. You, in your very being, because God made you and because God made you in his image, are worthy of dignity and respect. And so is your neighbor. God’s vision of unity offers dignity and respect to people, not trying to conform them into a mold, but offering love and respect and dignity to them. That is the true unity that Jesus is praying for in the Gospel, and the true unity that we are meant to strive for in this world.

The reality is that there is a lot of disunity in this world. There is a lot of division, and a lot of voices that want that division. There are also voices that want unity, but some of those voices are hoping for that totalitarian form. It is our work to try and have unity, yes, but it must be the unity that Jesus wants that is rooted and grounded in love.

So, my friends, work for that unity. Root and ground your life, the wholeness of your life, in that love, and this work of unity in that love, your relations with others in that love, offering dignity and respect to every person because every person is the image of God. Root and ground your life in that love. If we do, we can embody this prayer that Jesus has for us.

AMEN.

Our second reading today comes from the Book of Revelation, which is the last book in the Bible. But before we talk about the reading from Revelation, we need to go back to Genesis, the first book of the Bible. We go all the way back to the beginning, in the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth. Do you recognize that phrase, heavens and earth? We heard it in Revelation today. In the beginning when God created the earth, it was a formless void, welter and waste, and the Holy Spirit moved over the waters of the Creation. God spoke and said, let there be light. And there was light, and God said that it was good. Each day goes on like this. The next day God takes the waters and separates them. The waters below, which are called seas, the dome, called sky, and the waters above, which we call outer space. The next day those waters below, the seas, are separated so the earth can be seen. Then God creates vegetation, the plants, the trees, the seeds, the fruits. The next day God creates the sun and the moon and the stars. The next day, all the animals that go in those seas and go in the sky--the fish, the whales, the dolphins, the oysters, clams, shrimp, and all those wonderful birds up in the sky. The next day God creates all the land animals. At the end of each day God looks out over the Creation and says, it is good, it is good, it is very, very good. Then God takes a day to rest.

At the end of the Creation of all those land animals, he creates one more land animal, which is you and me. We are made in God’s image, and God tells us to take care of this Creation that he has made. God asks us to be the stewards of His good Creation.

Then Genesis tells us another Creation story. The order of things is a little different, but in this Creation story it is basically asking the question: if all of this is good, why does it seem that everything in this world is so messed up? This is the main thing about this Creation story, but there is still the theme that we are meant to be taking care of God’s Creation.

Now let’s go back to Revelation. It says, I saw a new heaven and a new earth, referencing the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth. God is creating a new heaven and a new earth. Creation is about the past, Revelation is about the future, which we call the eschatology, the end times, when God is going to come again. So while in the beginning we are talking about Creation, in the end we are talking about salvation and whatever that means, and scholars have written tomes about that topic. I will simply say that Revelation is addressing whatever salvation means. But notice that in this salvific moment, this eschatological moment way out in the future that has not yet happened but will occur, God says there is going to be a new Creation. In this Creation there will be a new heaven and a new earth.

What we have in both of these stories is God is telling us that Creation matters to God. It is good, and it is our work to help take care of it, to steward it. It nourishes us, it gives us food, it gives us drink, we have in the new Creation springs that are giving us life. We are connected to the Creation, we are related to it, and we have the sense that it matters to God, both in the past and in the end.

If it matters to God in the past, and it matters to God at the end, then it matters to God now, too. Creation matters in this present moment. The commandment to take care of this Creation, to be stewards of it, never went away. It is still there. We are still meant to take care of this Creation, to see its goodness and to tend to it. Of course we use it to nourish us, but not to abuse it. Remember that it does not belong to us, it belongs to God and we are its stewards.

One of my favorite interpretations of the Creation story comes from Desmond Tutu in his Children’s Bible. He says that Creation comes about because God’s love bubbled up and spilled over into Creation. All of Creation is a manifestation of God’s love. In Revelation, the new Creation is a manifestation of God’s love, a love so intense that as it says, God is going to dwell there in this new Creation with us. God’s greatest desire is to be with us in this new Creation, all manifestations of God’s love. When we hear in the Gospel reading that we are to love one another, I do not think that God means that we are only to love other people. We are meant to love this good earth that God has made and entrusted to us.

So, my friends, take care of this planet. Take care, be stewards of this Creation as God has asked us to do because it matters to God. And you are a part of the Creation, and you matter to God, as well.

AMEN.

Traditional

Let us pray: O God, whose son Jesus is the good shepherd of thy people; Grant that when we hear his voice we may know him who calleth us each by name, and follow where he doth lead; who, with thee and the Holy Spirit, liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

 Contemporary

Let us pray: O God, whose Son Jesus is the good shepherd of your people: Grant that when we hear his voice we may know him who calls us each by name, and follow where he leads; who, with you and the Holy Spirit, lives and reigns, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

This fourth Sunday of Easter is also known as Good Shepherd Sunday. In today’s world, I doubt many of us know too much about shepherds and sheep. Here’s something I learned last year. Sheep recognize and only respond to the voice of their shepherd. You can call and yell and coo and coax all you want, but if you’re not the shepherd it doesn’t matter. I saw a YouTube video of a shepherd with his sheep and he invited several different people, including other shepherds, to try and get the sheep’s attention. They called and called and cajoled, all to no end. Nothing. Until…their shepherd called them and then… instant recognition and response. Quite amazing. Shepherds know each of their sheep and give them names. And sheep recognize their shepherd. A good shepherd is guide, protector, and provider. This is the image for us as God’s sheep. Jesus calls us each by name because he knows us, guides, leads and protects us.

Jesus is our good shepherd calling us each by name. Have you ever considered this amazing fact? Jesus is calling each and every one of us by our names! (Insert several parishioners’ names)

To call someone by their name implies relationship. Knowing someone’s name is powerful. Over my 22 years of teaching, I learned thousands of names of the teenagers in my classes. Until I learned and could remember a student’s name, I couldn’t fully reach out and connect with them. I couldn’t know them. Names are important! Taking the time to learn and correctly pronounce someone’s name shows you care. It shows honor, value, and respect. Learning, remembering, and using someone’s name can also be quite intimate. Do you have a special name that only certain people call you? God knows your name! Do you have a nickname? Or a special name that only a few people use with you? My middle name is Jacob, but only my dad and my older brother ever call me Jake. It’s our special thing. Families, partners, friends may all have these very personal and intimate names for each other. God desires to be in relationship with you in the most intimate way too. Having created you, God knows everything about you. Everything that makes you the amazing, unique, human being you are. Ponder this for a moment. When God calls each of us by our names, God lets us know that we are intimately known, seen, and valued. All of our quirks, weaknesses, worries, secret hopes and joys, God calls us to bring it all into our relationship with the divine.

Remember when Mary went to the tomb after Jesus’ crucifixion to take care of his body and the risen Christ was there, but she couldn’t recognize him? Until…he called her by her name, Mary. And she and cried out Rabbi! Honored teacher!

And in today’s resurrections story about the beloved woman who cared and created for so many in her community. When Peter called her name, Tabitha, she returned from the dead to continue to care for her community. There are many stories in scripture of God calling people by their names or even giving them new names.

In our collect for today we pray: Grant that when we hear his voice we may know him…

But how can we be sure? There are lots of different people and things calling for our attention. How can we know that we’re hearing Jesus? How can we recognize his voice? God created us in and out of love and for love. And God’s call to us is love. The frequency of God’s call is goodness and mercy, compassion and forgiveness, welcome and healing. If we look for beauty, care, and community around us, we are attuning our ears to God’s call. When we marvel at the splendor of nature, when we honor and care for God’s creation, when we smile at kids and families at play, at teenagers discovering their passions and identities, when we see people gathered in community coming together to care for the needy, little acts of kindness and compassion, people helping others through the toughest times, it is then that we hear God’s voice and recognize our Good Shepherd calling us, inviting us to follow.

In today’s collect we also pray that we may follow where God leads.

But where are we led? Having been made in love, working to receive and believe we are loved and lovable, then we must broadcast that healing love to others and to our world. Jesus our Good Shepherd is calling us by name, guiding, protecting and leading us into good works. Together, as beloved community, we are being led to bring this call of love to our hurting, broken and polarized world. Following Jesus’ lead, we are called to broadcast compassion, mercy, and community wherever we go, to share how we’ve been loved, how we’ve heard Jesus call us by name, and how that call is not just for us, but for everyone. Listen carefully, God is calling out to you, calling you by name, inviting you into relationship, inviting you to help bring love into our world today. Will you hear that call and enter into the loving care of our Good Shepherd today? Listen for God’s call for your life.

Amen.

Our Gospel that we just heard is from the Epilogue of John’s Gospel. Why do I call it an epilogue? The last two weeks we have been hearing stories of the Resurrection. We heard on Easter Day the story of Mary Magdalene encountering the Risen Lord, and last week we heard about several of the Disciples who were gathered in a locked room when Jesus appeared. But Thomas wasn’t there, so one week later we heard that Jesus did the same thing, and this time Thomas was there and had the chance to encounter the Risen Lord.

Then John’s Gospel, as we heard last week, said “the end.” Now, it didn’t really say that. What John said was that there was a lot more stuff that Jesus did, that there were mores signs that were remarkable and wonderful, but he didn’t include all of them. He just picked these because they are great ones and this should be enough for you to hear and believe, and if you believe you will have life. That is the end. But yet we have a whole other chapter to the story. It is an epilogue. We have the full narrative part completed, and then we get one more vignette that is related, but kind of different. And that is what we have today, an epilogue.

What is the point of an epilogue? An epilogue is sometimes forward looking, saying something about the future, setting up a sequel, like at the end of a Marvel movie where after the credits there is a little hint of something coming. More traditionally, the epilogue is tying up loose ends and emphasizing some main, critical points the author wants to make. I think that is what is happening in John’s Gospel. But there is an element of forward looking, because the Disciples have gone back home and gone back to work. So Jesus does have to come again and call them again to follow him. Just because I am raised from the dead it doesn’t mean you can’t follow me any more. There is work to do. So it is a fore-looking epilogue in this regard.

But there are also loose ends to wrap up. What loose ends are there? One of the most important loose ends that this Gospel reading today is wrapping up is that Peter had denied Jesus three times. So how is it that Peter is this important guy if he denied Jesus three times? This Gospel is dealing with that. The clue to this is that really weird detail about the charcoal fire. Why does it matter that there was a charcoal fire? It matters because it only comes up one other time in the Gospel, and that is when Jesus denies Peter three times. After the Last Supper, after Gethsemane, after the arrest, Peter follows Jesus into the inner court where there is a charcoal fire that they are warming themselves by. There Peter is asked three questions about his relationship with Jesus, and each time he says I do not know him.

So what do we have in this part of the Gospel? Peter by a charcoal fire being asked three questions about Jesus and his relationship with him. Peter’s answer is, I love you. It is reversing what happened in the denial. It is his restoration. In this moment Jesus gives Peter three more opportunities, one for each of Peter’s denials, to say I love you, and Jesus restores him. Peter is able with the Psalmist to say, you have restored my life, O Lord.

This is interesting. What is more interesting is how it is that Jesus restores Peter, but this gets lost in translation. Remember this was not written in English. Typically, most languages have fewer words than English. The English language has a lot of words. When we translate Greek and Hebrew, the English translation has many more words than the original Greek or Hebrew. We like our English synonyms, sometimes because we want to add context or nuance, sometimes we think it boring to repeat the same word. So when we read an English translation, we find that there are many different words, but in the Greek or Hebrew it is the exact same word over and over again.

Today’s reading is the opposite. There are multiple words in Greek for love, but only one word in English. This Gospel reading uses multiple words for love that we don’t see. The two words for love used in the reading today are agape and philia. Philia is the brotherly love that has good feelings attached to it. Agape love, in Greek religious Scripture, is a higher form of love. It is understood, in first century religious communities, to be the divine love. So when John says, for God so loved the world, it is agape love. When it says in Deuteronomy, and when Jesus says, love the Lord your God with all your heart, it is agape love. It is the great love. When Jesus says to love your enemies, it is agape love. We don’t have to have warm feelings toward our enemies, we just need to love them. It is that high, deep love that Jesus is asking of us, but it does not have to be full of warm, squiggly feelings. So we have the higher love of agape, and the important, but slightly lower love, of philia.

Jesus comes to Peter and asks, do you agape love me? And Peter says, yes, I philia love you. Did Peter actually answer the question? So Jesus asks the second time, do you agape love me? And Peter says, yes, I philia love you. This is interesting. This is supposed to undo the denials, but is there a sense that Peter is still denying Jesus? Jesus is asking him do you agape love me, and Peter does not say yes, I agape love you. He says, yes, I love you in a different way, and this way is not as rich and deep and divine and holy as the way that Jesus is asking.

So the third time that Jesus asks the question, he asks do you philia love me? And Peter says, yes I philia love you. Jesus comes to Peter and asks do you love me in this awesome way, and Peter says I love you in the philia way. Jesus tries again: do you love me in this awesome agape way, and Peter says I love you in this philia way. Jesus says, OK. Do you love me in the philia way? And Peter says, yes, I love you in the philia way. Jesus does not berate Peter, he doesn’t require that Peter is perfect. Jesus’s desire for Peter is that he loves in the way that Jesus loves. That was the New Commandment. Love as I have loved. Love in this amazing agape way for me, for the world. Love like this is love in a perfect way. When Peter falls short of that, Jesus doesn’t say you’re out. Jesus comes and meets him right where he is. Can you do this Peter? Yes. Let’s try again: can you do this Peter? Yes. OK—I am coming right beside you Peter: can you do this? And Peter says Yes. Jesus says good. Now follow me. Jesus meets him where he is.

Isn’t that what Jesus is doing in the Incarnation? When God comes to earth, God is coming to meet us where we are. In the Incarnation, God is saying I want to be there right where you are. I have these dreams for you, but if we don’t make them, I will still love you. I’m still going to be with you. I will still care for you, and we’re going to work together on this. I hope I can lift you up, I hope we can get there, but if not I will come right where you are.

That is what Jesus does with us. Jesus meets us in all of our imperfections, in all of our limitations, right where we are. Jesus doesn’t wait for us to get it, to be perfect, to have that perfect, deep, rich love that God wants for the entire world and everybody within it. God meets us right where we are and says, I love you. Let’s walk together.

Do you agape love me? Yes, I philia love you. Do you agape love me? Yes, I philia love you. Do you philia love me? Yes, I philia love you. OK. That’s good enough. I love you, too.

AMEN.

Let us pray: Send your Holy Spirit and pour into our hearts your greatest gift, which is love, the true bond of peace. In the name of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, One God. Amen.

Today we continue with more of Jesus’ radical teaching. A quick recap of past episodes:

Jesus declares his mission statement and ours, as he reads from the prophet Isaiah in the synagogue in Nazareth:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

    because he has anointed me

        to bring good news to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives

    and recovery of sight to the blind,

        to set free those who are oppressed,

to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

From there he goes on healing and restoring, bringing outsiders in and lifting up those who’ve been cast down. The word spreads and everyone wants to come see and touch and be healed and miraculous healing power flows from Jesus healing EVERYONE.

Then he begins his biggest chunk of teaching, The Sermon on the Mount or the Plain as he pronounces the blessings or beatitude and the woes. Blessings on those who are suffering now, with the promise of accompaniment and future satisfaction, fulfillment and joy. And although I didn’t get to them last week, the woes that Jesus’ pronounces on those who are already full, rich, satisfied and laughing. These warnings AND sympathetic words of Jesus for those who think they’ve found contentment and satisfaction, when they haven’t. When they’ve only found fleeting happiness outside of the sustaining presence of a relationship with God.

Today, Jesus continues with more of his countercultural pronouncements of how to live in kinship with God, one another, and creation. Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who abuse you. What? These are the exact opposites of what we’ve been taught to do, right? Or at least what society tells us, what society values. Turn the other check?

Jesus is holding up a different way. It’s the way of love. We’re to see and interact and treat others the way we want to be treated. Actually, that makes pretty good sense, doesn’t it? We treat people kindly and with respect and we expect them to do the same. But what happens when they don’t? Then we can get mad and be rude and disrespectful, right? No Jesus says. In fact, no matter how much we might want to, and recognizing how hard it can be, Jesus says that we are to treat them BETTER than they treat us, we’re to respond with kindness and blessings. Wow!

After all, Jesus says, if we’re only nice to nice people, how does that show the extraordinary love and grace of God? If we share with people knowing they’ll return the favor, what’s new or different about that? That doesn’t really take much effort or extra love, does it? But loving our enemies, wow, who does that? Who CAN do that? Have you heard these amazing stories about people forgiving others who have really harmed them or their loved ones? I mean, those are powerful, aren’t they?

Now I want to stop here for just a moment and be very clear that Jesus is NOT advocating remaining in abusive relationships. It is NEVER OK for others to disrespect our human dignity as children of God. And we can and should take steps to protect ourselves and others from abuse of any kind. BUT, what Jesus IS saying is that we don’t have to return hate with hate, nor disrespect with disrespect, nor evil with evil. No. What Jesus showed and taught and modeled for us is to love everyone impartially, respecting their dignity, and seeking the goodness and love with which they were created. This is how God treats us, right? Jesus says that we’ll be children of the Most High when we act this way. God is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked, causing the sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sending rain on the righteous and the unrighteous (Matt. 5:45). Jesus calls us to be merciful as God is merciful. And he tells us not to judge or condemn others. Instead, we are to forgive, and in so doing we’ll be forgiven. Does this sound familiar? Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

Jesus exhorts us to share what we have, if anyone asks us for help, as much as we can, we are to help them. What happens when we give and share and care for others? Aren’t we often JUST as much the beneficiaries of this giving as the one we’re giving to? Jesus goes further about what we’ll get in return when we act in love. He says, when you follow me in acts of love and kindness, watch out! It will come back to you in overflowing, unexpectedly abundant ways. You know when you’re baking and you just pack the brown sugar down into the cup, or you tap the flour to get more in? Jesus says our blessings from acting in love will be so great that they’ll come overflowing back to us, right in our laps! If we measure out God’s love, forgiveness, and mercy for others in our lives, then that’s what we’ll get back, plus some! Extra peace, grace, and mercy from our good and loving God.

I don’t pretend that following these teaching of Jesus is easy. But I also know that we don’t do it alone. We have each other. We have Jesus who knows how tough it can be. And we have the power of the Holy Spirit working with us, through us, in us and all around us. Finally, and this really helps me, I know that I don’t have to be perfect. I’ll repeat that. WE don’t have to be perfect followers of Jesus. We just have to try. Period. And God takes our efforts and the desires of our hearts and smiles on them, and on us, and blesses them, and they are enough. They are more than enough, as together we work to show and share a new way of being in relationship with others. The way of Jesus is a way that honors each person just as they are. A way that shows love and kindness, even in the face of hatred. After all, as follower of Jesus, we know that in the end, love will always win. Amen.

Let us pray: God of love and life, enliven these words, speak to our hearts of the fullness of life found in relationship with you. Amen.

At this point in Jesus’ ministry, word has really begun to spread, and people are coming from all over, Luke tells us it was a great multitude of people from all Judea, Jerusalem, and the coast of Tyre and Sidon. Everybody, Jews and Gentiles from all around were coming to see and hear and, if they were lucky, touch or be touched by this amazing new teacher. Luke says they had come to hear him and be healed of their diseases; and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were cured. Jesus taught them, healed and restored them, and cured them from spiritual and mental angst. And get this next line from Luke: And all in the crowd were trying to touch him, for power came out from him and healed all of them. Power came out from him and healed all of them, all of them! Wow! What is going on here? Jesus is demonstrating divine power, love, and restoration to everyone, everyone! And after this amazing, loving care, healing liberation and restoration, Jesus begins to teach laying out a radical new way of understanding our human lives on this earth.

“Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God.”

To be poor is to be blessed? Yes, says Jesus. If you are poor, poor in what you own or don’t own, or poor in spirit, lacking, struggling, then, Jesus says, the Kingdom of God is yours. You’re close, SO much closer than others, to the Kingdom of God, to relationship with the divine, to blessings and reliance and satisfaction with the little you do have. With our things out of the way we can more easily turn to God and rely on God’s loving care. You may feel like you are at the bottom, but Jesus says that you own the whole kingdom! When we’re feeling low and down and like we don’t have much at all, Jesus reminds us that the whole Kingdom is ours through our relationship with the divine.

“Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you will be filled.

When people want for food, or want for direction, or guidance, or justice, they are blessed? Yes! Because they WILL be filled. They will find what they are looking for. God will provide for their needs. They will find satisfaction, what they were seeking, what they were hungering for will be found in relationship with their loving God. You may be hungry now, but you WILL be filled.

“Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.”

To weep and mourn in sadness is a blessing? Yes! Through God, and with God, and our Christian community, we are not alone in our grief and sadness. God, in Jesus, knows our human suffering and walks with us in it and through it all. Nothing, nothing, can ever separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Jesus promises that we WILL find joy and laughter again. Psalm 30 reminds us that weeping may endure the night, but joy comes in the morning!

“Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude you, revile you, and defame you on account of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, for surely your reward is great in heaven; for that is what their ancestors did to the prophets."

We’re blessed when people hate us, exclude us, insult us and spread rumors about us? Yes! When it’s because we’re acting in love and compassion and out of care for ourselves, for others, and for creation as followers of Jesus, yes. While others may put us down, God picks us up and smiles at our efforts to seek and serve Christ in everyone, to work for justice and peace, and to respect the dignity of every human being. God is the great INCLUDER, inviting and reminding us of our beloved status as children made IN love, BY love and FOR love. In God’s family EVERYONE belongs!

These were radical notions for people in Jesus’ time, and they continue to be radical and countercultural today. But this is the kindom or kinship that Jesus came to show and that he announced with his mission statement in the synagogue at Nazareth. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me

to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives

and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free,

to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

This work of following Jesus in our world is not easy, but it is good and right and just. It is healthy and life-giving, working together for the good of all people and for the good of our planet. And while we may feel at times as if we are lacking, remember that the kinship of God is ours, and while we may be weeping, mourning and grieving our losses, we WILL find joy and laughter again, and when people do or say mean things to us, take heart, God is with us! And remember that we are not alone in being criticized for caring and loving and sharing with others, all those who came before us faced the same abuse, if not worse. We are connected to them and with them in the great cloud of witnesses, showing and sharing God’s loving-kindness for all of God’s children and all of God’s creation. Blessed are we! Amen.

In today’s readings we hear about Peter and from Paul, two of the giants of early Christianity. Contemporaries, they became followers of Jesus very differently, though they reportedly met the same end, martyred by Nero in Rome.

At the time Jesus began his ministry Peter was a fisherman who apparently fished with his brother Andrew and their partners James and John. Based on the fact he was sometimes called Simon, or Simon Peter, he was likely not simply an Aramaic-speaking Jew but rather one who knew at least some Greek as well as Aramaic and perhaps Hebrew. Peter is believed to have lived in Capernaum on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee where he and his brother and their friends fished.

As today’s gospel makes clear, Peter and his fellow fishermen were the first people called by Jesus to follow him. Awestruck by the haul of fish they brought in when Jesus ordered him and Andrew to lower their nets after a night of catching nothing, Peter immediately fell at Jesus’ feet and begged him to leave, saying he was unworthy to even be in Jesus’ presence. Well no. Jesus not only didn’t leave but instead called all four of this team of fishermen to follow him. Leaving everything, they did exactly that. It seems that however unworthy Peter may have felt initially, it didn’t stop him from going with Jesus when Jesus called him to do so. Over time he became the leader of the twelve disciples, a leadership role that continued after the resurrection as the Christian community grew. It appears Jesus really relied on Peter. Peter, James, and John were the three disciples Jesus took up the mountain with him the day of the transfiguration. He took the same three with him to the part of Gethsemane where he prayed the night he was arrested. Yet as much as Jesus counted on Peter, we know Peter made Jesus really angry from time to time, most famously when he tried to persuade Jesus not to go to Jerusalem. Soon after that we hear about the infamous scene in the courtyard where Peter denied even knowing Jesus not once but three times. All this tells us that even though Peter became one of the most important leaders of the early church, he had the same human failings we all do. Like human beings of every age, fear sometimes got the best of him. Why wouldn’t he have tried to convince Jesus not to go to Jerusalem? Jesus was his friend, and he knew the Jewish authorities were determined to silence him. He didn’t want Jesus to put himself in harm’s way. But Jesus knew what he had to do, so Peter’s cautionary advice was not helpful, as Jesus made very clear with his response to Peter’s comments. As for what Peter probably regarded as his worst failing ever, his threefold denial that he even knew Jesus as he waited in the courtyard for news of what was happening in Jesus’ trial before the high priest, it was again fear that got the best of him. Yet in spite of his momentary lapses, we know that Peter was invaluable to the early church. Peter is often described as a sort of bumbling everyman who was forever getting things wrong, but that’s really not fair. Peter was a courageous, down to earth fisherman who ultimately came to love Jesus more than life itself.

It appears it would have been after the resurrection and the first Pentecost that Peter met Paul. Paul, or Saul of Tarsus as he was originally known, was born to Jewish parents who were Roman citizens, which means that he was a Roman citizen as well. It’s believed that his family moved from Tarsus, in modern-day Turkey, to Jerusalem in 10 CE, when he was still a child. A few years later he began his studies of Hebrew Scripture and then the law. Having grown up to be a pharisee by the time the Christian community began to grow, Saul was vehemently opposed to faithful Jews becoming followers of Jesus. He worked to arrest and imprison both male and female members of this growing branch of Judaism. We know he was present at the stoning of Stephen, the first Christian martyr, because scripture tells us the others laid their cloaks at his feet. It was while he was on the way to Damascus to arrest and extradite more Christians back to Jerusalem that Saul had what one might consider to be the most famous ah-ha moment of all time. Unable to see the light of Christ when Jesus was still walking the earth, Saul was temporarily blinded by a flash of light on the road as he heard a voice he understood to be that of Jesus asking him why he had been persecuting him. Saul collapsed, and when he got up, his spiritual blindness now having become physical, his friends had to lead him into Damascus. After three days, Ananias, a Christian leader who did not want to go anywhere near Saul, having heard what he had been doing to Christians in Jerusalem, went to him because he had been told in a vision to do so, and restored Saul’s vision. Upon regaining his sight, Saul’s spiritual blinders fell off as well, he was immediately baptized and well, you know the rest of his story. He took the name of Paul, and switched from being one of the most zealous persecutors of Christians to the early church’s most famous missionary.

There’s an extremely important message for us here, especially in these contentious times. Paul’s conversion tells us that we need to be very careful about writing people off as “one of them,” as someone who’s simply too different from us in whatever way we want to name, for us to relate to them, work with them, find common ground with them. Paul’s story tells us that people can change. Not everyone will of course, but anyone can, so we need to be open to that possibility.

The reason we pay attention to these stories, the reason we bother to read the Bible at all is that, as much as the world has changed in 2000 years, the human condition has not. Now, as then, the vast majority of people are governed by a powerful few, some of whom are basically good, some of whom are utterly corrupt, most a mixture of the two. But surrounding those powerful few are people like Peter the fisherman, Paul the pharisee, people like you and like me, in whom God sees great potential. Some, like Peter, say yes immediately to God’s call, others like Paul require a figurative two by four to the head, but in the end, using the hands and hearts of all those who ultimately say yes, God can do great things.

A story: Once upon a time about 19 years ago, I was a member of the Standing Committee when Bernie Lindley came before us. Bernie is from Brookings, the son of a crab fisherman who earned a degree at Willamette University before returning to Brookings and the family business. With time Bernie realized he felt called to be a priest. A family man with two children by then he wasn’t able to just pick up and go to seminary for three years, so he enrolled in the School for the Diaconate, led in those days by our very own Deacon Penny Berktold, in order to get as much training as he could that way. After Bernie left the Standing Committee interview that day, I remember thinking to myself after interacting with this down to earth, deeply spiritual fisherman, I just met Peter. While I know those of us on the Committee would have liked to ordain Bernie on the spot, Bishop Itty required him to do one year of residential seminary training before being ordained. Upon his return to Oregon from his year at Virginia Seminary, Bernie was ordained deacon and then priest, and became the rector of his home town parish. Since then St. Timothy under Bernie’s leadership has become a true force on the south coast. Years ago they provided access to medical care to those who had no other way to get it by convincing medical professionals to come to the church and volunteer their time. When the Oregon Health Plan went into effect they helped people fill out the required paper work in order to enroll. They have a clothes exchange whereby unhoused individuals can come by, use their shower and then trade the clothes they’ve been wearing for clean ones. Members of the congregation take loads of dirty clothes to the laundromat as needed. And of course they have a feeding program. While that was twice a week prior to Covid, during Covid other churches closed down their feeding programs so St. Timothy expanded theirs to four days a week. Some of their neighbors complained so the city passed an ordinance saying an organization could only serve two meals a week. Bernie said no, that would be impinging on the first amendment right of his parishioners to live out their faith. The city council was unmoved, so the church sued the city. With the support of Bishop Diana and contributions from many of us around the diocese the case wound its way through the courts until a federal judge finally ruled in favor of St. Timothy. The city ended up paying all of St. Timothy’s legal fees. The feeding program has continued. Now Bernie would tell you he’s just a crab fisherman who became a priest. I doubt the members of his congregation regard themselves as saints either, yet collectively they have had an extraordinary impact on the lives of those in need in Curry County.

All of us have ministries that matter. Whether you make quilts for newborns, or sandwiches for the hungry, or music that gladdens the hearts of everyone who hears it, your ministry matters. If your life’s work is healing the sick, teaching the next generation, helping those most vulnerable to the misuse of power to be safe, that is your ministry and it matters. On a given day if your only interaction with another person is to speak a few kind words to the checker at the grocery store, smile at a child who looks lost and alone, or call a friend who has lost a loved one to say Hey, I’m here if you need me, that matters. Collectively all our ministries, every act of kindness is a thread in the tapestry that portrays the goodness of God for all the world to see. As Mother Teresa reminded people throughout her life, some may be called to do great things, but we are all called to do small things with great love. Amen.

Today, on the Feast of the Presentation, we find ourselves smack dab in the middle of Epiphany. We are a month in, but still have a month to go because the beginning of Lent is late. We have a full Epiphany season this year.

One way we can think about the seasons of the church year is to think of them as individual units: what is Advent telling us, what is Christmas telling us, what is Epiphany telling us. That is one way to think about the seasons. Another way to think about them is to think of them as larger units, as a series or stories that happen over multiple seasons. If we think of them this way, Advent and Christmas and Epiphany are one unit, a trilogy, or perhaps a trinity, of seasons that are working together for the same thing. These three seasons are all about the Incarnation. In Advent we are preparing for the coming of Christ, at Christmas we are celebrating the birth of Christ, and in Epiphany, people are having their epiphanies. They are realizing that in the person of Jesus, there is something happening. He is more than just a regular person. The thing that they are experiencing is the fullness of God dwelling within this human. So we have Advent, a season of preparation, Christmas, a season of celebration, and Epiphany, a season of realization.

Each week we hear stories of people having their epiphanies, their encounters and their realizations about Jesus. These stories don’t work perfectly chronologically. There are two tracks going on here. We have the kid track and the adult track. We start the season off with the Magi, who meet the baby Jesus. Then the Sunday after that we go to Jesus’s baptism when he is an adult, and the people who have their epiphany when the heavens open and the Holy Spirit descends like a dove and a voice comes out of heaven. Then we have the story of the first miracle at Cana in Galilee and the realization the folks there had. The following story was about Jesus in the Temple where he read the scriptures, and the people realized He was the embodiment of Isaiah’s dream for this world. Jesus said, today this has been fulfilled in your sight. He is the embodiment of the Good News to the poor, and release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind.

This week we jump back to the kid track, and we hear Simeon and Anna and their epiphanies when they meet the baby Jesus. Next week we will go back to the adult track, and in the following weeks hear stories about people having their realization when Jesus calls them, when he heals folks, when people hear him teach or preach. The whole season ends with the most magnificent realizations when Peter, James, and John go to the mountain and have the experience of the Transfiguration.

If we think about these seasons, not as individual units, but a larger grouping of preparation, celebration, and realization, we notice there are other threads going through them. One of the threads throughout all three of these seasons is the thread of light. In Advent we heard readings about light, and we lit more candles week by week. At Christmas we celebrated the Light of Christ into the world, and we heard more readings about light, including the Prologue to John’s Gospel in which John said that the Incarnation of God is the coming of the Light into the world. No matter how dark it gets, John promises us that the darkness cannot overcome this Light.

As we get into Epiphany and the story of the Magi, we have the light of the star. Today we again have light. Simeon, when he encounters Jesus, says, “Lord, you have now set your servant free to go in peace as you have promised. For these eyes of mine have seen the Savior whom you have prepared for all the world to see. A light to enlighten the nations, and the glory of your people Israel.” What Simeon experiences is seeing the light. What Anna experiences is seeing the light, the light of Christ that came into the world that John promises us cannot be overcome by any darkness.

Why do we do this every year? Why do we have a church year with its seasons and patterns that we repeat every year? Why do we go through this? We go through this every year in order to form ourselves evermore into the likeness of Christ. We go through this particular trilogy/trinity of seasons in order to help us prepare, celebrate, and realize the presence of the Light in our lives today. We take time in Advent to intentionally prepare. We take time in Christmas to intentionally celebrate. And we take time in Epiphany, intentionally hearing these stories of peoples’ realizations of the Light, to help form us so that we can see it better in our lives. Each year we go back to it, trying to deepen our understanding, our appreciation, our vision to see that Light more clearly.

Here is the thing about the light and the darkness: the darkness might not be able to overcome it, but that darkness is strong, isn’t it? It has been there, it is still there, and it is going to continue to be there. The darkness shows up in all kinds of different ways. In comes in pain and suffering, illness, grief, sorrow over loved ones who died, relationships that fall apart. It comes in jobs lost, and in the powers and principalities of this world that are throwing all kinds of darkness into the world. I know that many of us have all kinds of darkness going on in our lives, from the personal to the communal darkness. I know that many of us see great, big, dark storm clouds coming in. But the reason we do this every year, is so that no matter how dark it gets, we can still see the Light, because the Light is still there, my friends. The darkness cannot overcome it. The Light of Christ is with you. It is shining a Light on the path. The Light of Christ is with you, trying to help you so you will not stumble and fall, so you can keep walking forward in faith and hope towards God, and his dream and vision for this world. The promise that God has made to us, the Light of Christ, is there. It was born, and it has been realized.

So, my friends, I encourage you, during the month left in this Epiphany season, to look for the Light. Look for the Light in the stories of other people. Look for the Light each week in the Gospel readings that we hear. Look for the Light throughout history in the stories of the Saints. There are great stories of their realizations, and the Light of Christ that they saw. You love St. Francis? Go read his story. Go learn how it is that he saw the Light. You love Dr. King? Go read his story. He told us how he went up on the mountaintop and saw the Light of Christ. People throughout generations have seen this Light, and when we read their stories we can also see it. A better place to look for the Light is in your own life, because the Light of Christ is shining there. Look for the Light that has been there throughout your life, and it is still there.

Look for the Light, and then, as Simeon says, the Light is not just for him, it is for the whole world. This Light is not something that we can hoard and keep to ourselves. This Light is something that we are meant to share with others to help them through the darkness, as well.

Seek the Light. See the Light. Share the Light, each and every day.

AMEN

Let us pray: Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. Amen.

Here we are, the third Sunday after the Epiphany, in this season of the revealing and manifesting of the divine identity of Jesus. You remember the star, the Magi, the Holy Spirit dove, the voice of God at Jesus’ baptism: “You are my beloved, with you I am well pleased!” the 180 gallons of water turned into fine wine?

Then, after being tempted in the desert, Jesus, filled with the power of the Spirit returned to Galilee, the region where he grew up. He’s been teaching in the synagogues in the area and people are talking about him. Today, he arrives in his childhood home, Nazareth, and its sabbath day so he goes to synagogue and volunteers to read. The attendant hands him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah, a long scroll, in our bibles it’s 66 chapters long. He finds a specific section and begins to read. Now up to this point we’ve witnessed signs and miracles proclaiming Jesus’ divinity, showing us that he was more than just a wise man, gifted teacher or prophet, but God incarnate! But what was he here to do? Jesus reads from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

While this section of scripture from the prophet Isaiah was probably well-known to his listeners, what comes next, Jesus’ mic-drop moment, is what would have utterly shocked and amazed those in the synagogue. After finishing the reading, he rolls the scroll up, hands it to the attendant, and sits down. This was normal practice, stand to read, sit to preach. The eyes of all in the synagogue are fixed on him.

Ok, we’ve heard about our hometown boy, Mary and Joseph’s son, carpenter’s apprentice, let’s see what he’s got.

Jesus gives perhaps the shortest and most powerful sermon ever, one line!

“Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” BOOM!

Right here and now, this scripture has just been realized. It’s me. THIS, THIS is what I’ve come to do. I’m the one you’ve been hearing about, looking and waiting for for all these years.”

Jesus’ purpose on this earth is laid out, his mission statement is:

To bring good news to the poor. To set people free, to release them from the shackles, real or metaphorical, that bind them. To free them from oppression, from racism, from addiction, from shame, from feelings of worthlessness, and to offer them new life, full, abundant life. Jesus has come to help people see again, to see clearly their value as beloved children of God, to see their neighbors, ALL of their neighbors, as made in God’s image and deserving of honor, dignity, and respect. To help us see through our differences and focus on what we have in common. Jesus has come to proclaim that God’s favor, loving care, and guidance are with us. This was known as a Jubilee year, proclaimed and celebrated every 50 years, a year of celebration, rest, and liberation. A time when debts would be forgiven, slaves would be freed, fields would be allowed to rest and rejuvenate, and people could return to their own land.

Good news. Freedom. Restoration. Forgiveness. Rest, and return. Jesus is here to lift up the lowly and the broken. Jesus has laid out for the people in the synagogue at Nazareth, and us here in this sanctuary today, what he’s all about. And, what we are called to be all about too. Perhaps even more so now, in these times, than ever before, at least in my lifetime.

So, if we really want to follow Jesus, to be Christians in our world today, then this is OUR mission statement too. This is what we are to be about if we seek to follow Jesus. To show with our actions that we care for the least, the last, and the lost, just like Jesus did. This is radical stuff from the radical divine human, Jesus the Christ.

To live like Jesus is to put others first, helping, sharing, making sure we all have enough and that we’re all safe and cared for and loved. It’s all about helping out those in need. Advocating, standing up with those who are being put down and told they are different or other or inferior. It’s about being the Good News of God’s conquering love for EVERYONE, E-V-E-R-Y- ONE!

In Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, we hear: “We are the body of Christ and individually members of it… If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it. In his letter from a Birmingham jail The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. echoes: "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."

Each of us must work and share together in the mission of Jesus: to bring good news to those who need to hear it most, to those who are hurting, scared, lonely, on the margins. To seek and serve Christ in everyone we meet, to work for justice and peace, and to honor the dignity of every human being. To set people free. These promises from our baptismal covenant guide us. Today, Jesus has declared our mission in this world. Let us go forth together, in the power of the Spirit, to bring good news to those who are hurting, afraid, and oppressed. Amen.