While at Hogwarts, Harry Potter wanders into the woods and he sees another student, Luna Lovegood, and she’s standing next to this very odd-looking creature. It looks kind of like a large horse with these massive wings. And Harry realizes that most of the other students cannot even see it. That he sees something that others do not see. And it always feels awkward when we’re the only one. And he asks Luna, what is it? She says, It is a thestral that only those who have experienced loss can see it.

Because grief gives us eyes to see what we could not see before. It is the gift that nobody wants. But if we live long enough, It is the one we all receive. And this is true of all grief. Beforehand, there are certain things we cannot see. Afterwards… We can notice the pain of others in new ways. Because grief can soften our hearts and widen our souls. And when Harry discovers that Luna can also see what he can see, he finds this comfort in knowing that his experience of grief is shared by others.

and Martha and Mary could see what others could not because of their experience of loss. Their brother, Lazarus, had become sick and he was not getting any better. They even sent word to Jesus, the one that you love is ill. And Jesus deeply loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, but for reasons that are unclear to us, he waited two more days. Finally, he decided to go. The disciples were somewhat apprehensive. He would face imminent danger along the way. There were people plotting against him, and he would be going towards Jerusalem, which was more dangerous for him, but he needed to go. Lazarus had died.

We can experience loss in countless ways. The loss of a loved one, the loss of hope, the loss of opportunity, the loss of innocence, the loss of friendship, the loss of financial stability. And just two more days can make a significant difference in our lives, leaving us with questions we cannot answer and burdens that we cannot carry alone.

After a long night in the hospital, where I looked around in the waiting room and every seat was taken by a friend from church. We were confronted with the shocking news that Mary, a good friend, had passed away. The injuries of the car accident had proven to be too much. So I had to put on a coat and tie for the funeral. I was only in high school, but along with several other members of the youth group, we were asked to serve as pallbearers. And the sanctuary was full, not an open seat anywhere. And the service was beautiful. And then we recessed out of the back of the sanctuary. We stood next to the exit because we didn’t know what we were doing. They just told the pallbearers where to stand.

and then the family recessed out. And when Mary’s mother walked out of the sanctuary, she lost all of her strength. When she walked by me, she almost collapsed. Instinctively, I put out my arms. And I had never. felt the burden of such grief before. that we cannot carry it alone.

and unable to carry their burden, Martha and Mary went running out to meet Jesus when he finally arrived. They were full of questions. If you had been here, our brother would not have died. Then, in this profound moment that impacts our lives, going beyond mere words, assuring us that we are never, under any circumstances alone, Jesus wept. It was the tears of the divine. It is the very heart of God.

And then they walked to the tomb, like visiting the grave after the headstone has been placed. Lazarus had been dead four days. And standing there in front of the cave, peering into the past and fearful about the future, Jesus said, roll the stone away. Lazarus, come out, unwrap him and let him loose. Death is not the victor, and the love of God is stronger than the grave.

wake of loss, we can eventually find the strength that we need for tomorrow. And then the day after tomorrow, it is a one day at a time kind of journey and we find the strength that we need through the tears of God and the hope of love that is shared with us by others.

And in the wake of loss, we are not always sure what to say. We just know we don’t want to say the wrong thing. But the one thing we can always say. is that we are held by the hands of God. Even when our hands are not strong enough to hold on to God, God holds on to us because God can bring life. Out of death.

We began the journey of Lent here in this room with ashes, the sign of the cross on our foreheads, saying, from ashes we have come and to ashes we shall return. And I remember years ago, I received a phone call a couple weeks before Ash Wednesday, and I was asked to help lead a chapel service at a hospice facility on Ash Wednesday. They needed someone, anyone, to offer the imposition of ashes. And for reasons I will never understand, they called the Baptist Church. But I drove over there that morning with ashes in the passenger seat.

And at the beginning of the service, we listened to the hopeful words of Scripture. We talked about the celebration of Palm Sunday. And we reflected on the heartache of Good Friday. And then we heard again the good news of Easter morning. and I walked around the room. standing by each patient. From ashes we have come. and to ashes we shall return. those words. never felt so tender. but within them and behind them are the hopeful words of Easter. because Jesus weeps with us and God’s compassion comes to us and the love of God is stronger than the grave. because the hands of God will never let us go.

On the day that Desmond Tutu handed over the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, where they investigated and documented all of the horrible tragedies of the apartheid, trying to foster dialogue between perpetrator and victim, then on that day when he handed over the report, Richard Lisher reminds us that Desmond Tutu said, when the church looks at the cross. It sees the very worst of what human beings can do. but it also sees the very best of what God can do. And when we experience loss or we are overcome with grief, we need to remember and be reminded of the very best of what God can do. A grace that is beyond measure. A hope that exceeds our understanding. and a love that is stronger than death. Amen.

When the pitcher on the mound gets hit by a line drive, all the way in the stands, we might recoil in pain. Or when we hear our grandfather all the way in the next room laughing that big belly laugh that fills up the house, we might start laughing as well. Or when our friend goes on and on about their gratitude for their child’s teacher, we might go home and write a thank you note to our child’s teacher as well.

Because neuroscience supports what the church has said for years, that we are created and fashioned in the image of God. It is, as Marco Iacoboni, a neuroscientist at UCLA says, we are wired for impact. He researches mirror neurons, enabling us to feel what other people are feeling.

And if we scratch the surface of the Gospel of John, we find the reason for that empathy. Where it says in the most well-known Bible verse, in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only son, so that everyone who believes may not perish but have eternal life.” For God so loved the world, the Greek word is cosmos as in everything, that nothing and no one falls outside of the reach of God’s steadfast love. It is the reason for empathy.

As the theologian Jurgen Moltmann writes, love makes the suffering of the other unbearable for the one who loves. That love cannot ignore the pain of others.

Jesus and the disciples were traveling through Samaria. Samaria was not the place you wanted to stop if you could help it. It’s like driving down that highway in Alabama and you pass the gas station that has bars on the window. Sure, they have a bathroom, but you’d rather keep driving.

Well, Jesus and the disciples stop in Sychar within Samaria. It was the location of Jacob’s well, and he met a woman in the middle of the day at the well. And most people back then went to the well first thing in the morning, because if you don’t have running water at home, you needed to get water for all the activities of the day. So when the story says Jesus met the woman in the middle of the day, it signals to us to pay close attention.

And the first thing we overhear is an unlikely conversation. Jesus asks, can I have a drink of water? And she says, how is it that you, a Jew, ask a drink of me, a woman in Samaria. That there were all these religious, ethnic, gender boundaries that would have gotten in the way and made this kind of conversation unlikely.

But Jesus moves beyond. If you knew who it is that is saying to you, give me a drink, you would ask for living water. And she says, but you don’t even have a bucket. It’s like Nicodemus asking, how can you be born after growing old? That she was focused on the practical, not fully understanding what Jesus was trying to say.

And then Jesus says, I am the living water. And the Gospel of John has all of these I am statements. I am the bread of life. I am the living way. And all of those I am statements reach back to that sacred ground on which Moses stood beside the burning bush when God said, I am who I am. Moses keeps asking, who do I tell Pharaoh sent me? God says, tell Pharaoh, I am has sent you. It is the sacred name of God.

And Jesus says, I am the living water. Jesus carries the living water of the steadfast love of God which does not require a bucket and is not held back by the boundaries that we create.

The disciples see Jesus with this woman, and they are concerned about those boundaries. Why are you speaking to this woman, a Samaritan? That they fail to see this woman through empathy. It’s why labels like Samaritan are so dangerous. They rob us of our ability for empathy.

And Jesus is the empathy of God. Jesus is the Word became flesh, knowing what it is like to walk around in our shoes. It is the love of God for the world, which cannot ignore our pain. So it comes to share it with us, as in God is with us. Jesus is God’s empathy, which is why we are invited and called to show empathy to others.

Diana Butler Bass still remembers the first time that she walked into the dining commons of college. And she admits, “commons” is an odd sort of word. We don’t use it a great deal. Its peak use was back in 1810. And many of the ways we use it now is slightly negative. If something is commonplace, it doesn’t have great worth. Common sense is at best ordinary. But a dining commons or a high school cafeteria is meant to be common space for everyone.

But as we all know, it doesn’t oftentimes feel that way. Standing there with our plastic tray, holding our 2% milk and well done Salisbury steak, just looking, hoping for a friendly face, trying to figure out where we fit in in the Commons. But we have to remember. It’s not only about what we have in common with others, but also about what we can hold in common with others.

That we all need people in our lives in which we have things in common. But we can also remember the things that we can hold in common with others. That we can hold in common the belief that everyone is created in the image of God. That we can hold in common a gratitude for the gifts of others, especially when they are different from our own. And we can hold in common our need for humility and our hope for what is good for everyone. That we can hold in common the strength of empathy.

Because Jesus is the empathy of God. Showing us the living water. The steadfast love of God for the world.

2020. Minneapolis police officers detained George Floyd. He had been suspected of using a counterfeit $20 bill, and he was handcuffed face down where an officer had a knee on his back for over nine minutes. And he kept straining to say, I can’t breathe. The tragedy of his death tests the strength of empathy.

The officer was convicted of murder, but there were protests and violence, anger and tears. And one detail of the story that was not widely reported is that George Floyd was from Fayetteville, North Carolina. He was a son of that town. To those in Fayetteville, he was not a news story. He was somebody’s child.

And there were protests in Fayetteville. Most of them peaceful, but not all of them. That there was unresolved pain that caused more pain. There was anger that became vandalism. Tensions started to rise throughout the town.

And on June 1, 200 protesters marched down Murchison Road towards downtown Fayetteville. And waiting for them were 60 police officers in full riot gear. Most of the protesters were black. Most of the officers were white. And fear just hung in the air about what would happen.

But then, to everyone’s surprise, the police officers laid down their weapons and took a knee in the middle of the street in solidarity with the protesters. A representative from the police department later said, as a show of understanding the pain in our community and our nation, regarding equality, the Fayetteville Police Department took a knee to show that we also stand for justice for everyone.

The protesters could not believe it. One of the protesters posted on social media, men and women alike started crying and then, cautiously, walked towards the police officers to shake their hands. These are the moments that will go down in history and will be taught to future generations.

Later we learn one of the police officers played basketball with one of the protesters. And that police officer went to his supervisor and said, all they want from us is empathy. And the police chief, Gina Hawkins, said, “Well, what are we waiting for?”

Jesus is the empathy of God. It’s not just what we have in It’s also what we hold in Amen.

I read a story about a newlywed couple who for their honeymoon decided to travel across the country for six months seeing all the sights. And before they left, the wedding party wrote in big bold letters on their rear window, “honk if you support our marriage.” And from New England to New Mexico, people would honk and wave, sharing their excitement, showing their encouragement, and they loved all the attention from friendly strangers.

Well, when the six months was up and they were back home in the midst of ordinary life, going to work, paying the mortgage, one night the husband decided to clean off the rear window, but he didn’t mention it over dinner. And the next morning, his wife was in a rush to get out the door and to get to work, and she didn’t notice the rear window was now clean. And because she was in a rush on the way to work, she made an illegal U-turn, accidentally cutting someone off in traffic and the driver behind her started to honk furiously and she turned around with big smile on her face and said thank you I love you too but the other driver was not smiling that as we navigate the road in front of us, we need to foster a wider awareness. which is part of the invitation of Lent. It is what Saint Ignatius calls “an examined life.”

And Abram and Sarai teach us about this journey. It is a journey that inevitably changes us. It is why Abram and Sarai’s names became Abraham and Sarah. that they packed their bags and they left home. And they didn’t have the luxury of a travel agent writing out each step of their itinerary. They simply logged on to Google Maps, but when they tried to pull up the directions, there was no destination listed. That they left Haran, the place that they knew. And they went to an unknown destination where there was not a mint on the pillow or a robe in the closet. They went into an unknown place. That God simply called them to go and they followed. and God would bless them and they would become a blessing for others. that we do not always know where the journey will lead us. But God travels with us. And if we pay attention, God reveals to us a wider world.

But there are hardships and challenges along the way that can make us question the journey itself. In 1965, Martin Luther King asked for volunteers to march from Selma to Montgomery. And Viola Liuzzo, who was a wife and mother in Detroit, traveled all the way to Alabama. She was like Abraham and Sarah. Her husband justifiably did not want her to go. He was worried. He didn’t want anything to happen to her. He kept saying, Viola, this is not your fight. But she kept saying, “This is everybody’s fight.”

And on that landmark day, which would bless future generations, she marched those 54 miles from Selma to Montgomery. And after the march, she offered a ride to a young man, a civil rights worker. She was driving back to Selma and he needed a ride. But along the way a car full of Klansmen saw them became furious that this white woman was driving a black man and they started shooting. The young man survived. Viola did not. She was only 39 years old. Later in her daughter’s life, when her daughter was in her 70s, said of her mother, “My mother actually believed it when Christ said that the suffering and needy are our people. Mom saw all other human beings as her people.”

And we might not be called to such a hardship as this. But we don’t know where the journey will lead us. And there are moments when it directs us in ways where we will not be sure about what to do.

In the words of Psalm 121, we’re meant for a journey. It’s a Psalm of ascent. They were oftentimes memorized and recited by those traveling to Jerusalem. And as people traveled back then, there was not always a Motel 6 to leave a light on for you or a Buc-ee’s where you could buy a brisket sandwich. It’s why hospitality was so essential, why we hear about it over and over again throughout the pages of scripture. Taking in a traveler or giving a meal to a traveler was an essential practice of faith because oftentimes people would sleep underneath the stars, taking comfort only in a campfire, knowing that they were vulnerable to all sorts of threats.

That’s why the psalmist says, I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where will my help come? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. And there are two ways to understand the hills in this song. It might be when a traveler looks up in front of them and sees the hills and knows they will have to climb them and face the dangers within them. It was a word of warning. The second way is that these hills refer back to the hills of Mount Zion. where God met the people in the wilderness after they had escaped Egypt, that you can look up and see the hills and know that God will meet us there.

It’s like when Jesus wandered out into the wilderness facing temptation, but relying on God. Or how Jesus sent out the disciples without food, bag, or money, relying on God’s presence.

Throughout this psalm it says, “God will keep us six different times.” And God will keep us because, as scripture says, God’s righteousness or God’s faithfulness. But as Richard Lisher reminds us, there are two different ways to understand God’s righteousness. The first way is a righteousness that is so pure that it has to stand alone. That it always protects itself because it doesn’t want to be contaminated so it sequesters itself. But this is not the righteousness of Jesus. The Word became flesh. Where God comes to us, God is not sequestered from us.

So the other kind of righteousness is so good that it cannot help but reach out and share its goodness with others. It’s the righteousness of love. A love that packs its bags and goes to those in need. A love that offers a ride to a young man back to Selma. It’s the righteousness of Jesus where love has this inherent propensity to give, not to guard, to reach out and not to reject.

And it comes to us through the shared journey because it fosters in us this wider awareness. It’s why Jesus calls the disciples together but sends them out to travel with one another. And it’s why a church is more of a verb, than it is a noun. A church worships, prays, serves, shares, gives, receives, hopes, grieves, celebrates: we are made up of all sorts of verbs.

And in order to remain aware of God’s steadfast love, we need others who will share it with us. It’s the shared journey: someone who will gently lay a hand on our shoulder when we are hurting, so that we can see more than just our grief. Someone who prays for us when all we can see is the dangers in the hills and not God’s companionship with us. Or, someone who will stand next to us and sing when our voices are weary, drawing our attention to God yet again.

We need to gather, serve, celebrate, grieve together. It is part of the blessing, and the blessing of others in the shared journey of faith. Amen.

Family photos are so important. We put them on our bookshelves, we hang them on our walls, and we are always thankful for those pictures after the fact. But when we are trying to coordinate everybody’s calendars so we can all get together, we might question whether it is worth it. That we spent weeks trying to find one day where all members of all the Martin family could be together. It felt like we were standing there, blindfolded, throwing a dart, just hoping to hit an open day. And we finally arrived at a day where we could all be together.

And we met that afternoon with the photographer hoping to capture the best light because the camera is honest and the best light can soften a smile or brighten the background and we took what felt like thousands of pictures. We inched to the left, we leaned to the right, following all the photographer’s instructions, and we thought we got a few good pictures that day.

So when they arrived, we were so excited. We thumbed through them all. We thought there were a handful that were worth putting in a frame, sitting up on a bookshelf or hanging on a wall. Later on as I was walking by those pictures, I noticed something. I stopped and I looked closely and it looked like there was something in my eye. I didn’t remember anything feeling off that day, but the camera is honest. I even took the picture out of the frame and sure enough there was a tiny speck in my eye.

And Lent is honest like the camera is honest. That if we look closely, we might discover a speck in our eye. And as small as it is, it can cause us to stumble, which I know is disheartening. But Lent also whispers to us that we are surrounded by enough love that we can actually learn from our mistakes.

In the book of Genesis, we read that story which we refer to as the fall. Adam and Eve are in the Garden of Eden and they can eat of any and every tree except the one in the middle, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And the serpent in its cunning invites them to test this warning. The serpent says, the fruit is good to eat. And not only that, you will also have the same knowledge as the Lord, knowing good and knowing evil.

So they accept this invitation and they test God’s warning and they discover that the warning is warranted. Their eyes are open. This was their first mistake. But the second might have been more detrimental, because no one could decide whose fault it was. Adam blamed Eve. Well, she gave me the fruit. Eve blamed the serpent. The serpent said it was good. The second mistake was ignoring the speck in their eyes, that we are unable to learn and grow when we shift blame and accuse others. And in the wake of the first mistake, we do well to avoid the second.

Initially, the words of the psalmist would have been unrecognizable to Adam and Eve. Happy are those whose transgressions are forgiven. Adam and Eve were not happy. They were scared, terrified, worried, ashamed. But if we can remember the love of God that always surrounds us, we might muster up enough strength to experience what the psalmist describes.

For it is a prayer of confession, where the psalmist says, I acknowledged my sin to you and I did not hide my iniquity, that in the wake of that kind of honesty, forgiveness leads to wisdom. And grace fosters hope that we discover that God is our refuge, what the psalmist calls a hiding place, and that we might overhear the glad cries of deliverance.

But it is hard to look at the speck in our eyes. It is much easier to notice that speck in others. We’re prone to look elsewhere. It’s like the story about the man who lost his keys. He went back to the last place when he had them and he’s down there on the sidewalk on his knees and his hands looking for his keys furiously under this bright street lamp when a police officer comes up and the officer asks, what are you looking for? Trying to be helpful. And the man says, I lost my keys. And the officer says, is this where you dropped them? And the man says, no, I dropped them in the alley, but the light is much better here.

It’s easier to look for the speck in other people’s eyes. It’s harder to look in our own, and I wish, I wish it was easier. So much so that at times we assume that it should be. Every now and then I’ll be driving through my neighborhood and I’ll look over at the sidewalk and I’ll see something walking their dog. And the dog’s on a leash, but there’s all this slack in the leash that the dog is walking right beside its owner. When they get to the crosswalk, the dog stops and sits down and waits for the owner to cross and I think to myself, why can’t my dog do that? When I walk Kinsley, it feels like Kinsley is walking me.

But we should never fool ourselves by looking at pictures on social media, or referring to superficial examples, thinking that everybody else’s life is easier than our own. The truth is, everyone stumbles. And if we are honest with ourselves and honest with God, we can avoid the second mistake. Because God’s love is a watchcare kind of love.

When I went off to college, I joined the First Baptist Church of that other college town. And it was the rare place in my life during that season when I was around people who were not my age. Everywhere else I went, I was surrounded by other college students and I joined that church by watchcare. Meaning, I kept my membership in the church where I grew up, but I was now also a member of that church while I was in college.

And I met all these wonderful people who did not know me from Adam. In the church where I grew up, I was always Milton and Kathy’s son. I had all these Sunday school teachers who loved me and ministers who supported me and ushers who welcomed me, but I was always somebody’s child, all of which was a gift. But when I joined the church in college, they didn’t know who my parents were and I was given a respect I had not earned.

Nobody checked my references at the door and they gave me opportunities to serve, giving me more responsibility than I had proven I could handle. That it is a kind of love without prerequisites. It is the kind of love which always surrounds us, no matter what, where we can be honest with God and honest with ourselves, learning from our mistakes.

Oftentimes, we don’t want to look at the speck in our eyes because we think practice makes perfect. Somewhere along the way, we pick that up and we carry it with us. And we think if we notice the speck in our eyes, it will ruin our picture of perfection.

We are not called to perfection. Perfection can actually limit us more than it can help us. Because practice does not and never will make perfect. Practice makes us grateful because we are met by the grace of God that continues to affirm us and lead us forward.

That practice makes us humble, that we will fall short, but not in a way that destroys us because of the love of God. It gives us humility and practice makes us hope, that we have this larger, more expansive vision for our lives. That practice makes us patient, that we learn to be patient with others and with ourselves.

And practice makes us joyful. We discover this deeper purpose in calling for our lives and practice makes us faithful. It does not make us perfect. It makes us faithful, which is different, that we simply give of ourselves out of the love that we have received.

And Lent is a season for practicing a life of faith. It is possible because of the steadfast love of God that always surrounds us. Amen

Back in the ’80s, sitting in Jordan–Hare Stadium, somewhere in the middle of the game, you might look down about 15 rows in front of you, perhaps just one section over where there is this one courageous, committed soul standing up, sitting down, standing up, sitting down, raising his arms and lowering them all by himself. Because it was the era of the wave. Where at a football game or the World Cup or the Olympics, everyone would stand up raising their arms, lowering them, sitting back down, going around and around the stadium creating the wave. And we would sit on the edge of our seats watching it go around hoping it would not die out before it was our turn to stand up and to sit down. But it all started with one courageous, committed soul standing up, sitting down all by himself. And it was so mesmerizing. And we got so excited about it because of that feeling of being part of something bigger than ourselves. That we could not wait to stand up and participate in it. It’s why concerts are so exciting. Standing there in the crowd of hundreds all singing together with our favorite band. It’s why conventions are so interesting. People traveling from all over the country descending on one conference center around a shared interest. And it’s why summer camp is so fun. Everyone leaving home, coming back to camp yet again to celebrate those wonderful camp traditions. That we’re thankful for that one committed soul, who reminds us that we are all very small parts of this bigger wave.

And perhaps it’s what the psalmist was responding to or seeking after when the psalmist boldly says, happy are those who fear the Lord. That we don’t oftentimes put the word happy and fear in the same sentence. But this is not the fear of jump scares or horror films. It has nothing to do with monsters up underneath our bed. It is the fear of awe and wonder where we find ourselves standing in the presence of the grand mystery of God’s unending love. And any time we stand in the presence of something so sacred, it leaves us with fear and trembling because we are overwhelmed. And it includes the awe and wonder of moving together through the ways of Jesus and the love of God. It is like the wave going around and around the stadium that it creates this centrifugal force turning us outward towards the needs of others.

I still remember the playground of South Columbia Elementary School. We had all these swings and we had one big slide. And then we had what can only be described as the Hurl-a-Whirl. It’s like the teacups at Disney World. It’s this large metal platform that was a circle. And we would cram about 15 of us on it and there were a few places to hold on. And then the rest of the members of our class would run around spinning it faster and faster. And the faster it went, the centrifugal force started to pull you towards the edges, turning us outward. And like our good friend and wonderful theologian Fisher Humphreys says. The centrifugal force, the force that sends God’s people from themselves to others is evident in the biblical teachings about Jesus and his disciples. That if we look closely, there is this centrifugal force in the love of God. And we experience it, as we move together through the ways of Jesus.

In 2018, a young soccer team and its coach was trapped in a cave in Thailand. You might remember the constant media coverage that they had gone for a tour in the cave and then a severe downpour of rain flooded the entrance of the cave and they were trapped. And about 10,000 people participated in the rescue operation. Thousands more were glued to the TV watching every minute of the coverage, holding this young soccer team in their prayers even though they had never met them. They were trapped for about two weeks, slowly running out of food. They feared more rain coming and making the rescue operation completely impossible. And finally, they assembled a team of divers from around the world to come to Thailand where they were able to rescue every member of that team. And we all watched as they were reunited with their family. And we experience tears of joy. That it is the awe and wonder of the love of God, that pulls us outward, where we are paying attention to the needs of this world.

As the psalmist says, they rise in the darkness as a light for the upright. They are gracious, merciful, and righteous. That it is standing up in the middle of the darkness, joining with others so there might be light. It’s why Jesus says, you are the light of the world. And then none of us would light a lamp and hide it under a bushel basket. We put it up high on a lamp stand where it can illuminate the entire world. And if we take one candle and we place it with another and yet another, the light simply becomes brighter, reaching out towards all the darkness. That we are invited to let our light shine by joining it with one another.

In a beautiful book by Claire Keegan, Small Things Like These. She tells a story based on the painful history of the Magdalene laundry houses in Ireland, where young women who had nowhere else to go were conscripted to work in these laundry houses, where many times they were mistreated and forgotten. And she tells the story of Bill Furlong who delivered coal and timber so people could keep their houses warm in the winter. And he had grown up with next to nothing. His mother was always scraping by. If it wasn’t for the kindness of Mrs. Wilson for whom she worked, they never would have survived. That Mrs. Wilson not only supported them, but looked out for them when most people would have rejected his mother.

Later on in his life when he was married to his wife Eileen, they had five daughters and he was so grateful for their life. They were able to do far more for their daughters than his mother was ever able to do for him. And one night he said to Eileen, aren’t we the lucky ones? There are so many others. Who were badly off, and he would lay in bed at night going over all the small things which had created their good and grace-filled life.

One Christmas, he was making a delivery to the laundry house in town. And as he was getting back in his truck about to leave, he looked over and there were several young girls out front. And one of them goes running as fast as she can across the street and comes over up to him and says, Can you help us? Can you take us as far as the river just outside of town? And he was confused. He didn’t know what to say or what to do. He panicked. He got into his truck and he left. But this moment weighed on him. That night he told Eileen about it and she kept encouraging him just to remain quiet. Not to say anything, not to stir up any trouble. But he laid in bed thinking, what if this was one of my daughters?

Several days went by and he was making another delivery to the laundry house. This time he was carrying a bag of coal around back to their storage room where they kept it. And when he opened the door to the coal room, he found a young girl who’d been locked inside in the cold as punishment. And this time, he couldn’t remain quiet. He went to see those at the convent who ran the laundry house and voiced his concerns. But they quickly and diplomatically brushed them aside. So he went home carrying this heavy burden. All he could think about was all the small gifts of grace his mother had received. That enabled them to get by, that changed her life, that changed his life. And after a few days of carrying this burden, he had to go back. And this time, he walked around the laundry house back to the coal room. And when he opened the door, he found that young girl there again. And this time, he took his coat off and he wrapped it around. And he said, you can come home with us.

We are so thankful that we gather in this place. That we gather to worship and be with one another, small parts of a larger whole. And we might feel the centrifugal force of the love of God. Where we are sent out to care for others in so many small ways. We gather in this place thankful for the gifts of grace that we have received. And we are grateful that we can come together to worship and serve as a family of faith. And we are thankful for the opportunity of the global ministries offering, where in small ways we can share the grace that we have received with others, where we are small parts of the wave of God’s love. Amen.

In the midst of the excitement of a graduation, whether that’s from high school or college or even graduate school, as family are gathering and pictures are being taken—in the midst of all of that wonderful excitement, there is still this quiet, lingering dread over the commencement speech. How long is it going to be? How many clichés are going to be repeated? Well, the very best commencement speech I ever heard was by Dr. R. Kirby Godsey. Dr. Godsey was at one point the president of Mercer University, and he is a prominent Baptist scholar, and when he stepped up to the microphone, he immediately telegraphed that he would not speak long. And then he talked about sitting at a restaurant in New Orleans thinking about what he was going to say in that commencement address.

He was sitting at Mr. B’s Bistro in the heart of the French Quarter where food has a résumé. Mr. B’s Bistro was founded in 1979. It had grown this widespread reputation for its gumbo. And he sat at a table just outside the restaurant listening to the sounds of the city when he decided to simplify his commencement address to three words, thought, passion, and grace. That we were to always be thoughtful in what we did because blind faith is dangerous. And that we should always rekindle our passion for what we do to continue to fall in love with it. And finally, we should extend grace wherever possible because grace is necessary in all of life. Then he called the waiter over and asked for a large stack of napkins. And on all those napkins that say Mr. B’s Bistro, he wrote down thought, passion, and grace. And he wrote it on thousands of napkins so that when every graduate, as his or her name was called, and they came forward to receive their diploma, they were also given a napkin with those three words on it.

I don’t know how many people still write things down on the back of napkins. Perhaps we just send ourselves a text message or jot something down in our notes app. But if you are looking for a way to remember something important, writing it down on the back of the napkin is not a bad option. Because it’s something we can hold in our hand. We can put it in our pocket and take it with us when we leave the table. That it is a concrete reminder of something we do not want to forget. And even if we forget that it’s in our pocket, we find it when we put those jeans on again, crumpled up in the same place even after it’s gone through the wash.

And when the prophet Micah wanted to simplify what it is that is important to God, he pulled out a napkin and he wrote down three words, justice, kindness, and humility. And he shares those words with the people of God when they are struggling to feel grounded, that they are still reeling over the Assyrians invading the northern kingdom and all that it means for them. They are questioning what really matters. They keep asking, what is it that God wants from us? What are the offerings and sacrifices that God desires? What gifts do we need to bring where we will find favor with God? Micah pulled out a napkin and said, God desires for us to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with God.

It would not stretch our imaginations too far to consider and wonder whether Jesus had those three words in mind when he shared the beatitudes in the Sermon on the Mount. Because the beatitudes are longer than three words, but they seem to be built upon justice, kindness, and humility. And the Beatitudes are very different from the superlatives we find in the yearbook. Jesus did not talk about the best dressed or the most likely to succeed or the most outgoing. Jesus talked about the poor in spirit, those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, those who are persecuted. And nobody wants their picture next to those superlatives. But they are built on doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God.

Because we see them throughout the life of Jesus. That Jesus said, all we need is faith the size of a mustard seed. The poor in spirit, that he grieves to the point of death in the garden of Gethsemane. Those who mourn. And when he was tempted and offered the power of all kingdoms in the world, he chose meekness. And he said, ask, seek, and you will find hungering for righteousness. And he spoke of mercy, telling Peter to forgive not seven times, but 77 times. And he shared the golden rule, calling us to be pure in heart towards our neighbors. And he said not only to love our neighbors, but also our enemies as peacemakers. And he knew what it meant to be persecuted by others. That those three words that the Beatitudes are built upon remind us to always be mindful of the needs of the most vulnerable. That for Jesus, they were not gifts or offerings to bring. This was a way of life.

And as we gather around this table, we might consider what we would write on the back of a napkin. Because the table is about a way of life. That at a table we create friends, we build community, we serve our neighbors. So we might write down justice, kindness. and humility. And every time we gather around this table, it is to call us to remember. In many ways, it’s like the beginning of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. You know, where Mr. Rogers walks into the room, he puts on a sweater and he changes his shoes, and he’s singing along the way, it’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood, a beautiful day for a neighbor, would you be mine? But before he puts on that sweater, before he launches into song, there is a scene at the very beginning of every episode where you just see a traffic light. And it is always flashing yellow, inviting us, calling us to slow down and to remember what matters the most. And when we pull up a chair around this table, it is to slow us down. to what is most important. Justice. Kindness. Humility. that it is a way of life. As Fred Craddock writes, The measure of our faith is not who we will feed. It is who we will eat with.

I still remember playing the game of memory as a child and with my children, where you turn all the cards face down so you can’t see the pictures on them. And the goal is you want to find the most pairs or matches. And I always found this game so difficult. So I decided I was going to focus on one pair at a time, that I would turn over a card and see the picture. And every time it was my turn, I would turn over the same card until I found its match. And only then would I move on to finding the next pair. And that’s not the best way to play the game. Or the only way to play the game. I didn’t win much. oh but sometimes in life. We need to simplify our focus. There are so many things we can do and we can’t do them all that we need a short, simple list that grounds us in God’s Love.

As you came into worship this morning, along with the bulletin, you were given a napkin. I invite you to take out that napkin and find a pen. If you don’t have a pen, there are pens in the pew racks. And on your napkin, write down those three words. Justice. kindness, humility. and put that napkin in your pocket and take it with you when you leave this table today. And every now and then, pull it out and remember what grounds us in God’s love. Maybe it will change who we eat with. Maybe it will change much more. Amen.

I read an article years ago about surfing. It’s about a group of surfers that wanted to surf bigger and bigger waves. But these waves were so enormous that even experienced surfers could not paddle fast enough to get out in front of them in order to catch them. So, they started to use jet skis. They would lie in the water clinging to their surfboard with a friend sitting on a jet ski next to them. And when one of these enormous waves started to approach, the jet ski would pull the surfer out in front of the wave so the surfer could stand up and hang ten. But a funny thing happened. The more the jet skis pulled these surfers out in front of the waves, they started to get a better feel for them. When to start paddling, how to get out in front of them, to the point that they learned how to surf them without help.

About 25 years ago, I read a book by Diana Eck entitled, A New Religious America. It was about how this country had become the most religiously diverse country in the world. And it was based on well-documented statistics as well as people’s personal experience. That 50 years ago when you were driving down the road, no one ever looked out their window and saw a Hindu temple, a mosque, or a Buddhist monastery. But we could all find those locations on our Google Maps today in about three minutes. And like surfing bigger waves, change can feel overwhelming. There’s always been that lingering fear over what is different, even though God breathed life into all of humanity. It means we need to foster a new understanding, a deeper wisdom, and a wider love for the world in which we live, leaning into bigger ways of embodying grace, creating community, and promoting peace.

After the death of John the Baptist, Jesus was walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee and he saw all these fishermen. First, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew, and then James and John, the sons of Zebedee. And they were all tending to their nets, mending them, cleaning them. And Jesus said, follow me and I will make you fish for people, that it was a new calling, a pivot in their lives, where they were to put down those nets and focus on loving their neighbor as themselves, serving others, sharing forgiveness, building community. But none of them put down individual fishing poles. It did not say Zebco on the side of their nets. That when they went fishing, they threw out these large and wide nets and pulled back a huge amount of fish. It’s like that story in the Gospel of John, where Jesus says, throw out your nets, and they pull in a net full of fish of 153 different kinds of fish. That as we practice loving our neighbor as ourselves, we need a new understanding and a deeper wisdom and a wider love because our neighbors are going to be different from us. They are not enemies to avoid, they are neighbors to serve.

And then the apostle Paul deepens our understanding of this calling. Yet again, we’re in 1 Corinthians. There’s all these divisions within the early church. Some are saying, “I follow Apollos. I belong to Paul. I belong to Cephas.” It was a mess. And Paul asks, “Has Christ been divided?” And then Paul says, “As brothers and sisters have the same mind.” Well, I don’t know about you, but I don’t know many brothers and sisters who think exactly alike. Brothers and sisters know what it means to argue, to not get along, to feel that tension that can be between us. But perhaps that’s part of Paul’s point. That as brothers and sisters who know what it means to deal with tension, they also know how to work through it because there is something that we are rooted in together which is far more important. That maybe we not only need the same mind where we agree on everything, but also the same heart. We need the same heart of patience and mercy, wisdom and understanding so that we can care for our brothers and sisters and we can love our neighbors as ourselves.

One thing that can make this rather hard is a hermeneutic of suspicion. Hermeneutic, just a fancy word for interpretation. Like reading scripture and interpreting what it means. That when we open up scripture and we bring to it a critical eye, reading it closer than we have in the past, looking for things that are there, that we didn’t assume they were there in the past. It leads us to deeper, clearer, faithful understandings of Scripture. But if we’re not careful… this can bleed out into other parts of our lives. As Richard Topping, the president of Vancouver School of Theology says, “If we have been trained to have a critical eye, we can bring a hermeneutic of suspicion to others.” That we’re so used to identifying the problem, improving the theory, seeking a better way that we are unable to also see what is good, leading to more division and less cooperation. The theologian Miroslav Volf says it this way: “In order to change the world, we need an I-have-a-dream speech, not an I-have-a-complaint speech.” That we also need a hermeneutic of generosity, where we seek out the same heart with others so that we can serve our brothers and sisters and love our neighbors as ourselves.

That we need what Alyce McKenzie and Owen Lynch call soft eyes. Hard eyes is where we see the trees, but not the forest. That we’re so focused on one thing that we can’t see anything else. That we see that we come from different cultures. We have different viewpoints. We approach things in such different ways that we’re hyper-focused on those things. Which means we fail to see how kind they are towards others, how devoted they are to their family, their sense of humor, their hard work. That hard eyes keep us having the same heart. Where soft eyes enable us to see others with generosity and grace. Or, as someone who has a brother and a sister, I hope they always see me in those ways. And as someone who has neighbors on all sides of my house. I hope they always treat me in those ways. Which means I am called to see and treat others in those ways as well.

And the good news is… Jesus sees all of us in those ways. Because Jesus looked on fishermen, and he looked at a tax collector, and he looked at a zealot. He looked at the one who would eventually doubt him, and the one who would eventually deny him, and the one who would eventually betray him. And Jesus said, “Follow me,” because Jesus has soft eyes. He looks at us, with generosity and grace, which leads us to a new understanding, deeper wisdom, and a wider love. Amen

I am admittedly far from an expert when it comes to music. So my opinion doesn’t matter a whole lot. But I would argue that the greatest song ever written was “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” by Otis Redding. That when that song begins with the sounds of the ocean in the background and the quiet strumming of the guitar, it immediately transports you to another place, watching the ships roll in and the tide roll out. Otis Redding was born in Macon, Georgia, and he spent his entire life there. He toured all over the South and the country, but he always came back home to Macon. He was the son and grandson of sharecroppers, and he grew up learning how to sing in the church. Early on, he was a part of a quartet called the Junior Spiritual Crusaders. And later on, he sang with the Pine Toppers. He loved other artists like Little Richard, who was also from Macon, and of course, Sam Cooke. But he also loved Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones, even covering the Stones song “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” And his agent was a 19-year-old college student from Macon. And like so many artists, he was always trying to evolve and fine-tune his sound. At one point in his career, he started to have problems with his voice. They discovered polyps on his vocal cords and he had to have surgery. And part of the recovery for the surgery was he could not use his voice. He could not even speak for some time. So he used this as an opportunity to focus on songwriting—that he wanted to reinvent his sound. And “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” was going to be the beginning of this new trajectory in his career.

And he could not wait to share it with the world, but he never got the chance. On December 10, 1967, Otis Redding and several members of his band died in a plane crash over Madison, Wisconsin. And “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” was released a month later, January 1968. It was his first and only number-one song. In many ways, it feels a little bit like an unfinished. He never got to see his success. But then again, we should never measure our lives with our accomplishments, like drawing an arbitrary finish line on the ground. Because unfinished does not mean failure. The reality is if we work for those things that matter the most, we will all have something that is unfinished.

And the prophet Isaiah echoes this sentiment, saying, “God has called me, God has named me”—that Isaiah was a part of something much bigger than himself. He also admitted, “Have I labored in vain? I spent my strength on nothing.” And that contradiction, being a part of something so big and important and then feeling as if what we do does not matter, does not make sense unless we have worked for something bigger than ourselves. Because everything that gives us purpose—when a child calls us mom or dad, when a friend asks us for advice, when a mentor gives us a leadership opportunity, when a patient puts his trust in us, when a student takes notes on our lessons, when a young person reaches out for our hand, when a board looks to us for advice, or when a decision is placed in our hands—we have this opportunity to affect the lives of others, which can give us such fulfillment. But then there are days where we feel the weight of that burden and we ask, “Have I labored in vain?”

And when those words are on our lips, we must remember that unfinished does not mean failure. Because when we work towards those things that matter the most, they are for us to steward and not to accomplish. For us to serve and not to complete. That fulfillment comes from being faithful, not from being finished. And the psalmist speaks into these very moments because the psalmist asks for help, saying, I waited patiently for the Lord. He inclined to me and heard my cry. And that is true, whether we wait patiently or impatiently. That God hears our cries and God can give us a new song to sing. That it might be a brand-new song—starting over, beginning again, doing something new—or it might be a new verse to the same song we are already singing. Because when we ask, Have I spent my strength on nothing? We need to know and be reminded and assured that what we do matters—as a parent, as a spouse, as a friend, as a teacher, as a technician, as a manager, as a nurse, as a church member, as a person of faith.

And this feeling was not unfamiliar to Jesus because Jesus started his ministry by saying, the kingdom of God has come near. The kingdom of God was the focus of his life where all wrongs would be made right, all sin would be forgiven and all brokenness would be healed. And he kept saying, this is a reality. It is here on this very day, but it is not quite yet complete. And when we work for something bigger than ourselves, there are days when we catch glimmers of it. We see it in real time. But then there are other days, where as we fall asleep we are wondering, have I labored in vain? That we find ourselves somewhere in the middle, which is where we find Jesus. It is, as Gwendolyn Brooks writes, it is living in the along. That it’s not about a finish line. It’s about living in the task at hand, in the hope of this day, in the goodness of this very moment. And when it gets hard, which it always does, we find renewal and a new song in God’s goodness and grace.

In his beautiful novel, Theo of Golden, Alan Levi tells the story about Theo who spends his days seeing goodness in others. And he starts buying all these portraits and seeking out members of this small town to give them the portrait of themselves. And then he tells them what he sees in them, giving them renewal, purpose, and strength. That it is quite the gift to help others see these things in themselves.

And he meets in this small town, Simone, who is a wonderful cellist. But Simone talks about the days where he is practicing and rehearsing a very complicated piece of music. And after hours and hours of practicing, he still cannot get it right. And he gets so angry and frustrated. And it’s in those moments where he feels like he is laboring in vain, that he will take that complicated piece of music and just set it aside. And then he will pull out of his file something very familiar to him, a piece that he has played a thousand times before, that he will just return to the basics. And whenever we are wondering to ourselves, have I spent my strength on nothing? That we can return to what is most important, finding renewal. That we can return to the basics, restoring our sense of purpose. That we can return to the ways of Jesus, mindful of the needs of our loved ones, offering hospitality to strangers, extending forgiveness to others. It restores our souls and renews our spirits where we have a new song to sing of God’s love. Amen.