(Scriptures: I Samuel 2:1-11, Romans 16:25-27, Luke 1:25-56)
Every now and then, events come to pass that we thought we’d never live to see. When many of us were growing up, the Cold War between America and the Soviet Union was an entrenched fact of life, something we thought was an unchangeable reality, like death and taxes. Many who grew up in the 1950’s and 1960’s remember bomb shelters and duck and cover drills in school, where, in case of nuclear attack, school children were told to kneel under their desks with their hands clutched around their heads and necks. In 1961, the Berlin wall went up, dividing capitalist West Germany from Communist East Germany. By the 1970’s, when I was in high school, the duck and cover drills had ceased, but the tension between our countries remained, as it seemed like capitalism and communism were in a fight to the death for world domination. And then, in the late 1980’s, it just….ended…in 1989, the Berlin Wall fell, and events continued rapidly from there. Similarly, many of us remember other moments we never thought we’d live to see – apartheid, which enforced segregation between the races in South Africa, coming to an end in the early 1990’s, what were called “the troubles” in Ireland, in which Protestants seeking union with Great Britain and Catholics nationalists wanting to preserve independence from Great Britain killed one another for decades starting in the 1960’s, coming to an end in the “Good Friday” Belfast Accord of 1998. More recently, years of violence in Liberia have come to end in a fragile time of relative peace under President Ellen Johnson- Sirleaf. In these times of change, there are many theories of what happened, what brought them about. In some cases, these events are still too recent for us to have fully developed a perspective on them; the histories are still being written.
This may seem like a very strange way to begin a sermon for the last Sunday in Advent. We want angels and wise men and a manger, not talk of social change. Our Advent readings include statements that seemed extravagant, unrealistic, pie-in-the-sky. But the examples of sweeping change with which I began this sermon remind us that sometimes entrenched oppression, entrenched misery gives way to new hope; the impossible becomes not only possible, but inevitable, and what seems unreal becomes reality.
On this fourth Sunday of Advent, as we draw near to the end of this season of waiting, today’s Scripture readings give us words from not one, but two mothers. Our Old Testament reading quotes the words of Hannah, the first of two wives of Elkanah. Elkanah’s other wife is Peninnah – in Hebrew the name just means “the second one” or “the other one”. Hannah had been barren, so perhaps Elkanah married Peninnah to assure himself that he would have children, that his name would live on on. Hannah went to Shiloh to beg the Lord for a child, and vowed that if the Lord gave her a child, the child would be devoted to the Lord’s service. As Hannah left her child, Samuel, with the aged priest Eli, she prayed the beautiful words we heard read earlier. And, of course, our Gospel reading includes Mary’s Magnificat, Mary’s hymn of praise to God and thanksgiving for the child within her, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit.
We have a number of moms in our congregation, those with young children, and those whose children are grown, but no doubt remember what it was like to be expecting. That’s an experience I haven’t had. But I would imagine that as your bodies were going through the changes of pregnancy, you had so many thoughts about the child growing within you. Of course, boy or girl? What will we call the baby? Would he or she take after you or the baby’s father? I’d imagine, as you gave birth and as your baby grew, you’ve had such hopes and dreams for your child. What sort of person would your child grow up to be?
And our two moms in our readings this morning, Hannah and Mary, had high hopes for their children – and that’s putting it mildly. Hannah and Mary both literally expected their children to turn society upside down – or maybe right-side up. Here’s Hannah: “Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread, but those who were hungry are fat with spoil. He raises the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes and inherit a seat of honor.” And here’s Mary: “He has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty.” Not exactly the kind of language we’d include in an invitation for a baby shower. Hannah and Mary are speaking in what is sometimes called the prophetic past tense, speaking with such certainty that it’s as if all these things have already happened. If Jesus heard words like this as he was growing up, it’s no wonder that his first sermon, as recorded by Luke, was on the text, “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 was Jesus’ personal mission statement, what drove him, what motivated him to ministry.
You don’t need me to tell you that many people in this neighborhood, in our city, our country, in the world are hurting. The divide between the rich and the poor is as wide as it has been since the Gilded Age of the 1870’s and 1880’s. For those at the bottom of the economic ladder, prospects for improvement are dismal. In these days, it’s easy to lose hope for anything better. In these days, it’s easy to become discouraged, and just expect more of the same.
When we think about the forces that have power to create change in society, we think of guns and tanks, or people of great wealth and political influence. But throughout the Bible, we see that when God wants to bring change, he sends, not an army, but a baby. Think of Isaac, son of the promise, born to the aged Abraham and Sarah. Think of Moses, born to lead the children of Israel to freedom. Think of Hannah in our Old Testament reading giving birth to Samuel, who marked the transition from the social disorder of the time of the judges to the relative stability of the monarchy. And think of the birth John the Baptist, born, like Abraham, to an aged, childless couple, born to proclaim the coming Messiah, and Jesus, born to Mary, God in the flesh, in whom we are all saved.
We may think of Hannah’s and Mary’s dreams for their children as extravagant, over the top. But I think perhaps the question for us is not “why did they expect so much?” but rather “why do we expect so little?” Why do we expect so little? Hannah and Mary expected their children to turn their society upside down – or maybe right side up. But throughout history, the church, which professes to follow Mary’s son, instead of turning the world upside down, so often has just blessed the status quo. Hannah and Mary looked for the poor to be lifted up and the powerful to be humbled. Too often over the centuries, the church has upheld and blessed entrenched power as God’s will, leaving the poor to fend for themselves. Here at Emanuel, I think we sometimes let our size discourage us from hoping that God can use our congregation; we think that because we don’t have hundreds of members in the pews and millions of dollars in the endowment fund, God can’t use us to usher in the reign of God.
In his first letter to the church at Corinth, Paul said that God uses the foolish things of this world to shame the wise, uses that which is weak to shame the strong. Jesus was born, not in a palace, but in a stable. Jesus’ birth was a threat to Herod, a threat to the Roman empire and to all worldly empires, but good news to the shepherds and foreign wise men who came to pay him homage. It is not with the strong but with the weak that we find Jesus. So here at Emanuel, Jesus is right at home.
Hannah’s and Mary’s words gave voice to the hope within them, that the child within each of them would be used by God to turn society upside down – or maybe, turn it right-side up. And we here at Emanuel, as small as we are, still have new life within us – we’ve baptized several babies over the past year. Can a 150 year old church have children – “yes”! Can God use a 150 year old church to change lives, to nourish the life of the Spirit. Absolutely yes!
Did Hannah, did Mary know what plans God had for their children? Who can tell what plans God has for us, for the babies recently baptized and their families, and for those of us whose baptisms happened long years ago? We worship a God who uses old couples, long-childless mothers, unwed mothers to bring forth new life. And God can use us, if we’ll allow it. So, in a way, just as Hannah was expecting, just as Mary was expecting, so are we here at Emanuel – expecting, pregnant with possibilities, capable still of bringing forth new life, if God so wills.
During this Advent season of hope, peace, love, and joy, may we live with a sense of expectation – expectation that God who did great things in the past will do great things here in the future, that Jesus who passed from death to resurrection life will bring about resurrection life here at Emanuel Church. May it be so with us. Amen.
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Tidings of Comfort and Joy
(Scriptures: Isaiah 40:1-11, Psalm 126, I Thessalonians 5:16-24, John 1:6-8, 19-28)
We continue on in Advent, that season of waiting, waiting for the coming of the Christ child, waiting for the coming of hope, peace, and now, joy. The 3rd Sunday of Advent is traditionally called Gaudete Sunday, Gaudete, from the Latin for the word “rejoice”. Rejoice!
Our readings speak of a joy that is hard-won, a joy that comes at the end of a long period of endurance. Our reading from Isaiah comes at the end of the exile in Babylon, when the Jews are preparing to return to their homeland at last, after decades in a foreign land. After long decades of brutal exile, God will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms and carry them in his bosom and gently lead the mother sheep. Psalm 126 captures the mood of those returning from exile – “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with shouts of joy.”
The Declaration of Independence lifts up three basic rights of human beings – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And Americans have been pursuing happiness for some 235 years now. During this Christmas shopping season, we’re promised, as we’re promised every year, that if we buy more, better, bigger, faster, we will be happy.
But the joy of today’s readings wasn’t bought at the mall. Some of you remember that early in my time here at Emanuel, I went on two trips with the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference to visit churches in Cuba, as part of a delegation forming a partnership between the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference and the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba. Despite the signs everywhere proclaiming the triumph of the Castro Revolution – then celebrating its 50th year - by American standards, our hosts had very little – most buildings needed at least several coats of paint and most needed a good bit of exterior and interior repair, functioning indoor plumbing was a luxury, transportation options ran the gamut from surprisingly new Chinese buses to 1950’s vintage American cars, held together with hope and duct tape, to bicycle cabs to horses. On the way to a rural church, I saw a team of oxen pulling a jeep out of a ditch. Havana does have some lovely hotels and restaurants that cater to tourists, and so we ate quite well – and since we were paying, our hosts ate quite well while they were with us - but were very aware that many of those around us were accustomed to missing meals. Similarly, the churches we visited ran the gamut from long-established houses of worship that dated from before the Castro revolution, to churches set up in storefronts and even house churches. And yet at these churches the joy was just bouncing off the walls. From a material point of view, our hosts had very little to sing about – but at all the churches we visited, the joy of the Lord was in the house, evidenced by singing and clapping and shouting and swaying. And they shared the joy with those around them – even the smallest house church we visited raised rabbits and grew medicinal herbs for the members and also for their neighbors.
Our readings from Isaiah 40 and Psalm 126 show the joy of those returning from exile. It was a hard-won joy – they had been through a lot during the long years of exile. As Psalm 126 put it, they went into exile weeping, bearing seeds for sowing in a strange land, and now they were coming home with joy, bearing the sheaves, the fruits of their long endurance. And there was still much to endure – they were returning to a city of Jerusalem in ruins, a Temple site that had been burned to the ground. They had a whole lot of work ahead of them. And yet they were just so happy to be back home, back in the land that God had promised Abraham and his descendents.
I think I caught a tiny glimpse of what that joy might have looked like during my first winter here at Emanuel. You had worshiped downstairs in the social hall for a number of years because Rev. Grau could no longer climb the stairs. We went upstairs – so you were back in your sanctuary - but we had no organist. The search for an organist dragged on for months. Finally we found Ralph, our organist, and he graciously agreed to come and play for us, and was with us on Easter Sunday. And the joy in the congregation that morning – oh my goodness! - you were so happy to hear your organ again. Christ had risen from the dead, and it felt like something about the spirit of the congregation was resurrected that day as well. And the joy continues.
For a surprising number of our members, 2011 was a difficult year. The passing of various members of our congregation’s families, hospitalizations of other members, other personal tragedies that we’ve carried, and each one of us affected in one way or another by a difficult economy. For me, the joy is that as small as we are, we’ve been able to take each challenge, each tragedy, and wrap it in love and lift it up and offer it in prayer to God. As I’ve heard you say, more than once, we’re a small church, but we pray big. And even in this difficult year, there have been moments of joy – recovery and healing for several of our members, several baptisms, the many former members and friends of the congregation with us on our anniversary, the video you made of so many holy moments over the 150 year history of our congregation. This is joy that is a gift of the Spirit, a joy that can carry us through hard times. This is the joy that Paul was talking about in our reading from I Thessalonians:
"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances – in ALL circumstances - for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything; hold fast to what is good; abstain from every form of evil. "
So on this 3rd Sunday in Advent, we celebrate the gift of the Spirit that is joy. May the joy of the Spirit be with us in this season of Advent as we await the coming of the Christ child. And as we wait,
"May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this."
May it be so among us. Amen."
We continue on in Advent, that season of waiting, waiting for the coming of the Christ child, waiting for the coming of hope, peace, and now, joy. The 3rd Sunday of Advent is traditionally called Gaudete Sunday, Gaudete, from the Latin for the word “rejoice”. Rejoice!
Our readings speak of a joy that is hard-won, a joy that comes at the end of a long period of endurance. Our reading from Isaiah comes at the end of the exile in Babylon, when the Jews are preparing to return to their homeland at last, after decades in a foreign land. After long decades of brutal exile, God will feed his flock like a shepherd; he will gather the lambs in his arms and carry them in his bosom and gently lead the mother sheep. Psalm 126 captures the mood of those returning from exile – “When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream. Then our mouth was filled with laughter and our tongue with shouts of joy.”
The Declaration of Independence lifts up three basic rights of human beings – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And Americans have been pursuing happiness for some 235 years now. During this Christmas shopping season, we’re promised, as we’re promised every year, that if we buy more, better, bigger, faster, we will be happy.
But the joy of today’s readings wasn’t bought at the mall. Some of you remember that early in my time here at Emanuel, I went on two trips with the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference to visit churches in Cuba, as part of a delegation forming a partnership between the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference and the Fraternity of Baptists in Cuba. Despite the signs everywhere proclaiming the triumph of the Castro Revolution – then celebrating its 50th year - by American standards, our hosts had very little – most buildings needed at least several coats of paint and most needed a good bit of exterior and interior repair, functioning indoor plumbing was a luxury, transportation options ran the gamut from surprisingly new Chinese buses to 1950’s vintage American cars, held together with hope and duct tape, to bicycle cabs to horses. On the way to a rural church, I saw a team of oxen pulling a jeep out of a ditch. Havana does have some lovely hotels and restaurants that cater to tourists, and so we ate quite well – and since we were paying, our hosts ate quite well while they were with us - but were very aware that many of those around us were accustomed to missing meals. Similarly, the churches we visited ran the gamut from long-established houses of worship that dated from before the Castro revolution, to churches set up in storefronts and even house churches. And yet at these churches the joy was just bouncing off the walls. From a material point of view, our hosts had very little to sing about – but at all the churches we visited, the joy of the Lord was in the house, evidenced by singing and clapping and shouting and swaying. And they shared the joy with those around them – even the smallest house church we visited raised rabbits and grew medicinal herbs for the members and also for their neighbors.
Our readings from Isaiah 40 and Psalm 126 show the joy of those returning from exile. It was a hard-won joy – they had been through a lot during the long years of exile. As Psalm 126 put it, they went into exile weeping, bearing seeds for sowing in a strange land, and now they were coming home with joy, bearing the sheaves, the fruits of their long endurance. And there was still much to endure – they were returning to a city of Jerusalem in ruins, a Temple site that had been burned to the ground. They had a whole lot of work ahead of them. And yet they were just so happy to be back home, back in the land that God had promised Abraham and his descendents.
I think I caught a tiny glimpse of what that joy might have looked like during my first winter here at Emanuel. You had worshiped downstairs in the social hall for a number of years because Rev. Grau could no longer climb the stairs. We went upstairs – so you were back in your sanctuary - but we had no organist. The search for an organist dragged on for months. Finally we found Ralph, our organist, and he graciously agreed to come and play for us, and was with us on Easter Sunday. And the joy in the congregation that morning – oh my goodness! - you were so happy to hear your organ again. Christ had risen from the dead, and it felt like something about the spirit of the congregation was resurrected that day as well. And the joy continues.
For a surprising number of our members, 2011 was a difficult year. The passing of various members of our congregation’s families, hospitalizations of other members, other personal tragedies that we’ve carried, and each one of us affected in one way or another by a difficult economy. For me, the joy is that as small as we are, we’ve been able to take each challenge, each tragedy, and wrap it in love and lift it up and offer it in prayer to God. As I’ve heard you say, more than once, we’re a small church, but we pray big. And even in this difficult year, there have been moments of joy – recovery and healing for several of our members, several baptisms, the many former members and friends of the congregation with us on our anniversary, the video you made of so many holy moments over the 150 year history of our congregation. This is joy that is a gift of the Spirit, a joy that can carry us through hard times. This is the joy that Paul was talking about in our reading from I Thessalonians:
"Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances – in ALL circumstances - for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. Do not quench the Spirit. Do not despise the words of prophets, but test everything; hold fast to what is good; abstain from every form of evil. "
So on this 3rd Sunday in Advent, we celebrate the gift of the Spirit that is joy. May the joy of the Spirit be with us in this season of Advent as we await the coming of the Christ child. And as we wait,
"May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this."
May it be so among us. Amen."
Sunday, December 4, 2011
Prepare the Way
(Scriptures: Isaiah 61:1-11, 2 Peter 3:8-15a, Mark 1:1-8)
Since early October, we’ve been reading and watching on TV the “Occupy” movement – first “Occupy Wall Street” and then Occupy Oakland, Portland, and, more locally, Occupy Philadelphia, which until Tuesday last week was situated at City Hall. A nucleus of Occupiers – somewhere upwards of 100 tents at any given time – were camped out 24/7 in tents on Dilworth Plaza, outside City Hall. Around this nucleus, a larger and incredibly eclectic assortment of activists – students, environmental activists, anarchists, Quaker and interfaith peace activists, clergy, labor union leaders, assorted other groups such as the “Granny Peace Brigade” – came and went as family schedules and day jobs permitted. There were also many homeless persons, who slept on Dilworth Plaza outside City Hall most nights. While these homeless were perplexed to see so many new neighbors on their doorstep, they were also grateful for the meals that the Occupy group served, over 1000 meals a day. The news media covering the Occupy movement were frustrated, first, that the Occupiers didn’t have a single leader – with their very participatory form of organization, all however many hundred people at Dilworth Plaza, everyone there, were potential leaders – nor did they have a tidy list of demands, beyond an overall message that the wealthiest 1% of Americans are causing financial hardship, political disenfranchisement, and environmental devastation for the remaining 99% of Americans, and indeed, for the rest of the world. Put simply, those at Dilworth Plaza were and are sick and tired of being sick and tired. On Tuesday last week, the police cleared Dilworth Plaza, but while the tents are gone, the feeling of being sick and tired of being sick and tired remains. As one of the signs at the Occupy camp said, “You can’t evict an idea.”
Today’s reading from Mark’s Gospel beings with the words, “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Mark’s is thought by Bible scholars to have been the first of the four Gospels to be written, to which Matthew and Luke added additional material and of which the writer of John’s Gospel was at least aware. To Mark’s material, Matthew and Luke added, among other information, the birth narratives – the announcement of the angel to Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, the manger, the wise men. John’s Gospel begins with a cosmic portrait of Christ as the pre-existing Word who was with God and who was God from the beginning, now become flesh in Jesus of Nazareth. But Mark’s Gospel has none of that. Mark begins with a quotation from Isaiah – with some additional material from Micah included – about a messenger preparing the way, and the voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight!’ And with that very brief introduction, we meet John the Baptist out in the wilderness. We’re told that people from the whole Judean countryside and even from Jerusalem were going out to John, to be baptized in the river Jordan as a sign of repentance. It almost sounds a little like John the Baptist had his own “Occupy the Jordan River” movement going on. Certainly with the description of his being clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt, eating locusts and wild honey, he’d have fit in just fine with the scruffy crowd in Dilworth Plaza – though the description is intended to remind us of Elijah, whom the prophet Micah said would announce the coming of the Messiah.
We may wonder why so many went out to the wilderness to be baptized by John. After all, it isn’t like everyone could just hop in their SUV or even carpool out to the Jordan. SEPTA and Amtrak didn’t go there. It was a long, uncomfortable walk or donkey ride from Jerusalem and the countryside to the wilderness, a major investment of time, a major investment of effort, to go out into the wilderness, where there were no creature comforts, no turnpike service plazas or vending machines, not even a porta-potty, nothing at the end of their long walk but John and the Jordan River.
Why did they go? We’re told they came to be baptized as a sign of repentance. Over 2000 years, we’ve layered a lot of religious glop on the word repentance, but at its core, repentance means a change of mind, a change of consciousness, a change of direction. It’s a recognition that the status quo isn’t working, that change is needed, and a resolve to stop doing what isn’t working in order to do something that will work, or at least that might work. For John’s followers, similar to the current Occupy folk, the status quo that needed to change was both personal and societal. After all, if going to the Temple and performing the prescribed sacrifices and rituals – or going to the local synagogue to hear the reading and exposition of Torah – had been sufficient, they wouldn’t have slogged out to the desert. If they had been living comfortably under Rome’s occupation of Judea, they wouldn’t have slogged out to the desert. But, in fact, none of these things were working. The Roman occupation was messed up, the religious establishment was messed up, and they themselves were messed up. The crowds had no grand social vision, and really neither did John. They just knew that both they and their society were broken, that they were sick and tired of being sick and tired, that they needed God to intervene in a deep way in their lives and in society. And John was very clear that he was the messenger, not the Messiah. It was not for John to save the people or their society; he could only point the way to the One who would.
Today’s reading from Mark reminds us that the Good News of Jesus may begin with the bad news that the status quo isn’t working, that change is needed, specifically, that we – you, me, each of us, all of us - need to change direction. As Jesus said elsewhere in the Gospels, it is those who are sick who need a doctor, not those who are well. Our reading from Isaiah brings a message that would resonate powerfully with the Occupy folks at Dilworth Plaza, and no doubt resonated with John’s followers: “Bring good news to the oppressed, bind up the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners, proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” It’s a message of radical change, radical personal change and radical social change. It was not for John to bring all this about himself, but to point to Jesus, the One anointed by God to do all these things – remember that in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus chose this very Isaiah text for his very first sermon. Like the 1% who hold great power in our day, the powerful of Jesus day were offended at this text, and in fact tried to throw him off a cliff. But for those who were oppressed, brokenhearted, and captive to the powers and principalities, in Jesus’ day and in ours, Jesus’ words were life-changing, like rivers of water in the desert.
The Occupy folks at Dilworth Plaza were there to point to the need for change. John was out in the desert, to point to the need for change. And we as followers of Jesus are likewise called to point to the need for change, and to point to Jesus as the one who makes change possible, to point to Jesus as the one whose birth and life, death and resurrection have brought in God’s reign. We can point to Jesus by telling our neighbors about Jesus, by inviting them to church. We can also point to Jesus in our lives, by modeling a way of life that’s different, by living in a way that says that Jesus, not the almighty dollar, reigns. We do that by raising money for the food cupboard and for the ministries of the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference. We do that by providing safe space for parents to raise their children. We do that by providing a place where hurting people can come for prayer, and coffee and cake, and a kind word.
“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,” said John the Baptist. In these remaining weeks of Advent, may we at Emanuel Church prepare ourselves and help to prepare our world for the coming of the Christ child. Let every heart prepare him room. Amen.
Since early October, we’ve been reading and watching on TV the “Occupy” movement – first “Occupy Wall Street” and then Occupy Oakland, Portland, and, more locally, Occupy Philadelphia, which until Tuesday last week was situated at City Hall. A nucleus of Occupiers – somewhere upwards of 100 tents at any given time – were camped out 24/7 in tents on Dilworth Plaza, outside City Hall. Around this nucleus, a larger and incredibly eclectic assortment of activists – students, environmental activists, anarchists, Quaker and interfaith peace activists, clergy, labor union leaders, assorted other groups such as the “Granny Peace Brigade” – came and went as family schedules and day jobs permitted. There were also many homeless persons, who slept on Dilworth Plaza outside City Hall most nights. While these homeless were perplexed to see so many new neighbors on their doorstep, they were also grateful for the meals that the Occupy group served, over 1000 meals a day. The news media covering the Occupy movement were frustrated, first, that the Occupiers didn’t have a single leader – with their very participatory form of organization, all however many hundred people at Dilworth Plaza, everyone there, were potential leaders – nor did they have a tidy list of demands, beyond an overall message that the wealthiest 1% of Americans are causing financial hardship, political disenfranchisement, and environmental devastation for the remaining 99% of Americans, and indeed, for the rest of the world. Put simply, those at Dilworth Plaza were and are sick and tired of being sick and tired. On Tuesday last week, the police cleared Dilworth Plaza, but while the tents are gone, the feeling of being sick and tired of being sick and tired remains. As one of the signs at the Occupy camp said, “You can’t evict an idea.”
Today’s reading from Mark’s Gospel beings with the words, “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” Mark’s is thought by Bible scholars to have been the first of the four Gospels to be written, to which Matthew and Luke added additional material and of which the writer of John’s Gospel was at least aware. To Mark’s material, Matthew and Luke added, among other information, the birth narratives – the announcement of the angel to Mary and Joseph, the shepherds, the manger, the wise men. John’s Gospel begins with a cosmic portrait of Christ as the pre-existing Word who was with God and who was God from the beginning, now become flesh in Jesus of Nazareth. But Mark’s Gospel has none of that. Mark begins with a quotation from Isaiah – with some additional material from Micah included – about a messenger preparing the way, and the voice of one crying in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight!’ And with that very brief introduction, we meet John the Baptist out in the wilderness. We’re told that people from the whole Judean countryside and even from Jerusalem were going out to John, to be baptized in the river Jordan as a sign of repentance. It almost sounds a little like John the Baptist had his own “Occupy the Jordan River” movement going on. Certainly with the description of his being clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt, eating locusts and wild honey, he’d have fit in just fine with the scruffy crowd in Dilworth Plaza – though the description is intended to remind us of Elijah, whom the prophet Micah said would announce the coming of the Messiah.
We may wonder why so many went out to the wilderness to be baptized by John. After all, it isn’t like everyone could just hop in their SUV or even carpool out to the Jordan. SEPTA and Amtrak didn’t go there. It was a long, uncomfortable walk or donkey ride from Jerusalem and the countryside to the wilderness, a major investment of time, a major investment of effort, to go out into the wilderness, where there were no creature comforts, no turnpike service plazas or vending machines, not even a porta-potty, nothing at the end of their long walk but John and the Jordan River.
Why did they go? We’re told they came to be baptized as a sign of repentance. Over 2000 years, we’ve layered a lot of religious glop on the word repentance, but at its core, repentance means a change of mind, a change of consciousness, a change of direction. It’s a recognition that the status quo isn’t working, that change is needed, and a resolve to stop doing what isn’t working in order to do something that will work, or at least that might work. For John’s followers, similar to the current Occupy folk, the status quo that needed to change was both personal and societal. After all, if going to the Temple and performing the prescribed sacrifices and rituals – or going to the local synagogue to hear the reading and exposition of Torah – had been sufficient, they wouldn’t have slogged out to the desert. If they had been living comfortably under Rome’s occupation of Judea, they wouldn’t have slogged out to the desert. But, in fact, none of these things were working. The Roman occupation was messed up, the religious establishment was messed up, and they themselves were messed up. The crowds had no grand social vision, and really neither did John. They just knew that both they and their society were broken, that they were sick and tired of being sick and tired, that they needed God to intervene in a deep way in their lives and in society. And John was very clear that he was the messenger, not the Messiah. It was not for John to save the people or their society; he could only point the way to the One who would.
Today’s reading from Mark reminds us that the Good News of Jesus may begin with the bad news that the status quo isn’t working, that change is needed, specifically, that we – you, me, each of us, all of us - need to change direction. As Jesus said elsewhere in the Gospels, it is those who are sick who need a doctor, not those who are well. Our reading from Isaiah brings a message that would resonate powerfully with the Occupy folks at Dilworth Plaza, and no doubt resonated with John’s followers: “Bring good news to the oppressed, bind up the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners, proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” It’s a message of radical change, radical personal change and radical social change. It was not for John to bring all this about himself, but to point to Jesus, the One anointed by God to do all these things – remember that in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus chose this very Isaiah text for his very first sermon. Like the 1% who hold great power in our day, the powerful of Jesus day were offended at this text, and in fact tried to throw him off a cliff. But for those who were oppressed, brokenhearted, and captive to the powers and principalities, in Jesus’ day and in ours, Jesus’ words were life-changing, like rivers of water in the desert.
The Occupy folks at Dilworth Plaza were there to point to the need for change. John was out in the desert, to point to the need for change. And we as followers of Jesus are likewise called to point to the need for change, and to point to Jesus as the one who makes change possible, to point to Jesus as the one whose birth and life, death and resurrection have brought in God’s reign. We can point to Jesus by telling our neighbors about Jesus, by inviting them to church. We can also point to Jesus in our lives, by modeling a way of life that’s different, by living in a way that says that Jesus, not the almighty dollar, reigns. We do that by raising money for the food cupboard and for the ministries of the Pennsylvania Southeast Conference. We do that by providing safe space for parents to raise their children. We do that by providing a place where hurting people can come for prayer, and coffee and cake, and a kind word.
“Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,” said John the Baptist. In these remaining weeks of Advent, may we at Emanuel Church prepare ourselves and help to prepare our world for the coming of the Christ child. Let every heart prepare him room. Amen.
Wait and Hope
(Scriptures: Isaiah 64:1-9, I Corinthians 1:3-9, Mark 13:24-37)
Today is the first Sunday in Advent – the first Sunday in the church year. As sometimes happens, the church is out of step with society, and today doubly so. While our society celebrates New Year’s Day on January 1st, we celebrate the beginning of a new church year today. At the same time, most of society is already celebrating Christmas, has been celebrating Christmas since about Columbus Day or thereabouts – but in the church, we wait. We’ll celebrate Christmas in due time, but for now we observe Advent – from the Latin word adventus, meaning “coming” – a time of waiting for One we know is coming, but has not yet arrived.
This year, Advent begins at a time when it may feel like things are coming unglued, falling apart. We just went through a Black Friday in which gung-ho shoppers used fists and pepper spray to drive off fellow shoppers - at a mall in North Carolina, the soundtrack of Christmas music was momentarily drowned out by the sound of gunfire. At good old Penn State, wholesome Happy Valley – my alma mater – the university president, Graham Spanier, along with longtime football coach Joe Paterno were dismissed amid accusations of having covered up the sexual abuse of teens and pre-teens. There’s an increasing sense that our national government is dysfunctional, political leaders from both parties bought (or bought off) and paid for by Wall Street – and at Occupy Philadelphia and other Occupy gatherings across the country, people are taking to the streets to demand change. While the protesters have been mostly peaceful, in many cities the police have not, and we’ve been treated to the ugly sight of police officers pepper-spraying and beating nonviolent protesters. International news is no more comforting, amid the threat of financial default in Europe, the threat of war in the Middle East. Amid frightening national and international news, we’ve had our own personal traumas – death of family members or friends, illness, unemployment, domestic violence striking us or those close to us. At our community Thanksgiving service on Wednesday, I heard that the cupboard, with the help of our donations, served over 300 families last week. 300 families who, but for God’s grace and the generosity of Emanuel and other churches, would go hungry. What a witness of the struggles our neighbors are grappling with here in Bridesburg and surrounding neighborhoods. We may be tempted to throw up our hands in despair. For people of faith, we can hardly be faulted for asking, “Why doesn’t God do something? Is God on lunch break, or did God maybe clock out early and go on vacation? Where’s God when we need Him?”
Our Old Testament reading from Isaiah was written at a time when it seemed like things were falling apart, spinning out of control. It comes from one of the last few chapters of Isaiah, written after the Jews had returned from exile and settled back in Jerusalem. They had returned from exile with such high hopes. But the rebuilding of the Temple had been slowed down by threats and interference from surrounding tribes, and also bogged down by community infighting. Similar to some of our current controversies over inclusion within the church, there was disagreement over who could be called a Jew, who could gather to worship the Lord, with some calling for exclusion of all except the super-observant, the purest of the pure, while others called for broad inclusion. The devastation of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem matched the disorganization and conflict among the Jewish people.
And so in his frustration Isaiah cries out to God, “Get down here and do something, will ya! Tear open the heavens and come down! Send fire and earthquake, so that our enemies will know you’re still in charge!” Isaiah recalls God’s works in the past – “When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.” Isaiah confesses the guilt of the people – “We have all become unclean, and even our righteous deeds are like filthy rags….our sin blows us away like the wind….nobody calls on you.” And Isaiah even blames some of the people’s misdeeds on God, “You were angry, and we sinned, because you hid yourself we messed up.” Isaiah reminds God “Yet, O Lord, you are our father, we are the clay and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. Now consider, we are all your people.”
In Advent, we remember that God did indeed tear open the heavens, did indeed come down here and do something. He came down here in the child Jesus. Mark’s Gospel tells us that at his baptism, Jesus saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove. Matthew’s account of Jesus’ crucifixion includes an earthquake. So, in Jesus, Isaiah’s prayers were answered, though likely on a schedule far different – and better – than Isaiah had envisioned.
From our Gospel reading we are reminded that Jesus will come again, not as a baby this time, but in power and glory. Jesus employs apocalyptic language and figures of speech used in his day to express the overwhelming scale and impact of this coming event – there will be signs in the heavens, and the Son of Man will come with great power and glory, to gather the elect from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.
Jesus also said that only the Father knows when all this will happen – the angels don’t, even the Son doesn’t. There are lots of folks who want to try to set dates for us – this year marked the failure of not one but two of Harold Camping predictions, that of the Rapture on May 21 and the end of the world on October 21. I’m confident that the predictions of Hal Lindsay and John Hagee and the other screamers and shouters on radio and TV are just as far off-base – for example, Lindsay’s prediction of the Rapture a generation – estimated by Lindsay at 40 years - after the 1948 founding of the state of Israel is well past its sell-by date these 60+ years later.
That said, it’s easy to understand why so many listen to these predictions – because our world, like the world in Isaiah’s time, like the world of Jesus’ day, is threatening, especially to people of faith. Things seem out of control. Our natural environment is under assault on a global scale. There is great spiritual wickedness in high places. It may seem like God has left the building, like God has left the planet, has left us to our fate. When all that seems familiar is coming unglued, it’s a very natural human impulse to want the disruption to end. And it will, someday. But when it will happen, is not for us to know. In the meantime, in our reading from Mark’s Gospel, we have our instructions - to keep awake, to be faithful servants who are at their post whenever the Master returns. We have our instructions, to wait faithfully, and to live in hope.
The point of Jesus’ words is not for preachers on radio and TV to try to commit God to their timelines – the TV and radio preachers simply don’t have that authority over God. Rather, the point of Jesus’ words is for God to commit us to living our lives in a way that’s faithful to the Gospel. God in God’s sovereignty keeps God’s own council on matters of timing. Meanwhile, we are to preach and live out the Gospel. Jesus says, “Therefore, keep awake – for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all – Keep awake!”
The day will come when Jesus will return in unimaginable power and glory. Until then, Christ’s body, the church, is here. Until then, Jesus said that wherever two or three gather in His name, he’ll be in the midst. Until then, every day in some congregations – among the Roman Catholics, for example - and at least every week here at Emanuel, the gathered church prays to God, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Until then, we’re praying for the coming of the Kingdom, for Jesus to return, and God will honor those prayers. Until then, through the work and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, Christ is present in our words of love and deeds of compassion.
Remember that, as the saying goes, our lives – your lives, my life - may be the only Bible that unbelievers will ever read, the only Gospel they will ever hear. Let us at Emanuel Church not lead them astray by scribbling our own agendas in the margins. Instead, may we at Emanuel Church let God’s word shine forth from our lives, day by day for however many days God grants us on this earth. May those who walk through our doors truly say that “surely the Lord is in this place”, through our words of love and deeds of compassion truly come to know and love Emanuel – God with us. Amen.
Today is the first Sunday in Advent – the first Sunday in the church year. As sometimes happens, the church is out of step with society, and today doubly so. While our society celebrates New Year’s Day on January 1st, we celebrate the beginning of a new church year today. At the same time, most of society is already celebrating Christmas, has been celebrating Christmas since about Columbus Day or thereabouts – but in the church, we wait. We’ll celebrate Christmas in due time, but for now we observe Advent – from the Latin word adventus, meaning “coming” – a time of waiting for One we know is coming, but has not yet arrived.
This year, Advent begins at a time when it may feel like things are coming unglued, falling apart. We just went through a Black Friday in which gung-ho shoppers used fists and pepper spray to drive off fellow shoppers - at a mall in North Carolina, the soundtrack of Christmas music was momentarily drowned out by the sound of gunfire. At good old Penn State, wholesome Happy Valley – my alma mater – the university president, Graham Spanier, along with longtime football coach Joe Paterno were dismissed amid accusations of having covered up the sexual abuse of teens and pre-teens. There’s an increasing sense that our national government is dysfunctional, political leaders from both parties bought (or bought off) and paid for by Wall Street – and at Occupy Philadelphia and other Occupy gatherings across the country, people are taking to the streets to demand change. While the protesters have been mostly peaceful, in many cities the police have not, and we’ve been treated to the ugly sight of police officers pepper-spraying and beating nonviolent protesters. International news is no more comforting, amid the threat of financial default in Europe, the threat of war in the Middle East. Amid frightening national and international news, we’ve had our own personal traumas – death of family members or friends, illness, unemployment, domestic violence striking us or those close to us. At our community Thanksgiving service on Wednesday, I heard that the cupboard, with the help of our donations, served over 300 families last week. 300 families who, but for God’s grace and the generosity of Emanuel and other churches, would go hungry. What a witness of the struggles our neighbors are grappling with here in Bridesburg and surrounding neighborhoods. We may be tempted to throw up our hands in despair. For people of faith, we can hardly be faulted for asking, “Why doesn’t God do something? Is God on lunch break, or did God maybe clock out early and go on vacation? Where’s God when we need Him?”
Our Old Testament reading from Isaiah was written at a time when it seemed like things were falling apart, spinning out of control. It comes from one of the last few chapters of Isaiah, written after the Jews had returned from exile and settled back in Jerusalem. They had returned from exile with such high hopes. But the rebuilding of the Temple had been slowed down by threats and interference from surrounding tribes, and also bogged down by community infighting. Similar to some of our current controversies over inclusion within the church, there was disagreement over who could be called a Jew, who could gather to worship the Lord, with some calling for exclusion of all except the super-observant, the purest of the pure, while others called for broad inclusion. The devastation of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem matched the disorganization and conflict among the Jewish people.
And so in his frustration Isaiah cries out to God, “Get down here and do something, will ya! Tear open the heavens and come down! Send fire and earthquake, so that our enemies will know you’re still in charge!” Isaiah recalls God’s works in the past – “When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.” Isaiah confesses the guilt of the people – “We have all become unclean, and even our righteous deeds are like filthy rags….our sin blows us away like the wind….nobody calls on you.” And Isaiah even blames some of the people’s misdeeds on God, “You were angry, and we sinned, because you hid yourself we messed up.” Isaiah reminds God “Yet, O Lord, you are our father, we are the clay and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand. Now consider, we are all your people.”
In Advent, we remember that God did indeed tear open the heavens, did indeed come down here and do something. He came down here in the child Jesus. Mark’s Gospel tells us that at his baptism, Jesus saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove. Matthew’s account of Jesus’ crucifixion includes an earthquake. So, in Jesus, Isaiah’s prayers were answered, though likely on a schedule far different – and better – than Isaiah had envisioned.
From our Gospel reading we are reminded that Jesus will come again, not as a baby this time, but in power and glory. Jesus employs apocalyptic language and figures of speech used in his day to express the overwhelming scale and impact of this coming event – there will be signs in the heavens, and the Son of Man will come with great power and glory, to gather the elect from the ends of the earth to the ends of heaven.
Jesus also said that only the Father knows when all this will happen – the angels don’t, even the Son doesn’t. There are lots of folks who want to try to set dates for us – this year marked the failure of not one but two of Harold Camping predictions, that of the Rapture on May 21 and the end of the world on October 21. I’m confident that the predictions of Hal Lindsay and John Hagee and the other screamers and shouters on radio and TV are just as far off-base – for example, Lindsay’s prediction of the Rapture a generation – estimated by Lindsay at 40 years - after the 1948 founding of the state of Israel is well past its sell-by date these 60+ years later.
That said, it’s easy to understand why so many listen to these predictions – because our world, like the world in Isaiah’s time, like the world of Jesus’ day, is threatening, especially to people of faith. Things seem out of control. Our natural environment is under assault on a global scale. There is great spiritual wickedness in high places. It may seem like God has left the building, like God has left the planet, has left us to our fate. When all that seems familiar is coming unglued, it’s a very natural human impulse to want the disruption to end. And it will, someday. But when it will happen, is not for us to know. In the meantime, in our reading from Mark’s Gospel, we have our instructions - to keep awake, to be faithful servants who are at their post whenever the Master returns. We have our instructions, to wait faithfully, and to live in hope.
The point of Jesus’ words is not for preachers on radio and TV to try to commit God to their timelines – the TV and radio preachers simply don’t have that authority over God. Rather, the point of Jesus’ words is for God to commit us to living our lives in a way that’s faithful to the Gospel. God in God’s sovereignty keeps God’s own council on matters of timing. Meanwhile, we are to preach and live out the Gospel. Jesus says, “Therefore, keep awake – for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly. And what I say to you I say to all – Keep awake!”
The day will come when Jesus will return in unimaginable power and glory. Until then, Christ’s body, the church, is here. Until then, Jesus said that wherever two or three gather in His name, he’ll be in the midst. Until then, every day in some congregations – among the Roman Catholics, for example - and at least every week here at Emanuel, the gathered church prays to God, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Until then, we’re praying for the coming of the Kingdom, for Jesus to return, and God will honor those prayers. Until then, through the work and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, Christ is present in our words of love and deeds of compassion.
Remember that, as the saying goes, our lives – your lives, my life - may be the only Bible that unbelievers will ever read, the only Gospel they will ever hear. Let us at Emanuel Church not lead them astray by scribbling our own agendas in the margins. Instead, may we at Emanuel Church let God’s word shine forth from our lives, day by day for however many days God grants us on this earth. May those who walk through our doors truly say that “surely the Lord is in this place”, through our words of love and deeds of compassion truly come to know and love Emanuel – God with us. Amen.
Love Wins
(Scriptures: Ezekiel 34:11-24, Ephesians 1:15-23, Matthew 25:31-46)
Today is the last Sunday of the liturgical year, known as Christ the King Sunday, or more recently as Reign of Christ Sunday. And so we sing the church’s coronation hymns: All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name….Jesus Shall Reign where’er the sun does his successive journeys run….Crown Him with Many Crowns. (I always think that last hymn should be a favorite of dentists…..bad joke, I know.) Our hymns point to the reign of Christ, point to where all our faith in Christ and faithfulness to the church is leading, that great and glorious day when Christ will ascend the throne of his glory.
Our Scripture readings invite us to ponder what it means to call Christ our Lord, to say that Jesus will reign. It’s interesting that Christ the King or Reign of Christ Sunday always comes in November, just a couple weeks after our November elections. This year, there were mostly local and some statewide races, no big national names on the ballot – although, in Liberia, for whom we’ve been praying for some weeks now, there was a hugely important national runoff election – I understand President Sirleaf was re-elected. But even here, locally, on election day we collectively made decisions – who will we name as our city councilman, our county judges, our county row offices – recorder of deeds and prothonatary and dogcatcher and so on. If we voted, we made choices. If we didn’t vote, we also made a choice – to rely on the votes of others to select our political leaders. In any political process, the candidates make lots of promises before the election, but it is only after they have been sworn into office that we truly learn how they will govern and carry out their responsibilities, be it as mayor or dogcatcher or anywhere in between. Only after the election do we learn what kind of mayor or councilperson or dogcatcher they will be. In the same way, in today’s readings we consider what kind of ruler Jesus will be, what sort of reign Jesus will carry out.
It’s clear from our Scriptures that Christ is not aloof or remote or detached or above-it-all. Rather, his rule, his reign is very hands-on, very much involved with the details, passionately, intimately involved with humankind.
Both our Old Testament reading and our Gospel reading use the actions of sheep as a metaphor for human behavior. Our reading from Ezekiel is part of a message from God against the rulers of Israel, who, rather than caring for their flocks – that is to say, the people of Israel – have only looked out for their own interests. Rather than feeding their flocks, they have fed only themselves, leaving their flocks – the people – to fend for themselves. God proclaims that God himself will gather the sheep who have been scattered. But Ezekiel’s message from God is not only against the negligent shepherds, but against those sheep who in their arrogance have driven the weaker sheep from the fold, who in their greed have not only grabbed the best for themselves, but spoiled what was left for everyone else. We here in America may find ourselves in this text, where we consume far more than our share of the planet’s resources, and leave environmental destruction affecting the planet in our wake. Indeed, it’s a surprisingly current image when, in a news story unfolding day by day before our eyes, moneyed interests in our nation and even right here in Pennsylvania are willing to risk environmental degradation to parts of the state, ripping open the earth and potentially poisoning the water, in order to get rich by extracting natural gas from the Marcellus Shale reserves by the highly polluting process of hydrofracking. The developers will get the big bucks, and the rest of us will be stuck with the mess. Well does God say, in the words of Ezekiel, that God will judge between sheep and sheep.
And then we have the well-known parable of the sheep and the goats found in Matthew chapter 25, which develops Ezekiel’s image of God judging between sheep and sheep into an image of the final judgment. We are given a picture of Jesus as a king so concerned about his people that, not content to rely on his court officials for information and guidance about his populace, he disguises himself as a beggar and walks around incognito to see how his subjects treat one another. The king behaves almost like a modern-day secret shopper who enters a store and pretends to be a customer, in order to see how the store treats its customers. Or like an undercover investigative reporter who wears a hidden camera and approaches members of a religious cult or a drug gang, ostensibly seeking affiliation, but in reality trying to learn what goes on behind closed doors.
It’s been said that “character is how we behave when we think nobody’s looking.” In Jesus’ parable, the king’s ploy works – both sheep and goats think nobody’s looking, and go about their business as they always do. The king’s disguise works so well that neither the sheep nor the goats recognize the king, and so both the sheep and the goats behave in character, behave as they do when they think nobody’s looking – the sheep offering assistance, and the goats offering nothing. Both sheep and goats ask the king, “When did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison?” Both sheep and goats were told, “as you did – or did not do – unto the least of these, you did – or did not do – unto me.”
The point of Jesus’ parable isn’t about trying to work our way into the kingdom. Rather, it’s about Jesus, like the shepherd in our Ezekiel passage, trying to gather his sheep who have been mixed among other flocks. Shepherds would mark their sheep, so that if they got mixed up among other flocks, they could distinguish their sheep from the rest. And Jesus’ sheep are marked as well – marked initially by the waters of baptism, marking the death of our nature of sin and by God’s grace, the beginnings of new life in Christ, and as we live into our baptismal vows, by love for God and neighbor. In Jesus’ parable, love, compassion, hospitality, caring are the marks that separate the sheep from the goats.
It’s striking that in Jesus' parable, the goats are characterized not by having overtly done evil – the goats didn’t kill or steal or pillage or plunder - but by having failed to do good, by having done - nothing. And this aspect of Jesus’ parable challenges me – sometimes terrifies me. Maybe it challenges you as well. I can remember many times when I’ve fed the hungry, clothed the naked, visited the sick, visited prisoners - when I was at Old First, there were several persons with ties to Old First who got into trouble and were arrested, because of drug addictions or mental illness, and who I visited from time to time. And I can remember many times when I haven’t – times when I have passed by street people seeking donations without so much as speaking a word, times when I meant to visit someone in the hospital but never quite got there, never even got around to sending a card, times when somebody asked for something as simple as a ride, and I was too busy. Too busy. My record of compassion is a mixed bag. I feel like I’m not entirely sheep or entirely goat, but some of each, some sort of critter even stranger than the ones you’ll find at the Philadelphia zoo.
So maybe Jesus’ parable speaks on more than one level. It’s been said that the line between good and evil runs through every human heart. Maybe the line between the sheep and the goats is not only between people, but also within them. As we live into our baptismal vows, as the Holy Spirit we received at our baptism works within us over the course of our lives, as we ask God’s forgiveness week by week and implore God’s grace, by God’s grace we conform less and less to the world, and are more and more transformed into the image of Christ. God begins to give us an extreme makeover, as we begin to be transformed more and more from goats into sheep. The formal theological term is sanctification. It’s a process that begins in this life, but is completed in the life to come.
It’s a process that begins not only in our own lives, but in the lives of others. Genesis tells us that human beings are created in God’s image. Sin distorts that image, but does not erase it. When we’re tempted to lash out at another human being, to insult them, to ignore them….remember that they, like we, are created in God’s image. Sometimes the divine image is really, really, really hard to find – but it’s there. Somewhere. And so it really is true that how we treat other human beings is how we treat God.
Every week as we pray the Lord’s prayer, we say the words, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.” The Reign of Christ has begun – began with the resurrection of Christ, is spread in part through the work of the church – but is not complete. Jesus reigns, but not everyone has gotten the memo. We live in the space between “now” and “not yet.” But today’s Gospel reading tells us what God’s kingdom, God’s reign, will look like. Also remember that I John 4 tells us that “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.” And so, if God is love, and God reigns – then love reigns. Love rules. Love wins. All within ourselves and all within others that is unloving, will be left outside the door of God’s kingdom. God loves us, and at last we will be able to love God as we should, will be united in our love for God, and God’s love for us.
You don’t need me to tell you that we’re not there yet. We won’t get there in this life. But the beginnings of the kingdom are sprouting, even sprouting here at Emanuel Church. The love of God and love for one another we experience here, even though we don’t always get it right, is a small sample of the love we will experience unfailingly in the world to come. You could say that, at our best, we’re like a little outpost of heaven. Paul’s lofty words in our reading from Ephesians: “God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come.” – may seem far away from our own experience. But even as Paul looks ahead to Christ’s reign coming in its fullness, Paul is so certain of it that he speaks as if it’s already happened – as if, even though we only get glimpses of it in this life, it’s already a done deal. And it’s a done deal that will include us, the church, as Paul goes on: “And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” For the church – hey, that’s us, the church, the body of Christ.
May we at Emanuel Church continue to be a place where God’s love can be found. May we continue to be a place where people can come and see and taste that the Lord is good, where people can get a glimpse of heaven, a glimpse of the goodness that is to come. May it be so with us. Amen.
Today is the last Sunday of the liturgical year, known as Christ the King Sunday, or more recently as Reign of Christ Sunday. And so we sing the church’s coronation hymns: All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name….Jesus Shall Reign where’er the sun does his successive journeys run….Crown Him with Many Crowns. (I always think that last hymn should be a favorite of dentists…..bad joke, I know.) Our hymns point to the reign of Christ, point to where all our faith in Christ and faithfulness to the church is leading, that great and glorious day when Christ will ascend the throne of his glory.
Our Scripture readings invite us to ponder what it means to call Christ our Lord, to say that Jesus will reign. It’s interesting that Christ the King or Reign of Christ Sunday always comes in November, just a couple weeks after our November elections. This year, there were mostly local and some statewide races, no big national names on the ballot – although, in Liberia, for whom we’ve been praying for some weeks now, there was a hugely important national runoff election – I understand President Sirleaf was re-elected. But even here, locally, on election day we collectively made decisions – who will we name as our city councilman, our county judges, our county row offices – recorder of deeds and prothonatary and dogcatcher and so on. If we voted, we made choices. If we didn’t vote, we also made a choice – to rely on the votes of others to select our political leaders. In any political process, the candidates make lots of promises before the election, but it is only after they have been sworn into office that we truly learn how they will govern and carry out their responsibilities, be it as mayor or dogcatcher or anywhere in between. Only after the election do we learn what kind of mayor or councilperson or dogcatcher they will be. In the same way, in today’s readings we consider what kind of ruler Jesus will be, what sort of reign Jesus will carry out.
It’s clear from our Scriptures that Christ is not aloof or remote or detached or above-it-all. Rather, his rule, his reign is very hands-on, very much involved with the details, passionately, intimately involved with humankind.
Both our Old Testament reading and our Gospel reading use the actions of sheep as a metaphor for human behavior. Our reading from Ezekiel is part of a message from God against the rulers of Israel, who, rather than caring for their flocks – that is to say, the people of Israel – have only looked out for their own interests. Rather than feeding their flocks, they have fed only themselves, leaving their flocks – the people – to fend for themselves. God proclaims that God himself will gather the sheep who have been scattered. But Ezekiel’s message from God is not only against the negligent shepherds, but against those sheep who in their arrogance have driven the weaker sheep from the fold, who in their greed have not only grabbed the best for themselves, but spoiled what was left for everyone else. We here in America may find ourselves in this text, where we consume far more than our share of the planet’s resources, and leave environmental destruction affecting the planet in our wake. Indeed, it’s a surprisingly current image when, in a news story unfolding day by day before our eyes, moneyed interests in our nation and even right here in Pennsylvania are willing to risk environmental degradation to parts of the state, ripping open the earth and potentially poisoning the water, in order to get rich by extracting natural gas from the Marcellus Shale reserves by the highly polluting process of hydrofracking. The developers will get the big bucks, and the rest of us will be stuck with the mess. Well does God say, in the words of Ezekiel, that God will judge between sheep and sheep.
And then we have the well-known parable of the sheep and the goats found in Matthew chapter 25, which develops Ezekiel’s image of God judging between sheep and sheep into an image of the final judgment. We are given a picture of Jesus as a king so concerned about his people that, not content to rely on his court officials for information and guidance about his populace, he disguises himself as a beggar and walks around incognito to see how his subjects treat one another. The king behaves almost like a modern-day secret shopper who enters a store and pretends to be a customer, in order to see how the store treats its customers. Or like an undercover investigative reporter who wears a hidden camera and approaches members of a religious cult or a drug gang, ostensibly seeking affiliation, but in reality trying to learn what goes on behind closed doors.
It’s been said that “character is how we behave when we think nobody’s looking.” In Jesus’ parable, the king’s ploy works – both sheep and goats think nobody’s looking, and go about their business as they always do. The king’s disguise works so well that neither the sheep nor the goats recognize the king, and so both the sheep and the goats behave in character, behave as they do when they think nobody’s looking – the sheep offering assistance, and the goats offering nothing. Both sheep and goats ask the king, “When did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison?” Both sheep and goats were told, “as you did – or did not do – unto the least of these, you did – or did not do – unto me.”
The point of Jesus’ parable isn’t about trying to work our way into the kingdom. Rather, it’s about Jesus, like the shepherd in our Ezekiel passage, trying to gather his sheep who have been mixed among other flocks. Shepherds would mark their sheep, so that if they got mixed up among other flocks, they could distinguish their sheep from the rest. And Jesus’ sheep are marked as well – marked initially by the waters of baptism, marking the death of our nature of sin and by God’s grace, the beginnings of new life in Christ, and as we live into our baptismal vows, by love for God and neighbor. In Jesus’ parable, love, compassion, hospitality, caring are the marks that separate the sheep from the goats.
It’s striking that in Jesus' parable, the goats are characterized not by having overtly done evil – the goats didn’t kill or steal or pillage or plunder - but by having failed to do good, by having done - nothing. And this aspect of Jesus’ parable challenges me – sometimes terrifies me. Maybe it challenges you as well. I can remember many times when I’ve fed the hungry, clothed the naked, visited the sick, visited prisoners - when I was at Old First, there were several persons with ties to Old First who got into trouble and were arrested, because of drug addictions or mental illness, and who I visited from time to time. And I can remember many times when I haven’t – times when I have passed by street people seeking donations without so much as speaking a word, times when I meant to visit someone in the hospital but never quite got there, never even got around to sending a card, times when somebody asked for something as simple as a ride, and I was too busy. Too busy. My record of compassion is a mixed bag. I feel like I’m not entirely sheep or entirely goat, but some of each, some sort of critter even stranger than the ones you’ll find at the Philadelphia zoo.
So maybe Jesus’ parable speaks on more than one level. It’s been said that the line between good and evil runs through every human heart. Maybe the line between the sheep and the goats is not only between people, but also within them. As we live into our baptismal vows, as the Holy Spirit we received at our baptism works within us over the course of our lives, as we ask God’s forgiveness week by week and implore God’s grace, by God’s grace we conform less and less to the world, and are more and more transformed into the image of Christ. God begins to give us an extreme makeover, as we begin to be transformed more and more from goats into sheep. The formal theological term is sanctification. It’s a process that begins in this life, but is completed in the life to come.
It’s a process that begins not only in our own lives, but in the lives of others. Genesis tells us that human beings are created in God’s image. Sin distorts that image, but does not erase it. When we’re tempted to lash out at another human being, to insult them, to ignore them….remember that they, like we, are created in God’s image. Sometimes the divine image is really, really, really hard to find – but it’s there. Somewhere. And so it really is true that how we treat other human beings is how we treat God.
Every week as we pray the Lord’s prayer, we say the words, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.” The Reign of Christ has begun – began with the resurrection of Christ, is spread in part through the work of the church – but is not complete. Jesus reigns, but not everyone has gotten the memo. We live in the space between “now” and “not yet.” But today’s Gospel reading tells us what God’s kingdom, God’s reign, will look like. Also remember that I John 4 tells us that “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God in them.” And so, if God is love, and God reigns – then love reigns. Love rules. Love wins. All within ourselves and all within others that is unloving, will be left outside the door of God’s kingdom. God loves us, and at last we will be able to love God as we should, will be united in our love for God, and God’s love for us.
You don’t need me to tell you that we’re not there yet. We won’t get there in this life. But the beginnings of the kingdom are sprouting, even sprouting here at Emanuel Church. The love of God and love for one another we experience here, even though we don’t always get it right, is a small sample of the love we will experience unfailingly in the world to come. You could say that, at our best, we’re like a little outpost of heaven. Paul’s lofty words in our reading from Ephesians: “God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come.” – may seem far away from our own experience. But even as Paul looks ahead to Christ’s reign coming in its fullness, Paul is so certain of it that he speaks as if it’s already happened – as if, even though we only get glimpses of it in this life, it’s already a done deal. And it’s a done deal that will include us, the church, as Paul goes on: “And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” For the church – hey, that’s us, the church, the body of Christ.
May we at Emanuel Church continue to be a place where God’s love can be found. May we continue to be a place where people can come and see and taste that the Lord is good, where people can get a glimpse of heaven, a glimpse of the goodness that is to come. May it be so with us. Amen.
For All The Saints
(Scriptures: Joshua 24:1-25, I Thessalonians 4:13-18, Matthew 25:1-13)
Today we celebrate All Saints Day – Tottenfest is what the German founders of the congregation called All Saints, when we remember our saints – our family members, members of Emanuel church, other people who have touched our lives before passing from this life to be gathered to the Church Triumphant. It’s a time of gratitude, a time of giving thanks for the ways in which God’s grace was at work in the lives of our loved ones. And by remembering our saints, those who have gone before us, we are led in turn to remember who we are, and more importantly, whose we are.
All three of today’s Scripture readings have something to tell us about the importance of remembering who we are. Our reading from Joshua gives us Joshua’s farewell speech and final charge to the Israelites whom he had led into the promised land. The children of Israel had driven out the Canaanites and settled the promised land. The Lord had granted Israel rest from the enemies. But Joshua is concerned that peace and prosperity may lead the children of Israel to forget their covenant with the Lord. And so Joshua begins his farewell speech by retelling the entire story of Israel, beginning with God’s call of Abraham, the entry of Joseph into Egypt, the Exodus of Moses from Egypt, the long years in the wilderness, and the various conquests made by Israel as they settled the land of promise. Joshua recounts all this history in order to tell the people of Israel – remember who you are. Remember where you have been, and what you have gone through to arrive where you are. Most of all, remember how all this came about: not by your might, but by God’s gracious will. God says, “I gave you a land on which you had not labored, and towns that you had not built, and you live in them; you eat the fruit of vineyards and oliveyards that you did not plant.” All this goodness is God’s gift.
Having recounted all of God’s mighty acts on their behalf, Joshua begins to tell how the people must respond, beginning, “Now therefore….” God’s mighty deeds on their behalf demand a response. “Now therefore revere the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and faithfulness; put away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt.” Joshua challenged the people with the choice that was before them: “Choose this day whom you will serve.” You can serve the gods that your fathers served beyond the River, or those of Egypt, or those of the people you just got done driving out of this land, but – Joshua says – “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Those Emanuel saints whom we remember today confronted that same choice. Faced with options to devote their lives to accumulating wealth, or to pleasure, or to any number of other things, they chose to serve the Lord. They served the Lord by attending this church or other congregations, by being active in the life of their faith communities and supporting the church financially, by living their faith in their family lives, by clinging to the Lord in time of trouble and remembering the Lord in time of plenty. Just as the Israelites had their stories of how God had called them and delivered them from slavery and led them through many difficulties, we at Emanuel have our stories of those saints who taught us the faith, who served this church faithfully through good times and bad.
In our epistle reading from I Thessalonians, Paul is comforting those who have suffered the death of loved ones, and are worried that they’ll never see their loved ones again. Paul relieves their fear by telling them that those who have died in Christ will rise first, before those who are alive at the time of his coming. So we have assurance that we will see our loved ones, our saints, again. Reunited with our loved ones, we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore, Paul says, encourage one another with these words.
Finally, our Gospel reading reminds us that while we don’t know the times God has appointed, we are to live in such a way as we are ready at any time – to meet our Lord at the moment of death, or to meet our Lord at the second coming. Not a one of us here – not you, not me - has any assurance that we will wake up tomorrow morning. So we need to be ready. If there are those to whom we owe a phone call or a letter, a word of forgiveness, or an “I love you” - do it now. Do it now. Don’t delay. Don’t wait until tomorrow, for tomorrow may never come. We are prepared – for Christ’s coming, or for our own departing – when we share the good news of Jesus with those around us, when our love of God overflows into love for neighbor. In our Gospel reading, what made the bridesmaids wise wasn’t that they knew when the bridegroom was coming. After all, when the bridegroom was delayed, both the wise and foolish bridesmaids fell asleep. But the wise bridesmaids brought extra oil, so that their lamps would go the distance to the wedding banquet. In the same way, we need a durable faith, so that the light of our faith will go the distance, lighting a path for others.
Our saints here at Emanuel had that durable faith that went the distance. Through a Great Depression and two World Wars many of them married, raised families, and supported the ministries of the church. They were faithful during the years Emanuel was growing, and they continued faithful in more recent years as our numbers declined. Now they are with God, part of that great cloud of witnesses spoken of in the letter to the Hebrews. That great cloud of witnesses surrounds you, and you, and you, and me, and all of us. They have run the race of faith, and I think of them now up in the stands, up in the bleachers, cheering us on as we run the same race they ran. We feebly struggle; they in glory shine.
In a portion of the book of Joshua immediately following this morning’s reading, after the people covenanted to serve the Lord, Joshua set up a stone, and when he had set up the stone, he said to the people, “see, this stone shall be a witness.” And we have stones that have been set up as witnesses. The headstones outside our window are a witness to the faith of our fathers and mothers. On this All Saints Sunday, may their faith inspire us to keep faith with the God of our fathers and mothers. May their faith live on in all we do, as individuals, and as the gathered community of Emanuel Church. Amen.
Today we celebrate All Saints Day – Tottenfest is what the German founders of the congregation called All Saints, when we remember our saints – our family members, members of Emanuel church, other people who have touched our lives before passing from this life to be gathered to the Church Triumphant. It’s a time of gratitude, a time of giving thanks for the ways in which God’s grace was at work in the lives of our loved ones. And by remembering our saints, those who have gone before us, we are led in turn to remember who we are, and more importantly, whose we are.
All three of today’s Scripture readings have something to tell us about the importance of remembering who we are. Our reading from Joshua gives us Joshua’s farewell speech and final charge to the Israelites whom he had led into the promised land. The children of Israel had driven out the Canaanites and settled the promised land. The Lord had granted Israel rest from the enemies. But Joshua is concerned that peace and prosperity may lead the children of Israel to forget their covenant with the Lord. And so Joshua begins his farewell speech by retelling the entire story of Israel, beginning with God’s call of Abraham, the entry of Joseph into Egypt, the Exodus of Moses from Egypt, the long years in the wilderness, and the various conquests made by Israel as they settled the land of promise. Joshua recounts all this history in order to tell the people of Israel – remember who you are. Remember where you have been, and what you have gone through to arrive where you are. Most of all, remember how all this came about: not by your might, but by God’s gracious will. God says, “I gave you a land on which you had not labored, and towns that you had not built, and you live in them; you eat the fruit of vineyards and oliveyards that you did not plant.” All this goodness is God’s gift.
Having recounted all of God’s mighty acts on their behalf, Joshua begins to tell how the people must respond, beginning, “Now therefore….” God’s mighty deeds on their behalf demand a response. “Now therefore revere the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and faithfulness; put away the gods that your ancestors served beyond the River and in Egypt.” Joshua challenged the people with the choice that was before them: “Choose this day whom you will serve.” You can serve the gods that your fathers served beyond the River, or those of Egypt, or those of the people you just got done driving out of this land, but – Joshua says – “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Those Emanuel saints whom we remember today confronted that same choice. Faced with options to devote their lives to accumulating wealth, or to pleasure, or to any number of other things, they chose to serve the Lord. They served the Lord by attending this church or other congregations, by being active in the life of their faith communities and supporting the church financially, by living their faith in their family lives, by clinging to the Lord in time of trouble and remembering the Lord in time of plenty. Just as the Israelites had their stories of how God had called them and delivered them from slavery and led them through many difficulties, we at Emanuel have our stories of those saints who taught us the faith, who served this church faithfully through good times and bad.
In our epistle reading from I Thessalonians, Paul is comforting those who have suffered the death of loved ones, and are worried that they’ll never see their loved ones again. Paul relieves their fear by telling them that those who have died in Christ will rise first, before those who are alive at the time of his coming. So we have assurance that we will see our loved ones, our saints, again. Reunited with our loved ones, we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore, Paul says, encourage one another with these words.
Finally, our Gospel reading reminds us that while we don’t know the times God has appointed, we are to live in such a way as we are ready at any time – to meet our Lord at the moment of death, or to meet our Lord at the second coming. Not a one of us here – not you, not me - has any assurance that we will wake up tomorrow morning. So we need to be ready. If there are those to whom we owe a phone call or a letter, a word of forgiveness, or an “I love you” - do it now. Do it now. Don’t delay. Don’t wait until tomorrow, for tomorrow may never come. We are prepared – for Christ’s coming, or for our own departing – when we share the good news of Jesus with those around us, when our love of God overflows into love for neighbor. In our Gospel reading, what made the bridesmaids wise wasn’t that they knew when the bridegroom was coming. After all, when the bridegroom was delayed, both the wise and foolish bridesmaids fell asleep. But the wise bridesmaids brought extra oil, so that their lamps would go the distance to the wedding banquet. In the same way, we need a durable faith, so that the light of our faith will go the distance, lighting a path for others.
Our saints here at Emanuel had that durable faith that went the distance. Through a Great Depression and two World Wars many of them married, raised families, and supported the ministries of the church. They were faithful during the years Emanuel was growing, and they continued faithful in more recent years as our numbers declined. Now they are with God, part of that great cloud of witnesses spoken of in the letter to the Hebrews. That great cloud of witnesses surrounds you, and you, and you, and me, and all of us. They have run the race of faith, and I think of them now up in the stands, up in the bleachers, cheering us on as we run the same race they ran. We feebly struggle; they in glory shine.
In a portion of the book of Joshua immediately following this morning’s reading, after the people covenanted to serve the Lord, Joshua set up a stone, and when he had set up the stone, he said to the people, “see, this stone shall be a witness.” And we have stones that have been set up as witnesses. The headstones outside our window are a witness to the faith of our fathers and mothers. On this All Saints Sunday, may their faith inspire us to keep faith with the God of our fathers and mothers. May their faith live on in all we do, as individuals, and as the gathered community of Emanuel Church. Amen.
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