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Trinity Hartford 17 After Pentecost 22A October 5, 2014
I took the chance to go hiking this week on the section of the Metacomet Trail, in Farmington south of Route 6. Having climbed Rattlesnake Mountain, I found myself standing atop of a huge tumble of gigantic stones, some the size of a house, and the rock cliff, with vets to the North, South and East, from where I could see the tower of Trinity Church — stones which had been there since the last ice age — thousands of years. Magnificent rock.
Maybe that’s why “stones, rock” stood out for me in today’s readings.
In the gospel story today, Jesus also was standing on a mountaintop, in the Temple in Jerusalem, on Mount Zion. He also stood atop huge stones — not a prehistoric jumble of rock, but new, finely crafted stone ashlars which were a marvel of the world he lived in, and ours today too. The stones which had been worked and moved and finished in place were, some of them, they say, are 44 feet long, maybe fifteen feet thick, weighing an estimated 600 tons — that’s 120,000 pounds each — laid without mortar to build the foundation for the Temple. Each such ashlar had to be perfect; a fault, a crack, a softness in the stone meant the stone would have been passed over, rejected.
In Scripture, Stones, Rock are an image for the strength, permanent and enduring love and constancy of God year after year, generation to generation.
The Commandments given by God were written on stone (Ex 24:12-14) (Ex 32:15, 16) Moses came down from the mountain, carrying the two tablets of the covenant in his hands, tablets of stone that were written on both sides, on the front and on the back. The tablets were made by God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved in stone, meant to last for all time.
But remember the story? How Moses in his anger at the people threw the tablets down and broke them. (Ex 34) Later, Moses made two tablets of stone like the first ones, and (someone) either God or Moses wrote on them and Moses came down with the covenant, newly engraved, written in stone.
Rock also became an image for God. Psalm 18:2ff The LORD is my rock, my fortress, my deliverer, my rock in whom I take refuge, my stronghold.
And for God’s safekeeping of his faithful people: Psalm 27:5 In the day of trouble, the LORD will set me high on a rock.
And again, Psalm 40:2 (God) drew me up from the pit of tumult, out of the miry bog and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.
Then there are those verses that Jesus used in today’s confrontation with the chief priests and elders of the people. Psalm 118:22 The stone that the builders rejected has (in fact) become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing and it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the LORD has made, let us rejoice and be glad in God.
The Temple, and the stones of which it was built, were the fame of all Judea. So Jesus, in his increasingly direct confrontations with the chief priests and elders, having told the story of how the wicked tenants rejected the owner’s son, (who was killed with stones?) referred to those ashlars,
21:42 Have you never read in the scriptures: 'The stone that the builders rejected has in fact become the foundation’s most important stone; this was the Lord's doing, and it is amazing in our eyes'? Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom.
What Jesus was telling his scoffers was that they had rejected the Messiah sent by God, God’s Son, whom God had sent to them; in fact they were plotting to kill him. In the same way, they had rejected the most important building stone God had given for building the entire Temple of God, again the image of not embracing God’s Messiah given as the foundation for the Realm of Heaven.
The Messiah, present among them — and among us — who is Jesus is the right foundation stone - maybe not by earthly standards — but born of God; it is Jesus who is the new stone, “like a rock” (to borrow a phrase from Chevy’s truck commercials): strong, permanent in love in God year after year, generation to generation.
Paul, in his writing to the Philippians, talked of how he gave up depending on the old rock, the law written on the stone tablets, and had come to the new rock, the living rock, who is Christ.
3:4b If anyone else has reason to be confident (in the old way, the law written on stone tablets), I have more: and he listed his credentials. (circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.)
Yet , he wrote, whatever gains I had (before), these I have come to regard of no account because of Christ, because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all former things, as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith.
Standing on the rock, knowing Christ, priceless.
Standing on the rock. Jesus, with another image recorded elsewhere in Matthew, put it this way: Mt7:24 A Wise man builds his house upon the rock; come rains, floods, wind, a coastal storm beating against that house, and it won’t wash away, because it had been founded not on sand (think back: we know what happens to those houses), but on rock. The rock who is Christ,
Too, the invitation to us, from Saint Peter. “Come to him, a living stone, rejected by mortals yet in God’s sight chosen and precious. and like him, living stones, let yourselves be built up into a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.”
Sekai Elizabeth Tengatenga, your parents who know this living stone who is Jesus, who raises us up and keeps us safe, from generation to generation, they have brought you here today, so that you too can live in and come to know Christ Jesus, the new rock fashioned and given in God. Ngoni and Lindsey, and godparents, it takes some work to get onto that rock. You pledge today to be her guide, her mentor, to show her the way that leads to the rock, on high, to know and see the world differently. Sekai, we rejoice in your baptism. Stand on the rock, become with us another living stone, help us to be the Temple of God given for the health and blessing of the world.
“On the solid rock we stand, all other ground is shifting sand.” Thank God: Jesus is the New Stone, not a tablet, breakable, Not a jumble of rock, haphazard, but made by God to be the living foundation, in fact The Foundation Stone, permanent, for all time, in God. And for that we give thanks and praise today, and forever.
Matthew 21: 23-32
Unless you haven’t been paying attention or have been very, very busy, you know we’re only 5 weeks away from what’s known in this country as the mid-term congressional elections. For Connecticut folks, it also means we’re 5 weeks away from choosing a governor and other state officials. All of which also means that it’s hard to escape the endless media interviews of would-be office holders.
These interviews are frustrating at so many levels, aren’t they? Not least because no matter what the question is, the answer is bound to be one of the talking points they want to get across. “How are you?” “The taxes are too darned high and my opponent is a liar!”
Still, on occasion, it happens that talking points are successfully challenged. One method is to challenge an answer with a video tape of the candidate saying the opposite of his present platform. It’s what’s known as a “Gotcha” moment.
For example, the interviewer asks, “Do you support gun control?” And the candidate responds “no.” Then the interviewer might say, “Very interesting. But on such and such a date you said otherwise. Let’s play that clip.” Then the video tape would show the person on the hot seat saying on another occasion that he thought gun control was a good thing.
In response, of course, the guest would hem and haw and try to convince everyone that his views on the subject had really never changed, that the quotation was taken out of context and yada, yada, yada.
The take-away from such gotcha moments is that it would seem there is nothing worse for anyone running for political office than to have to admit that they have ever, ever changed their mind about anything. From gun control to national health care to abortion to marriage equality, you name it: for anyone to be on record as having changed their minds – well, they might as well abandon all political hope.
Changing one’s mind. Is it really that bad?
The religious leaders in our gospel lesson this morning clearly thought that changing one’s mind was akin to self-immolation. To briefly reset the scene, the leaders were trying to trap Jesus into saying his authority came from God. This answer would then give the leaders enough warrant to denounce Jesus as a heretic and destroy his growing movement.
In response, Jesus posed a question about John the Baptist. Long story short, the leaders knew that no matter how they answered Jesus had them. So, they disingenuously said, “We don’t know.”
Jesus then told them a parable of a man who had two sons. The father asked one to go work in the vineyard. He said no, but changed his mind and went and did the work. He then asked his second son to work in the vineyard. He said he would, but didn’t.
Jesus then asked the religious experts: So, then, who did what his father wanted? It was a “Duh” question. “The first son,” they replied.
And Jesus said, “Gotcha!” You, he said, are like the son who said he would go and work but didn’t. You claim to be so close to God, but yet you refused to pay attention to John the Baptist who was God’s prophet.
In fact, Jesus went on, you think you’re better than the so-called worst people in Palestine – the tax collectors and prostitutes – but you’re not. They, he said, the socially marginalized, although not included in your definition of people acceptable to God, will in fact enter the kingdom of God before you because in the end some did respond positively to John the Baptist.
In sum, these religious experts had many of the right answers about God. But right answers alone aren’t enough when it comes to listening for God wants.
So, point number one for us this morning – the obvious: It’s not what we say with our lips about God that matters, but what we do as a result of what we say we believe.
To be very sure, one of the most regrettable things about Christianity is that many of us have been taught that Christianity is basically a belief system. That if we hold to orthodox beliefs about such doctrines as the virgin birth, the resurrection, the trinity, etc., then we’re a Christian, a disciple of Jesus.
Jesus, of course, never said any such thing. He was, though, quoted several times saying, in effect, the fruits of our lives will reveal the sincerity of our claimed love for God and neighbor.
Now, it’s not that beliefs don’t matter. Obviously, to come to the conclusion that God was incarnate in Jesus of Nazareth who revealed truths about living a life most pleasing to God is a core belief for anyone who would go out of their way to call themselves Christian. And there are other doctrines of the faith that help us understand God and how we are to act lovingly and justly in the world.
But, to Jesus’ argument, one can get straight A’s on the Bible and churchly doctrines, and still miss the point of what God is doing in the world and what God wants from us.
Point number two from Jesus’ parable: What would seem an advantage in relating to God can, in fact, be a great disadvantage.
The religious leaders in fact had a great advantage. They were clearly highly regarded and good godly people, the best of the best: chief priests and elders, roughly the equivalent of our most influential clergy and lay leaders. But, apparently, they were suffering from a malady that might be called religious privilege. That is, they felt they had all the answers about God and were thus entitled to all the privileges. And were hell bent to defend their rules and regulations and system.
Now, to be fair, such assumption of religious privilege sooner or later comes to all movements of faith. We seem almost incapable of helping ourselves in our predisposition to legalize and codify and draw lines of who’s in and who’s out. I mean, that’s the church. Every church, sooner or later.
And, for those of us on the inside – you too - it’s very hard to get our attention that changes in our thinking and behavior need to happen. We fall in love with our beliefs and our customs as if God has, in fact, stopped speaking.
This was precisely what was going on with the chief priests and elders. They assumed God had stopped speaking. That because John the Baptist, let alone Jesus, didn’t reflect their way of thinking, they could be dismissed.
Which was what caused Jesus to retort that even society’s most notorious outcasts are likely to catch God’s new truth before the religiously privileged simply because such folk aren’t so in love with the old religious truths and traditions that they have become blind to God’s new thing.
Point number two again for us: We who are religiously privileged in American Christendom always need to beware that our wonderful system of doctrines and traditions and customs may in fact come to be a stumbling block in following Jesus.
Point number three: Our understanding of truth necessarily evolves as does our understanding of what it means to be Christian.
Why? For one thing, we just grow smarter.
For example, once, as my mother taught me, I believed that eating two eggs, buttered toast, some bacon and a glass of whole milk every day was good for my health. Then I learned it wasn’t. Once I believed the world was created in 6 days. Now I don’t. Once I was homophobic. Now I’m not.
Once, although it’s hard to reconcile, many of us who are 60 and over treated the planet and environment as a commodity solely given for our enjoyment and disposal. We didn’t even begin to link care for the earth with God. Now, we know better, and are rightly ashamed. And so on.
So, in the changing of our minds did the truth change?
No. I, we changed as we grew in knowledge and wisdom and what it means to live truthfully and responsibly and justly as children of God.
Point number three again: Our understanding of truth as well as our understanding of what God is calling us to do and to be changes, evolves, matures and this is a good thing.
Had the religious leaders in Jesus’ time been mindful of this, been more humble about it all, their encounters with Jesus might have been totally different. Instead, they were stuck in old beliefs, in old practices, honoring timeworn customs with hearts and minds closed to God’s new thing.
Now, although I’d prefer to think that this parable has nothing to do with me today, it does. It bids me to look within and check things out. After all, looking back, all my new understandings have come at the expense of previously held, even once professed wonderful understandings of faith and life.
So, might it be so now? Yeah, it might.
And nowhere might it be more obvious for me and possibly for you than in regard to how God might be calling us as Trinity Church for future mission, given as we have been hearing, that status quo simply isn’t an option.
Accordingly, as we look upon the world into which we as a church are even today being sent, a world of neighborhoods, of work places, of schools, of families, and beyond, we must pray to be open to the “duh” questions Jesus is posing to us as we reimagine our place in the mission of God.
Duh questions like:
What do we have as a faith community that our neighbors need most?
How can we be the best stewards of our assets in service to the world?
What unique gifts and talents do we possess that God is calling us to exercise in this time, in this place?
How do we teach each other, support each other to best accomplish God’s mission?
Questions such as these that, if we receive them with open hands and hearts, and not clenched fists of defensiveness will make glad the heart of God who is calling us to exciting though challenging new frontiers.
We can try to stall Jesus by saying “we don’t know” what we’re supposed to do. And, right now that’s actually true: your church’s leaders don’t know exactly what we’re being called to be and to do in these changing times. Our input has been and will continue to be solicited as in the forum today.
But after months of listening, researching, studying and praying, soon enough we’re going to have the options in front of us. Soon enough we’ll know as best we can know what God’s new possibilities for us are.
And then we’ll get to decide which of the two children we want to emulate: the one who said the right things; or the one who, however long it took him, in the end did what his father was asking him to do.
Trinity Church 15th after Pentecost September 21, 2014 Proper 20A
Over these past weeks, as we have progressed through the teachings of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew, each building on the other, we definitely have been on a roll. One teaching following another, one parable, one image after another - all defining the Kingdom of Heaven, and what it is to live in it right now. Member-ship. Spiritual fertility and how to improve on that. How someone can be both a rock for Christ and at the same time a stumbling block for the gospel. The expectation of forgiveness, no matter how little or how great the debt.
Now we have the story of the vineyard owner who goes to the town square at different times in the day to hire workers. (Its place in Matthew’s gospel is right before Jesus makes his entry into Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives. The stories we shall read in weeks ahead are placed from his time in the Holy City just before his betrayal and arrest.)
Let’s walk around this parable, poke at it, look into it.
Jesus said, there was a landowner who went into town to hire workers for his vineyard. He first went out early in the morning. 6 am? After agreeing with the laborers for the normal daily wage, he sent them into his vineyard. When he went out about nine o'clock, he saw others standing idle in the marketplace; and he said to them, 'You also go into the vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.' So they went.
Same thing at noon, and at three, and at five (“Why are you still here standing around?”) in the late afternoon.
20:8 When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his manager, 'Call the laborers and give them their pay, beginning with the last and then going to the first.’ When those hired about five o'clock came, each of them received the usual daily wage. Now when the first came, they thought they would receive more; but each of them also received — the usual daily wage. And they complained to the landowner, saying, 'These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have worked eleven hours, borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat.'
First, in the worldly scheme of things, let’s admit that the landowner’s action is just not right. The principles of employment in business or in the factory would be in chaos if there are not a clear delineation of what we call “hourly wages.” “You work one hour, you get paid for one hour, your work half-time, get paid half-time. Work full-time, full time pay. More than that? Overtime!”
Ah, but the Kingdom of God is not about worldly schemes. Sure, there are business principles and practices that apply to the church’s day to day accountability, but the Church is something much different, so much more, than a business; it is the embodiment and sign of the Kingdom of God.
That’s what this story points out so clearly. It’s not about farm owners and workers. It’s about the Kingdom of heaven. So. The landowner is …. ? (God) The hired workers are …. ? (you and me). The work is ….? (to go into the fields and bring in the harvest; to go out to live and proclaim the Gospel and bring in others who will come to God and give their lives for the Kingdom).
The “usual daily wage” ….? The gift of salvation — becoming a member of, belonging to, the Kingdom, reborn as a new child of God, receiving the Holy Spirit living inside, hope-filled for heaven. And it’s pre-paid, given even before the work has begun!
Here are some points that jump out for me from Jesus’ story.
In God’s sight, there is absolute equality in terms of the value of the workers and the work they do. Doesn’t matter when you showed up, how long you’ve been at work: everyone is equal in God’s sight — and must be in yours, too. New to the acolytes? the choir? (we have three new choristers who will be given white cottas today) the parish? the Church? Doesn’t matter, old or new, each one is valued and as valuable as the other.
In God’s invitation, as in the landowner’s, there are no hidden catches or conditions: no fine print. It’s plain, and simple: Everyone available is invited in, and given the full day’s pay and benefits.
What does all this say about God whom we know? Here comes that beautiful adjective once again: God is Generous. Inviting every
one into the vineyard. Forgiving debt. Paying everyone equally. Some may complain: “I deserve more!” In the ways of the world, perhaps yes. But this, brothers and sisters, is the Kingdom of Heaven. It’s God’s world.
As the landowner replied to one of them, 'Friend, did you not agree with me to the terms? I am doing you no wrong. Take what your are given and be thankful. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? I choose to give to these last the same as I give to you. Or are you upset because I am generous?’
I’ve been thinking of generosity a lot recently, because I have been immersed in the Roosevelts. For some months I’ve been working my way (very slowly) through Doris Kearns Goodwin’s monumental (monumentally long) biography of Teddy Roosevelt. And together Kate and I have been watching Ken Burns’s episodic film “The Roosevelts” on public television. I wake up dreaming ”Roosevelts” at night.
The public saga of Teddy Roosevelt began at the end of the nineteenth century when the “barons of industry and finance” as they became barons, J. P. Morgan, John D. Rockefeller, and others, and fabulously rich, they led strangely bifurcated lives. On the one hand, they were generous to the Church* and various charities On the other hand they were absolutely ruthless, unethical and unlawful in their dealings with their employees and small competitive business owners. Other people were the means to their personal wealth, and not considered recipients of blanket generosity. Consolidation of power in mining, oil and the railroads into “trusts” was bought at the price of virtually enslaving, ruining and impoverishing the workers and competitors. Were they generous? In public, at small cost, they could appear to be. In reality, generosity was not a working concept in their real lives. To Teddy’s, Eleanor’s and Franklin’s credit, even though they were born in to that upper class, they saw the immorality, and consistently fought to bust and rein in that power
How different from being “captains of industry” it is to be in Jesus. Pure and simple, through and through: consistent generosity. So that we forgive as we have been forgiven, we are generous as our God has been and is generous to us.
Dave Wadsworth was a vestryman of Trinity Church, Waterbury and in church every Sunday morning. He owned a family business in the south end of Waterbury, a sign-making and truck-lettering business. I knew Dave for about five years before I learned that as a matter of principle, every time there was a job opening in the shop, he first sought to hire a recently released convict who wanted to make a new start in his life, and eventually move into his own business. That’s generosity.
For to live in the Kingdom of heaven is like a merchant who has found a pearl of inestimable value, and goes and sells everything he has so he can obtain that pearl. It is, as Saint Paul wrote to the Philippians, everything:
Philippians 1:21 For to me, living is Christ, and dying is gain. If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me; and (being in Christ) I do not know which I prefer, to be alive, or to die. I am hard pressed between the two: my desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better; but to remain in the flesh is more necessary for you. Since I am convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with all of you for your progress and joy in faith.
So too for us, invited into the vineyard by God, every one of us equals, full wages and benefits provided, called to live in the same generosity with which we have been blessed.
So, go. And let generosity be our hallmark. For that’s how it is to go with God.
* for full disclosure: J.P. Morgan was the prime mover in the establishment of the Clergy Pension Fund of The Episcopal Church.
Sermon Proper 19A, September 14, 2014
Trinity Episcopal Church, Hartford, CT
Marie Alford-Harkey, M.Div.
Matthew 18:21-35
Perhaps you remember the 2006 shooting at an Amish school in Nickle Mines, PA that left 5 Amish girls dead and 5 more wounded. The story in the media quickly became about Amish forgiveness. They said they forgave the killer, Carl Roberts, but they went far beyond words. Amish people comforted the Roberts' family. Amish families nurtured relationships with his parents, and his widow. The book group is reading the book about this event in September. It's called Amish Grace.
Here's what the Roberts' mother recalls. "On the day it happened, Henry, our Amish neighbor up on the hill, whom I call an 'angel in black,' came to our house. My husband [Roberts', the killer's, father] provided transportation for the Amish when they needed to travel by car, and he was just devastated. All day long, my husband couldn’t lift his head. He kept taking a towel and wiping it over his head—he just kept wiping the tears away and couldn’t lift his head up at all. And then Henry came, and he was the first sign of healing for my husband. He put his hand on my husband's shoulder, just stood there and comforted and consoled him for an hour. Henry said, "Roberts, we love you," and just kept affirming and assuring him. The acceptance we have received from the Amish community is beyond any words. To be able to have a community of people that have been hurt so much by what our son did and yet to have them respond to us the way that they have has been an incredible journey." (p. 192)
Amish people attended Carl Roberts' funeral. They donated some of the money that they received from kind people around the world to Roberts' family. The Amish community in Nickle Mines, PA reached out to extend forgiveness in a situation where no one would have expected it and the world was astonished at this reaction. Media stories for months on end focused on "Amish forgiveness."
And yet the book that examines this phenomenon is titled Amish Grace. Here's how the authors define grace and forgiveness.
"Grace, as we use it in this book, is a broad concept that characterizes loving and compassionate responses to others. Forgiveness is a particular form of grace that always involves an offense, an offender, and a victim (in this case, a victimized community). When forgiveness happens, a victim forgoes the right to revenge and commits to overcoming bitter feelings toward the wrongdoer." (p. 151-152).
The book makes the point that the Amish extended the grace of forgiveness not because they are heroic, but because it is woven into the fabric of their lives and of how they practice Christianity. The Amish believe that what they are called to do is emulate Jesus in their actions. That explains a lot of the practices that many of us find strange.
The Old Order Amish, of which the Amish community in Nickel Mines is a part, believe that judicious use of technology, a commitment to non-resistance, mutual aid, and a yielding of one's self for the good of the community and the Christian faith are the ways in which they are called to emulate Jesus.
In emulating Jesus’ forgiveness, the Amish believe that this parable, teaches us everything we need to know about forgiveness. They teach that forgiveness is an ongoing practice. Many of the Amish people interviewed for the book talked about how hard it was to continue to forgive when they remembered what they called "the happening."
The Amish believe that today's parable teaches us that God initiates forgiveness out of God's grace to us, but if we don't do our part and continue to extend forgiveness and grace to one another, the relationship becomes broken.
This is not because God is angry or vindictive, however. Not forgiving, not extending grace, not asking for forgiveness when we need to, allows us to hold on to bitterness and hurt and anger. And those things separate us from a loving God who cannot be angry or bitter or hurt. We aren't asked to forgive one another out of fear that God won’t forgive us or out of duty. We are asked to forgive one another because it's the surest path to the reconciliation of all people to each other and to God. Because it's the surest path to healing and wholeness for ourselves and others. Forgiveness doesn't mean that what someone did was right or that it's ok with us. Forgiveness means that we have decided (and perhaps continue to decide) to allow ourselves to move on from the pain.
I joked that I was going to title this sermon "Don't be a jerk." Because on a day to day basis, when we're not talking about forgiving a monumental wrong, that's what grace and forgiveness look like. "Don't be a jerk."
When I was a high school teacher, the classroom-appropriate way I expressed this was, "Be respectful." I had 5 classroom rules and this was the first one. I always told my students that it didn't just apply to them, but to me as well. I can still remember when I had to apologize to a whole class of students for being a jerk.
I had scolded them like crazy the day before because of their bad behavior with a substitute teacher. I had used phrases that I told them we would never use in my classroom, like "You all know you're supposed to sit down and shut up when a sub is here!" I never, ever allowed my students to say "shut up," and I never said it either. Well, almost never. I raised my voice. I pretty much modeled everything I had told them was NOT respectful.
The next day, the day after that lecture, they came into my classroom, still abashed. I could tell they were trying to sort out whether I was going to continue to be angry. But it had not taken me long after they left my classroom the day before to realize what I had done. And so I began the class by apologizing to them. Their eyes went wide. They were as attentive as I could ever have wished. They were absolutely unnerved by the idea of a teacher apologizing to a class. It was kind of touching, really. So I asked them to forgive me, they mumbled like the embarrassed teenagers they were, and we went on with our lesson.
But I noticed that the apology had made a huge difference in our relationship. They had the power to forgive me or to decide to be bitter and sulky and see me as just another example of an adult who didn’t practice what she preached. Those kids became my most enthusiastic class, and I believe it was because they chose to forgive me. They trusted me, they worked hard for me. They did silly skits and sang silly songs and allowed their teenage cool to be replaced with a spirit of fun and playfulness.
So what I mean by "don't be a jerk," is that we Christians need to practice extending grace and forgiveness to one another, all the time, in things big and small. It changes our relationship with God and with one another when we do. Sometimes, that will mean reconciliation with the person that wronged us. Many times, it won't. But we can choose to let go of a desire for revenge and bitterness, even as we move forward in our lives.
And we can choose to let go of judging one another.
In the activist communities that I'm a part of, we often engage in what my friend Christian calls "spectacular displays of distrust and hostility." He goes on to describe how we do this to each other. "We shoot accusations like arrows from the safety of our Facebook chairs, far enough away to avoid getting splattered with the mess. Simply disagreeing with a person’s ideas or interpretation of an event is immediately labeled as bullying, slander or worse."
This is true in most of our daily lives, isn’t it? It's so easy to criticize other peoples' actions and motives. We often assume the worst about our interactions with another person. We take things personally. We don't even stop to give people the benefit of the doubt, to lead with love, or at least with curiosity. It's almost as if we look for ways to be hurt. This is exactly the opposite of what we are called to do.
Imagine if we tried leading with grace and forgiveness, for the big things and the small ones. And imagine if we tried it not just with other people. What if we tried leading with love and grace and forgiveness toward ourselves as a spiritual practice? Many of us have been brought up to believe that God sees our sins, all the time, and that those sins make God angry, and that God then judges us because God is angry. But what if the reason our sin disrupts our relationship with God is not because God is angry, but because God is perfect love? God sees us as good, so before we even ask, God has forgiven us.
Let that soak in for a minute. Imagine yourself as God sees you: good, cherished, loved to your core. Even the parts of you that you hide from yourself. God’s perfect love you, all of you, in your glorious potential. If you can open yourself up to even consider what that might feel like, then that, my friends, is the grace from which forgiveness flows.
Let’s begin to believe in the deep well of love that God has for us, and then let’s absorb and live in that grace and forgiveness that God extends to us. Then we can naturally extend the same to others. Amen.
Trinity Episcopal Church, Hartford
Year A – 12 Pentecost
August 31, 2014
Matthew 16: 21-28
“True Religion or Stumbling Block?”
It is wonderful and a joy to be back among you here at Trinity Church. During these past three months I have done a lot of travelling, and during that time there has been work, study and to be sure recreation and relaxation time built in. While I realized I am not the best or most consistent “blogger” during my time away, the blogs I posted do give a pretty accurate picture of the types of things I have been up to.
I was prohibited from accessing my office email during my absence – the wardens stopped responding to me while I was messaging them from Wales, and Pam unplugged my computer so I couldn’t access email for the rest of my sabbatical. What I could do to stay in touch with things here at Trinity was to read the weekly email blast that Marie puts out each Wednesday – if you don’t already get it, you should sign up for it. I could also read the weekly sermons – except for George’s because he doesn’t preach from a written text – and so there has been an opportunity to walk with you spiritually by reading the sermons each week as they are posted on our website. A practice that I would commend to all of you when you are away or on those rare occasions when you are unable to attend church on a Sunday.
And so I know that four Sundays ago, Bishop Drew preached a wonderful sermon on how we understand the Kingdom of Heaven; three weeks ago Marie preached on the importance of claiming the ordination that each one of us has from the sacrament of Baptism, and that we live that out by reliving the experience of Jesus’ feeding the 5000 – by presenting what we have to God, allowing God to bless those gifts as God gives them back to us to share with the world; two weeks ago Deacon Bonnie reminded us that Christ is present with us in both the good times and the bad. Just last week Drew challenged us to wrestle with what it means to claim our baptismal covenant by living more fully as a member of the Body of Christ in the world.
As I read those sermons and reflected upon my own experiences over the summer, I am struck by two phrases found in today’s service:
From the Collect of the Day: Increase in us true religion.
From today’s gospel: Jesus words to Peter – Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me.
Now I have to tell you that the Gospel passage that we heard last week and this week is one of my favorites. The very last words of last week’s Gospel passage show Jesus basically anointing St. Peter as the leader of the church He was sent to establish – he even uses the term “rock” to indicate the strength that St. Peter would have. And in that very same encounter between Jesus and his disciples which we continue in this week’s Gospel passage, there is Peter, trying to be faithful but protesting to Jesus that what he has just said can’t be true -- that Jesus can’t be allowed to suffer and die at the hands of the priests and the elders. At which point Jesus turns to the man he has just anointed as his successor and rebukes him with the words, Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.
How can it be that Peter – just a normal working guy like most of who gets thrust into this incredible leadership role – How can it be that within the space of probably 5 minutes Peter goes from being hero to goat, from being the rock on which Jesus will build his church to being a stumbling block for Jesus’ mission that warrants him being equated to the devil?
And when we realize that St. Matthew’s purpose in sharing this story is to make us realize that each of us is in the role of Peter, we have to ask ourselves, How do we – usually unwittingly – turn our best intentions into stumbling blocks? How have we misunderstood Jesus’ purpose? How have we, in our attempts to build up the kingdom of God through the institution of the church, somehow lost our way in furthering God’s mission?
Over the summer, I have worshipped at some 13 different churches, in three different countries, in four different states. Small country churches, suburban churches, inner-city churches. In addition, during my work with Partners for Sacred Places in Chicago, I analyzed the work of some 140 different congregations from all denominations, conducting on site visits and interviews at about 10 of them. Everywhere I went, I discovered people who are earnest in building up a church that furthers the mission of Jesus Christ – clergy and all of the baptized, working hard to keep their churches alive and growing.
What I discovered was virtually universal among the churches I visited: That one’s idea of what the church should be like – of what the Body of Christ should look like – is deeply influenced by our own experiences of church. What we grew up with informs our concept of what church should be like. And so we project our childhood or early adult experiences of church onto what the church should be like in the future. Or – on the opposite side – we stay away from the church of today because we harbor bad memories or horror stories of what we experienced as a young person. In both cases, we limit the future by what we have experienced in the past. In both cases, we limit what might be by what has already been. And in doing that, we shrink the infinite possibility of the divine to the finite, limited reality that is the world.
This is exactly what was happening in the interchange between Jesus and Peter. Jesus was sharing with the disciples his divine vision – what needed to happen for the continuation of his divine work on earth. In Peter, he saw the spark for that leadership. Peter, doing his human best, understood that in terms that he knew – his own vision of what a good outcome would be. And that’s when Jesus brings him up short with the stern admonition, Get behind me Satan1 You are a stumbling block to me.
Peter wasn’t a bad person – Jesus didn’t take back what he said about Peter being the rock. But he did teach Peter a lesson – that the Kingdom of God as it exists on earth is something other than our usual human expectations. And that means that we have to look beyond ourselves and our own experiences when we attempt to discern God’s will for the church of Jesus Christ.
As I have travelled and studied various churches, I have learned at least three related principles:
- That the potential for what a particular church looks like is defined at least in part by the gifts of that particular church: its location, its building (if there is one) and its land, the community which surrounds it, the community that actively participates in it, the gifts – both spiritual and material – of those who support it. As in the parable of the loaves and fishes several weeks ago, you first have to know what your gifts are before you present them to Jesus for a blessing, and then you take those gifts to use them as God directs.
- The reality of what the church becomes is dictated by the dedication with which the leaders of that body -- and all members of that body – are open to the prompting of the Holy Spirit on what to do with those gifts. Unlike the disciples, we don’t have Jesus personally present with us to direct us (“No, YOU feed the 5,000), and so we rely on the prompting of the Holy Spirit for direction on how to use our gifts.
- That as we look and wait for the prompting of the Spirit, we cannot frame that response only within the parameters of what we know. And this is where we typically fall short. Peter couldn’t envision a situation in which Jesus had to suffer and die for God’s work to be done. Similarly, we have to stop limiting our sense of “church” to a model that has its roots in 20th century middle America, understanding that what God has in mind for us may be something different. This is not to throw out the baby with the bathwater – it is simply to recognize that in the Gospels, God is always doing a new thing and calling upon us to refresh existing practices by embracing that new thing. Even Jesus taught in the Temple – he just wanted Temple leadership to pay less attention to the human trappings and more attention to what God was calling them to do.
This is going to be an exciting time for the church, and an exciting time for Trinity. It is a joy to be back with you, and I invite you to join me and all of our leadership as we remove stumbling blocks from Jesus’ path in pursuit of the divine calling to which He invites us. AMEN.
11 Sunday After Pentecost Proper 16, Year A
August 24, 2014
Jesus gathered around him a tight-knit circles of trusted disciples and with them in his travels he went far afield from his homeland. Last week we read in the Gospel of Matthew of his going north, out of the Galilee, and far from Judea, into the region of Tyre and Sidon: Canaanite, Phoenician territory, not Jewish — in what we now know as Lebanon. We know he went into the region of the Ten Cities, the Decapolis, and pagan Greek cities. And this morning, the setting of the Gospel is the region of Caesarea Philippi, another pagan city, this one dedicated to the Roman god Pan.
It was there, in the region of Caesarea Philippi, that the real question of who Jesus was finally came to a head. He asked them, “Who are people saying I am?” “Who do you say I am?” I imagine, as they travelled through these relatively foreign lands, with different cultures, and different major religions, they were peculiar, they stood out, by appearance working class Galileans, by their accent, and most of all, by their aura and message. And I imagine, their being in strange lands, they stuck close together, like mergansers on a lake, the rabbi-Messiah and disciples.
All three lessons this morning, in a sense, are about standing out and sticking close together.
The story of the Hebrews, that specific people, living among the Egyptians, as we read this morning, so clearly different — so much so that they posed a threat to Pharaoh, and he singled the whole class of them out for harsh work and oppression.
And think of the early Christians, scattered here and there across the Roman Empire. Even though they were drawn from all classes and races of people, they were set apart by their dress — that’s where we got these long robes we wear — their developing beliefs and worship, and their habits and customs — like considering one another brother and sister rather than Cappadocian or African, citizen or slave; considering their attachment to Christ Jesus and therefore to one another more important than race or language or clan or even, in some cases, family.
So it was that Paul wrote to the Roman Christians, reinforcing their sense of difference from the rest of the world and their close-stuckness in God and to one another,
“I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters (there’s that phrase), by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a (living) sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed (into the new) by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what the will of God is--what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
He went on, to compare their closeness and what we might call today their interdependence, with an image of the body (the body and its care were important in Greco-Roman culture), which sure enough has very different parts, but all are tightly bound one to another, so that if any one part gets separated, it loses its function, its life.
“We differ according to the gifts of grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.
“Yet, as the body has many members-parts, and not all the members-parts have the same function, so we, who are many,” he wrote to the Romans and also to the Corinthians, “we are one body in Christ, and individually we are members one of another. “
To be a body, a corpus, in Christ, members one of another. Some thoughts.
One. Member-ship is integral to our faith: tied in, together. bound. (e.g., Hebrews in Egypt). What Baptism is all about and why it is so important: it changes the whole place of one in the world, and it forms a ligature, a sinew, grafting us into with Christ, and with each other. A congregation then, is more than a gathering of disparate people, rather a whole, corpus, body. Joined together we all say who Jesus is.
Whether we all rise, or we all stumble, we all are jointly tied together.
Two. every person is necessary, gifted, is part and has a part.
“For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned.”
Our body’s goal: Together to grow up into him who is the head of the body as Paul wrote to the Colossians, again using the body-image, who is Christ. Connected to the head: Brain-body co-ordination. Connection. With leadership: every one of us is called to leadership. So much more than coming to church, or worshipping at Trinity, or making one’s communion. So much more than letting others — the clergy, or staff — run the church. This is you and you and I knit together with the very sinews of new life, each blessed with gifts to exercise in leading the body in its mission and life.
Three. The Body has work to do! to continue and expand the mission begun in Christ Jesus. We are here for the word. And the world. So each part must be working!
How are you working as a blessed member-part joined into the body in Christ and with one another?
Heart and spirit. Imagine the strength, the power, the health, the joy when all parts, bound and attached together, growing up into the head who is Christ, moves with the mind and compassion and generosity that comes in Christ Jesus!
Know that we are called to be joined into Christ, and in that call we are joined, connected in one with each other. That each of us is blessed with divine gifts in Christ, and that with those gifts every one of us is called to exercise leadership.
Much like the Hebrews living among the Egyptians in ancient days, just as Jesus and his band of disciples were strangers in the region of Caesarea Philippi, so we really do live in a world and culture where who we are and what we believe more and more is foreign to so many people.
In the midst of all that, we are called to be a special body cohering in Christ, each of us knit to the other, Pray for the body in Christ, this body of Christ, Trinity Church, members one of another. Get to know the other members of the body. With help if necessary, discern, know and cherish the gifts you are given in Christ. Take up your part. So then, gathered together in unity by the Holy Spirit, as we prayed this morning, knit together in a strange land, may we step out and serve those in need and invite yet others to become members, and work to bring the change of love into the world, all for the sake of God who in Jesus Christ gives such profound new life.
Rev. Bonnie Matthews, Deacon
August 10, 2014
Pentecost 9
Genesis 37:1-4, 12-28; Psalm 105 1-6, 16-22, 45b; Romans 10:5-15; Matthew 14:22-33
Because today’s Gospel from Matthew immediately follows the story of Feeding Five Thousand I feel it is important for me to begin by recalling the Gospel and Marie’s sermon from last week. Marie interpreted this story to be Jesus training the disciples to take up their own ministries.
Please bear with me as I read several lines from her sermon.
“Jesus is training the disciples to take up their own ministries. It starts when he refuses to allow them to send the people away to find food, but instead tells them "You give them something to eat." When they protest, he says, "Bring me what you have." And so they bring him the five loaves and two fish that they have.
After he said the blessing, Jesus didn’t hand the disciples baskets and baskets of bread and fish. He handed back to them exactly what they had given him. He sent them out into that crowd of 5,000 men and countless women and children with five loaves of bread and two fish.
That’s what ministry looks like. Bring me what you have, says Jesus, and I’ll bless you and send you back into the world. But I’m going to make you do the work. You feed the people.”
This reading was an account of a miracle that was inclusive, a miracle for all who had come to hear Jesus as he taught. In all, five thousand men were fed, plus the women and children. And they were fed by the action of one (Jesus) through many (the disciples).
For me, this is why it is so important that we hear the Gospel story of Jesus walking on water today.
The placement of this story leads one to believe that this story happens immediately after five thousand plus have been fed. Jesus sends his disciples to go on ahead by boat to Gennesaret, while he (Jesus) goes off to be alone and to pray.
I imagine that the disciples may be feeling pretty good about being fed and feeding five thousand. Not unlike we as a community feel after we come into the sanctuary of this church, hear the words of Jesus, offer thanks and partake of the body and blood.
When we are fed we are sent. We are sent to go into the world to rejoice in the Holy Spirit. Not unlike the disciples being sent to go ahead to prepare the crowds, we are sent to share our ministries, to be the face of God in a world that is sometimes cruel and mixed up.
But as is wont to happen, while on the boat the seas become rough, the winds pick up and there are waves. It becomes increasingly difficult for the disciples to navigate the seas.
Doesn’t this scenario reflect the troubles we encounter from day to day?
Our attempts to be God in the world may be ignored. We may be ostracized for who we are or what we represent. We may even be having our own difficulties with interpersonal relationships, illness or finances. We see people who are hungry, people who are homeless, people suffering from mental disorders and addictions. We see people who are cruel to one another. We see people turn away trying to avoid the “unpleasant “. We may say or hear where is God in all of this?
In the Gospel story, the disciples see God in the form of Jesus walking on the water before them. This is when fear (doubt) settles in. Are they seeing a ghost, an apparition? This can’t be real.
But it is real. Through invitation, God in the form of Jesus is present to the disciples when he gets into the boat. Maybe even before he gets into the boat.
I believe that this happens today. Many of us encounter God as we walk through life. Sometimes we invite God to be present with us. Sometimes God comes into our midst uninvited.
Think about how we feel when that happens at Trinity. Each Sunday we invite God to be in our midst. We ask to be blessed, We remember and we ask God to be with those who are hurting, or in trouble when we lift them up in our prayers of the people. We celebrate and remember the love that God gave to us through his Son who died for our sins. We are blessed in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Then we are sent. We are sent , just as the disciples were sent on ahead to get in that boat.I wonder what awaits us in that boat. Many of us are healed by the comfort of his presence and the promise of his presence when we leave, just as the disciples were comforted when Jesus got in their boat.
“Do not be afraid, I am with you”
Are we comforted by those words or do we turn from them in disbelief?
This story is also recounted in the Gospels of Mark and John. In both of these books Jesus says It is I do not be afraid. He gets into the boat and the waters calm and there is nothing to fear.
But, Matthew takes the story to a more personal level……
Peter, his beloved, sees Jesus on the water and says, “Jesus, is it you?” “If it is, command me to come to you.” Jesus’ response “Come”.
The Peter who loves Jesus, the Peter who will deny knowing Jesus, the Peter who is referred to as The Rock, the Peter who wants so badly to demonstrate his love for Jesus goes.
He becomes aware of the wind, gets frightened and begins to sink. Peter calls for Jesus to save him. And Jesus does, He questions Peter’s doubt and he reminds Peter that he is of little faith.
Do not confuse little faith with no faith
Making this Gospel story personal, I wonder if I were in that boat on the sea with the wind and I was called would the impulsive Peter in me would go when commandedor would the controlling part of me cause me to hesitate and think about the dangers, think about my fears, think about the consequences of my actions and what the outcome may be. Would my faith sustain me or would my faith falter as Peter’s did? How would you respond to these questions?
I know at the first sign of trouble the fearful Peter in me would and does call for God’s help.
This story is not a story that calls us to remember that God is near and that everything is just fine in the world. This story reminds us that despite the dangers we place ourselves in, despite our short comings, despite disappointment with ourselves or with others, God is with us. Even at times of little faith.
Whenever I hear this story of faith I am reminded of a poem that many of us know. This poem reminds me that God is always with me. God won’t remove me from being troubled or in danger. But, God will be present with me.
The poem is by an unknown author. The version I am about to recite was written by Margaret Fishback Powers in 1964.
I would like you to take a moment to close your eyes, sit back and reflect on a time in your life when you may have been like Peter in today’s Gospel account.
One night I dreamed a dream.
I was walking along the beach with my Lord. Across the dark sky flashed scenes from my life. For each scene, I noticed two sets of footprints in the sand, one belonging to me and one to my Lord.
When the last scene of my life shot before me I looked back at the footprints in the sand. There was only one set of footprints. I realized that this was at the lowest and saddest times of my life. This always bothered me and I questioned the Lord about my dilemma.
"Lord, You told me when I decided to follow You, You would walk and talk with me all the way. But I'm aware that during the most troublesome times of my life there is only one set of footprints. I just don't understand why, when I need You most, You leave me."
He whispered, "My precious child, I love you and will never leave you, never, ever, during your trials and testings. When you saw only one set of footprints, It was then that I carried you."
May we all rejoice in the knowledge that through our joys and our sorrows, through our exhilaration and disappointment, that in faith be it small or large we are blessed by God’s presence.
Let the people say
Amen
Sermon Proper 13A
August 3, 2014
Trinity Episcopal Church, Hartford, CT
Marie Alford-Harkey, M.Div.
Matthew 14:13-21
Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself. But when the crowds heard it, they followed him on foot from the towns. When he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them and cured their sick.
When it was evening, the disciples came to him and said, "This is a deserted place, and the hour is now late; send the crowds away so that they may go into the villages and buy food for themselves." Jesus said to them, "They need not go away; you give them something to eat." They replied, "We have nothing here but five loaves and two fish.” And he said, "Bring them here to me."
Then he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven, and blessed and broke the loaves, and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. And all ate and were filled; and they took up what was left over of the broken pieces, twelve baskets full. And those who ate were about five thousand men, besides women and children.
In the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand there’s an inside story between Jesus and his disciples, and that’s where I want to focus today.
Jesus is training the disciples to take up their own ministries. It starts when he refuses to allow them to send the people away to find food, but instead tells them "You give them something to eat." When they protest, he says, "Bring me what you have." And so they bring him the five loaves and two fish that they have.
After he said the blessing, Jesus didn’t hand the disciples baskets and baskets of bread and fish. He handed back to them exactly what they had given him. He sent them out into that crowd of 5,000 men and countless women and children with five loaves of bread and two fish.
That’s what ministry looks like. Bring me what you have, says Jesus, and I’ll bless you and send you back into the world. But I’m going to make you do the work. You feed the people.
It’s an appropriate message on this weekend after the celebration of the anniversary of women’s ordination in the Episcopal Church. On July 29, 1974, eleven women were "irregularly" ordained to the Episcopal priesthood at the Church of the Advocate in Philadelphia. They came to be known as the
Philadelphia 11.
The Rev. Suzanne Hiatt, one of the Philadelphia 11, said in a speech some 9 years after the fact, "In the prayerbook ordination service according to which I was ordained a priest in July 1974 (remember, this was before the 'new' 1979 prayerbook), the bishop in laying hands on the head of the ordinand recites this formula: 'Take thou authority to execute the office of a Priest in the Church of God, now committed to thee by the imposition of our hands.' ... The bishop does not confer priestly authority but simply tells the ordinand to assume it. The story of the ordination of women priests in the Episcopal Church is a case study of women 'taking' authority..."
Those women got tired of waiting for the church to act, and so they took what they had, it was blessed, and they went about doing the work they had been called to do.
Perhaps you are like me. By the time I showed up at an Episcopal Church, the ordination of women was a given. Or perhaps you’ve been an Episcopalian for a long time, and you remember the ordination of the Philadelphia 11. Perhaps you are young enough that women have been priests in the Episcopal
Church all your life. Perhaps you’re still a little uncomfortable with the idea of a soprano-pitched chanting voice, or painted fingernails around a chalice, or a curvy female body under a cassock or alb.
But all of us, no matter where we are situated in respect to the events July 29, 1974, all of us have been affected by the ordination of women in this church. Thank God.
Earlier this year, when I was at my parents’ house down in Georgia, I came across an essay I wrote when I was a 9th grader. The date on this yellowing sheet of paper is 9-9-80. The title is "What I Want to Do With My Life."
In it, I wrote, "I want to find new ways to reach people for Christ and develop my own teaching ministry." My 14 year old self went on to say that "I want to study Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic," and that I "want to get into theology a little later on, after my beliefs and convictions become stronger." (I wonder who had warned me already about the crisis of faith that is a nearly universal experience for those who study theology.) Finally, I concluded that, "I want to be a really good teacher in some sort of outreach ministry teaching conferences and seminars."
Do you notice what I notice in that old paper? At 14, as a part of a conservative Christian tradition, it did not even cross my mind that I could study theology and become a minister. But I knew that I was called. And I went on to fulfill the call to teach. And by the time that I eventually heeded the call to study theology, because of the Philadelphia 11, I knew that it was possible for a woman, even a lesbian woman, to be a priest in my chosen faith tradition.
Last weekend, April and I went to the celebration that marked this historic anniversary at the Church of the Advocate. While April and I both love a good church party, I am usually the one who wants to go to diocesan convention, or General Convention, or a mission conference, or a listening session. But this was April’s idea. She was the one who reminded me that we stand on the shoulders of the Philadelphia 11, who took their authority as priests 40 years ago.
It was a joyous weekend, filled with the fun of greeting friends old and new, honoring how far women have come in the church, and recognizing how far we have to go in reaching the goal of equality for all people in the institutional structures of the Episcopal Church.
I got to meet and talk to one of my sheroes, the Rev. Carter Heyward, Ph.D., who was one of the Philadelphia 11 and a professor at Episcopal Divinity School (where April and I both went to seminary) from 1975 until her retirement in 2006. My smile (and Carter’s) in the picture that April took of us testifies to my excitement at that meeting.
Dr. Fredrica Harris Thompsett, another EDS professor and a noted Anglican church historian and theologian gave the keynote address at the symposium. She challenged us to live truly into the "embodied nature of Anglican theology" that emphasizes the goodness of all creation and the dwelling of the incarnate Christ in us and us in him. All people, she said, must claim their bodies "as sacred vehicles of spiritual authority."
And this is one reason why I say that all of us here have been affected by the ordination of women in the Episcopal Church. Every Sunday, we gather as diverse people who make up the whole body of Christ, and celebrate the Eucharist together. Just here in this community, we are old and young and in
between, we have light brown, dark brown, or rosy pink skin, we are lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender, we are born in this country and not born in this country. Our bodies vary by size, shape, and ability. The fact that those who preside at our celebration of the Eucharist, our priests, can also represent that beautiful diversity is of great theological significance, and it would not be true had not those 11 women "taken their authority."
The women who took their priestly authority, like Carter Heyward and Suzanne Hiatt, were unabashed feminists. They made no apologies for their hope that rather than the institution changing women to serve its ends, women could help the institution continue to renew itself by becoming less clergy-centered and less hierarchical. Our "new" prayer book of 1979 was meant to further this aim by reminding us that baptism is our first ordination.
Our catechism, which is much older, teaches us that "The ministers of the Church are lay persons, bishops, priests, and deacons." All Christians are ordained by God in Christ through baptism to carry out God’s mission in the world. We are all called to take what we have to Jesus, have it blessed, and
then go out into the world to do our ministry.
So today, I invite you to reflect on your own ordination as a minister of the gospel of Christ. What do you have that you can bring to Jesus to be blessed? How will you claim your authority as an ordained person?
The Rt. Rev. Andrew Smith
Trinity Hartford July 27, 2017
7th after Pentecost, A: Proper 12
"The Problem with 'The Kingdom of Heaven'"
Jesus said, ”The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and then covered over; then in his joy he goes and sells everything that he owns and buys the whole field.
“The Kingdom of Heaven.” This is a biblical phrase used in the Bible only in the Gospel of Matthew. And as every Bible commentator would point out, it is “the kingdom of heaven” that is the center, the focus, the heart of Jesus’s proclamation and teaching. It’s what he came to be about.
Here’s the problem for us, today. Two problems, actually. Kingdom And heaven.
The first is, even though we have this word “kingdom” and we regularly pray for it, “thy kingdom come,” we have little or no experience of what a “kingdom” really is.
Last time folks in this land lived under a king was in 1776, three hundred thirty-eight years ago, and that king was an ocean away. From the earliest days, including in the Biblical writings, the absolute power of kings — life and death — was absolute and to be feared. Laban exercised ultimate authority over his household and clan. Even the claim of Paul in the Epistle is based on portraying a royal court, with the Spirit and Christ interceding with God on behalf of the saints. As the king went, in victory or defeat, so did the people. Further, in Scripture and in the Western tradition, including England, that kingly authority was held to be a divine right; if one stood against the king, not only did one challenge the king’s power, but also God, and the divine order.
These days, in those countries which do have a king (or queen) — (notice that in Scripture all authority is masculine, which creates yet another problem for us today, especially as we observe the fortieth anniversary of the ordination of women as priests [finally] in The Episcopal Church) — the power and authority of those monarchs (a word which means one ruler over everyone) is severely limited, by the presence of democratically elected assemblies.
So it’s hard for us to know about kings, or lords, except perhaps as we read, or witness totalitarianism or the actions of radical, extremist groups today, how the life of a nation or a people, and the lives of individuals, subjects of the king, were held in the balance by the authority of one person.
Imagine one person, with absolute control for better or worse, for life or death, over a whole people, over your life. That is so far beyond our ken.
The other problem with the phrase “kingdom of heaven” is that we don’t know all that much about heaven. We each may have our private visions, and some may not think much of “heaven” at all, but as Paul wrote, at best we can perceive heaven as if we’re peering through a darkened, frosted window — with perhaps a few glimpses of the place here and there, but certainly not the whole picture.
If we can’t say much about heaven, then can we can look to the other Gospels, and the rest of the New Testament, where, by and large, the key phrase for Jesus’ central proclamation is “The kingdom of God?” Again, that’s not all that much objective help — for isn’t God another, greater mystery?
What then shall we do, if the central message of Jesus, or at least its tag-line, “kingdom of heaven, kingdom of God,” refers to a system (kingdom) in which we do not live (and I suspect would not accept,?) and with a place/time/person (Heaven, God) about whom we don’t have a whole lot of factual information? How shall we understand — and preach — the Kingdom of heaven?
I heard one answer to that question one summer some years ago in the village church in San Carlos de Arsenal, in far north Costa Rica. It was a hot! Sunday morning. We had travelled there in a minivan with our Costa Rican host family to the sugar cane fields for the wedding of Marielos, the niece of our Mama Tica (Costa Rican “mother”). It was Sunday mass, and since we were near the border, there were a number of Nicaraguans in church who had crossed over to work the sugar cane. As I listened to the sermon in Spanish, I became aware that the priest was preaching mainly to the Nicaraguenses. Telling them how blessed they were to be in Costa Rica. My eyebrows went up. I leaned over to whisper to Cecelia, “Is he saying what I think he’s saying?” A devout Catholic, she scowled and curtly replied, “Si.” He was telling them flatly that Costa Rica was the Kingdom of heaven.
Outrageous? Don’t the Jehovah’s Witnesses call their buildings, Kingdom Hall? Isn’t it a tenet of Roman Catholicism, and maybe other churches, that to be a member and only there is to be in the Kingdom? Haven’t there been groups that have separated themselves and gone off to create the Kingdom on their own? Or taken people by force: the Crusades, the recently proclaimed Islamic caliphate?
Jesus warned us about that, when he said, Beware: when some say, look it is here, or lo, it is there (Mark 13:21).” What shall we say?
First, to remember, as in today’s teachings, Jesus taught in images. Even “Kingdom of Heaven” itself is an image.
"The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in his field; it is the smallest of all the seeds, but when it has grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.”
God is planting something new that might seem really tiny, — among the disciples — now in us — but look how it shall grow!
"The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed in with three measures of flour until all of it was leavened.”
It is something that will infuse and change the world.
"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.”
What God has offered for those who seek the best is something so valuable that it’s worth giving up everything else one owns to possess it.
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and hid; then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”
Can we use images that are contemporary? Could we say that the kingdom of heaven is like a mother whose family lives surrounded by violence who sees in a far country a better life for her children and pays an exorbitant amount for the chance that her children can go there?
Further, about the Kingdom of heaven, there is more to come: a time, who knows? "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and caught fish of every kind; when it was full, they drew it ashore, sat down, and put the good into baskets but threw out the bad. So it will be at the end of the age.”
And Jesus said, "Have you understood all this?" They answered, “Yes.” Good for them!
But have we understood this? Well, perhaps a little bit. We know that we are called into an enterprise which is monumental, cosmic, involving all creation, in a new relationship through Christ with God as monarch that is far different from the “what a friend we have in Jesus” sentiment, a growing thing whose seeds have been planted in the world and in us by the life, teaching, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and that it is a thing of more value than anything else we can possess or imagine. And there’s more to come.
If you like things nailed down, made clear and definite, this must be tough. If you hate the archaic, patriarchal image, “kingdom,” well, it’s what we’ve been given, and I haven’t found anything to replace it. Realm? Perhaps. One thing always to remember: the reality is God’s. It is not from us. By grace we may be called to be part, but, as we admit in prayer, the kingdom, the power, the glory are God’s, God’s alone.
So, ”The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which someone found and then covered over; then in his joy he goes and sells everything that he owns and buys the whole field.
It is good news, this Kingdom of heaven, even if the proclamation is based on language outside our experience or in language we don’t use or want to use today. Good news. A gift. Search for it, give up what you need to to get it, live under God’s rule and guidance, let the kingdom grow in you, spread it and mix it into the world, and pray and look for kingdom come.
Our life’s joy.
5 after Pentecost
Proper 10 Year A July 13, 2014
Trinity Hartford
The Rt. Rev. Andrew Smith
This year Kate and I ordered three cubic yards of topsoil for the gardens around the house. The past several years we ordered compost, rich decayed vegetable mixture, but this year I thought it was time to mix in topsoil. Three cubic yards of the stuff, which wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow we spread in the flower gardens at the mailbox, around the underground utility boxes, in the front and around the sides of the house.
We live in a neighborhood whose developer, our neighbors have told us, cut down the trees and scraped and sold off the original topsoil which had been built up over the years by dairy farming. What is left is what other people would call subsoil: hard inorganic orange stuff. Lawns are supported by chemicals and water. Even the roots of the modest starter trees that were planted are raised above the lawn surface. Hard for anything to take root and flourish.
Jesus knew about how hard it can be for things to grow.
13:3 And he told them many things in parables, saying: "Listen! A sower went out to sow. 13:4 And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up. 13:5 Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and they sprang up quickly, since they had no depth of soil. 13:6 But when the sun rose, they were scorched; and since they had no root, they withered away. 13:7 Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. 13:8 Other seeds fell on good soil and brought forth grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. 13:9 Let anyone with ears listen!”
How often have we heard this image from Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew? Pretty famous one.
We can have two reactions to Jesus’s metaphor of soil in which seeds are planted. One is, oh well, isn’t that the way of the world? Some people are open, some people are a flash in the pan, for some nothing can get through. Jacob and Esau were born to fight. That’s just how people are.
The second, and this is a huge temptation, is to apply the categories — he’s hard-headed; she has no depth, he’s weighed down with so many worries, etc. — to apply those categories to others, without thinking much about how they apply to oneself.
So here are two suggestions.
First, let’s not think of the metaphoric types of soil in Jesus’s image as static, unchangeable “givens” in human nature. Jesus knew that even poor soil can be worked, to be made productive.
For instance, remember the other plant image Jesus used, in Luke, of the fig tree that for years wasn’t bearing fruit, and how the gardener pleaded with the orchard owner, “Let me dig round it and manure it; it may be that the tree will bear fruit next year.” And how the owner said, OK.
In fact, a central hope in Christianity for all people is for change, newness of life, blossoming, productivity; isn’t that what new birth and conversion are all about? Think of Paul, whose Epistle to the Romans we have been reading, and the enormous conversion that God worked in him. A whole new life, whose sole purpose was to publish the glory, love and mercy of God in Christ Jesus.
The second suggestion is: this teaching is not about human nature, or about someone else: let this be a teaching for you. Not a family member, or a co-worker, or a neighbor, but for you!
With those two suggestions in mind, let’s take a second look at the “parable” of the seed planted in the soils. The soils can be improved, enriched. And this means you. And me.
Just as Kate and I bring in compost and topsoil, and work it into the hardpan soil around our house, and sprinkle Preen to help keep the weeds down and Mole Max to repel the pests that would eat the roots, so our garden can be richer and grow healthier plants, brighter more numerous blossoms, for their sheer God-given beauty and for a delight and blessing for others, in the same way, no matter whether you, or I, (remember, this is about you, and me) are hard-packed dirt or shallow rocky soil or a patch choked with thorns, or maybe even passably nourishing soil, we can be worked, enriched, to produce fruit, fruit and blossoms, that are better.
What then are the ingredients that we can mix into the “who” we already are to enrich us to be even more fruitful, in God?
Ingredients. Here are three. (Taking notes?)
Reading. Reading implants newness into our minds and hearts. Above all else, read Scriptures. Read and read and re-read in the Bible. Let the stories of God and the phrases and the songs, and the import — what the Scriptures really are about — be turned deep inside you. I am always amazed how stuff of the Bible can form and shape, overtly and intuitively, our lives. Far beyond proof texts, maxims, and sound bytes, but enriching with deep wisdom, insight, knowledge, understanding.
Read about the world too, newspapers, blogs, books, non-fiction and fiction. Read and read. Helps to loosen up and turn over your mind and heart and make them more fertile.
2. And this may seem strange to say: Thinking. Think about God and the world. It’s funny: like Mary of Bethany, we think and worry about so many things, and yet Martha has the better part, just sitting with Jesus. Ponder. Wonder. Ask questions. Meditate regularly. Remember the stories, Sing the hymns. Pray prayers. As Paul said to the Romans,
Those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 8:6 To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. You are in the Spirit, since the Spirit of God dwells in you. 8:11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit that dwells in you.
3. Engaging. Engage actively with others. No, you can’t be a Christian with depth and richness alone in the woods or on the golf course. We have to be vitally connected with one another, as Paul says like parts of the body. One of the geniuses of the Anglican Communion is that we are expected, nay, forced, to engage one another in matters of life and faith. Ministry. Godly conversations. Every one of us should be in Adult Forums of at least one kind, or another. Get in there with others of faith or no faith. Work together for relief and justice.
Connect with a Spiritual Director, or Spiritual Advisor — better yet, connect with a person who can in God be a what I will call a Spiritual Challenger, who will dig deep and turn the soil and add to the mix that is you, and churn it over, so that you may produce even more beauty, more fruit.
Sure we are all different kinds of soil, as Jesus said. And in God, as the gardener works soil, we can be worked, enriched, added to, re-formed. Read things holy and secular. Think on God and the world. Engage with God’s people.
All so that the soil that is you and I can be enriched, the weeds kept down, the pests kept away, that the seeds which God the sower plants in us may find very good soil in which to take root and grow, and, picture it, newness of life, as we each and together become a garden beautiful and productive, pleasing to God and a blessing to the world.
Tend the garden!
