What Not to Wear to the Cedarcrest Prom

This blog post is based on my sermon from March 24, 2019.

(thank you to Sue Kravits for the meme)

Then Jesus said to him, "Someone gave a great dinner and invited many. At the time for the dinner he sent his slave to say to those who had been invited, 'Come; for everything is ready now.' But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, 'I have bought a piece of land, and I must go out and see it; please accept my regrets.' Another said, 'I have bought five yokes of oxen, and I am going to try them out; please accept my regrets.' Another said, 'I have just been married, and therefore I cannot come.' So the slave returned and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and said to his slave, 'Go out at once into the streets ad lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.' And the slave said, 'Sir, what you have ordered has been done, and there is still room.' Then the master said to the slave, 'Go out into the roads and lanes, and compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled. For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.'"

--Luke 14:16-24

Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. Again, he sent other slaves, saying, 'Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.' But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized his slaves, mistreated them, and killed them. The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. Then he said to his slaves, 'The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.' Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so, the wedding hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, and he said to him, 'Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?' And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, 'Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' For many are called, but few are chosen."

--Matthew 22:1-14

Now that's a very different version of the parable from the one that we heard in Luke!

In Luke's version, someone gives a great dinner, but all the invited guests have excuses for why they can't come. The house owner then tells his servant to go out into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame. The servant reports back that what the house owner had ordered was done and that there is still more room at the banquet. So the house owner told him to go out into the roads and lanes and compel people to come, so that the house would be full. Finally, the house owner, with a seemingly surly reply, declares that none of the original invited guests will taste the dinner. That's Luke's version of the parable.

Parable of the Great Supper, illustrated by Harold Copping (1863-1932)

"Go out into the roads and lanes, and compel people to come!"

In Matthew's version of the parable people actually die! A king gives a wedding banquet for his sons. When the king's slaves go out to spread the word, some of them are mistreated and killed. Then the king sends his troops to destroy the murderers and burn their city. Somehow a spurned banquet invitation leads to all-out war. I prefer Luke's version of the parable, where the house owner simply says to the no-shows, "Well, no dinner for you!"

I'm troubled by the gratuitous violence in Matthew's parable, but I don't believe that Matthew is advocating violence. The last thing we need is for a parable to advocate violence, particularly after what happened a little over a week ago in Christchurch, New Zealand! We do NOT need a religious text that seemingly advocates violence in the name of religion!

Instead of advocating violence, I believe that the Gospel writer Matthew was most likely reporting violence that had already happened. Most scholars believe that Matthew was writing to Christians who lived in Syria between the years 80 and 90 of the Common Era. To them the reference to the destroyed city would have evoked memories of the destruction of Jerusalem in the year 70. The earlier mistreatment and murder of the slaves would have been heard as a reference to Israel's rejection of the prophets. And the members of Matthew's church would have recognized themselves as the last-minute replacement guests assembled in the great wedding hall (insights from Thomas G. Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion Series, pp. 246-247).

If we put ourselves in the place of these last-minute replacement guests, then the parable, far from advocating violence, becomes a motivational lesson about living faithfully, even in times of violence and persecution.

Because of the times in which we live, there is an urgency about our faith. There is a compelling motivation to take our faith seriously enough to dress the part!

Look at the interaction in the parable between the king and someone who failed to dress the part.

When the king notices that one guest in particular is not wearing a wedding robe, the king says, "Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?"

This is another difference between Luke and Matthew. In the Gospel of Luke, the word "friend" has a positive connotation, but in the Gospel of Matthew it has a negative connotation and really means something more like "buster" (see Long, p. 247). Thus, the king is saying, in essence, "Hey, buster, where's your tux?" The guest is speechless, and the king orders him to be thrown into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, which is an ancient Jewish way of saying that his life will unfold in endless tragedy.

Endless tragedy? Simply for forgetting to wear a tux? Why does Jesus make such a big to-do about wearing the proper attire?

If we were to survey the full scope of the Bible, we would notice an interesting preoccupation with with what we wear. In the words of one preacher, the Bible begins with God dressing Adam and Eve in the Garden, and it ends with the saints being given white robes to wear in the New Jerusalem. In between there is Paul's reminder to the Galatians that "as many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ." Likewise, the Christians in Colossae, in a passage that is often quoted at weddings, are told to clothe themselves with "compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience" (insight from Bob Dunham, in a sermon preached at University Presbyterian Church, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, October 9, 2011).

Thus, it shouldn't be surprising that the Gospel writer Matthew also has a keen interest in what we wear. In our parable, the wedding robe itself represents the Christian life. In the words of preacher and scholar Tom Long, the parable reminds us with urgency that being a part of the Christian community should make a discernible difference in who we are and how we live . . .

There should be a sense of awe and responsiveness about . . . belonging to the community of Christ . . . Sure, the spotlighted guest in the parable was [whisked away] from the street unexpectedly and was probably wearing cutoffs and [sneakers], but, when he got inside, only a fool would fail to see the difference between what he wore and where he was. He was in the banquet hall of the king; he was at the wedding feast of the royal son . . . He is the recipient of massive grace. Where is his awe? Where is his wonder? Where is his regard for generosity? [The other guests have quietly traded] their street clothes for the garments of worship and celebration, but there he is bellying up to the punch bowl, stuffing his mouth with fig preserves, and wiping his hands on his T-shirt. When the host demands to know where his wedding garment is, the man is speechless, and well he should be. In his self-absorption, he [hadn't fully realized] until that very moment that he was at a wedding banquet at all! Just so, to come into the church in response to the gracious and unmerited invitation of Christ and then not conform one's life to that mercy is to demonstrate a spiritual narcissism so profound that one cannot tell the difference between the wedding feast of the Lamb of God and happy hour in a bus station bar (Long, pp. 247-248).

Many commentators have suggested that a guest at an ancient Mediterranean wedding would have been provided with a robe to wear, which perhaps explain the rage of the king upon discovering that this man had casually tossed his wedding robe onto a bar stool while taking advantage of the free booze.

For me, I'll admit that it makes the ending of the parable easier to swallow if the wayward guest had been given a robe to wear and then simply refused to wear it.

But part of me wonders that even if he hadn't been provided with a robe, wouldn't his awe and gratitude at being invited to the royal wedding have bee enough to motivate him to procure a robe? Wouldn't his thankfulness have been enough to spur him to new levels of ingenuity and creativity?

For most of my ministry, I have preached a gospel of gracious inclusion. All people are invited to the feast. God loves and cares for each one of us. In response the church is called to go out into the streets and invite still more people to come, because there is plenty of room in the banquet hall. And for those of you who need to hear that message this morning, I pray that is the message you will hear.

But for those of us who have heard that message, for those of us who have responded to the invitation and find ourselves assembled in the great wedding hall, there is another message--namely, that if we truly comprehend what a marvelous thing it is to be included in the family of God, then it will motivate us to take our faith seriously enough to dress the part!

The gospel message is "come as you are" not "come as you were." Grace is free, but it isn't cheap.

We have all been invited to the $500,000 per plate dinner that we could have never afforded on our own. The creative challenge before us is to figure out how to dress. Even if the tuxes and gowns are not passed out as we walk through the door, surely we have enough ingenuity to figure out how to dress to the nines anyway.

Surely, we have enough awe and gratitude to help each other grow in our generosity, to help each other grow in our spiritual disciplines. And in the midst of the violence in our world, it is all the more crucial that we dress the part, that we look and sound like peacemakers and seekers of justice.

In Keene, New Hampshire, there is a facility named Cedarcrest that provides round-the-clock treatment for children with severe mental and developmental disabilities. Most families are too overwhelmed to provide that level of twenty-four hour care at home.

One Saturday I was making a pastoral visit to Cedarcrest with a family from the congregation I once served in Vermont, and I noticed that all along the walls of the front hallway were pictures of the Cedarcrest children in evening gowns and tuxedos.

One 12-year-old boy had a jacket and tails draped over the back of his highly specialized wheelchair.

Another photo showed a toddler wearing an absolutely stunning sequined dress.

I asked one of the staff members about the photographs, and she told me that they were photos from the Cedarcrest Prom. I remarked how the staff must have spent hours and hours custom fitting the formal wear and painstakingly dressing each child, not to mention all the other preparations for the prom.

And she smiled and nodded her head in a way that indicated that all of those hours of work had been a labor of love.

If you are ever invited to the Cedarcrest Prom, you wouldn't dare show up in a T-shirt and jeans!

The View from the Back of the Line

This blog post is based on my sermon from March 10, 2019.

For the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard. After agreeing with the laborers for the usual 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. When he went out again about noon and about three o'clock, he did the same. And about five o'clock he went out and found others standing around; and said to them, "Why are you standing idle all day?" They said to him, "Because no one has hired us." He said to them, "You also go into the vineyard." 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 when they received it, they grumbled against the landowner, saying, "These last worked only one hour, and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the day and the scorching heat. But he replied to one of them, "Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you not agree for the usual daily wage? Take what belongs to you and go; I choose to give to this last the same as I give to you. Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?" So the last will be first, and the first will be last.

--Matthew 20:1-16, New Revised Standard Version

 (with thanks to Sue Kravits for the meme)

If you're a fan of the filmmaker John Sayles, then you surely know the movie "Matewan," which was about the attempt to unionize coal miners in Matewan, West Virginia in 1920. The film is narrated by fifteen-year-old Danny Radnor. At this young age Danny is already a coal miner, and he's a part-time Baptist preacher. From time to time he preaches at both of the Baptist churches in his small town: the Hard Shell Baptist and the Soft Shell Baptist. 

One night Danny is preaching at the Hard Shell Baptist Church. He reads the same parable that we just read, the Parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard. Now, by way of background you should know that Danny's father was killed in a mining accident, and Danny is hoping that the coal miners in his town will be able to get the union so that they can press for safer practices and better pay. However, the pastor of the Hard Shell Baptist Church (played by John Sayles in cameo) believes that the union organizers are all communists and agents of Satan!

In this particular scene Danny reads the parable from the pulpit while the Hard Shell pastor sits in the chancel and looks over Danny's shoulder. Danny finishes reading the parable, and then he says, "Now, it's clear from this parable that Jesus ain't heard nothin' about the union! Cuz if he had, he'd of changed his tune! He'd say everyone should get the same dollar for the same work!" And that's about as far as Danny got with his sermon before the Hard Shell pastor chased him out of the pulpit!

When we hear this parable, we're tempted to think that there are all kinds of things that Jesus ain't heard nothing about.

Has Jesus ever been to college, for instance? Apparently Jesus doesn't understand that if you're taking a university-level course that you simply cannot ditch class the entire semester, fail to turn in any work whatsoever, play hooky on the day of the midterm, and then show up on the last day of classes and announce that you'd like full credit for the course! That's not how it works.

Also, Jesus apparently has never stood in line at King Kone on a summer's evening. That bit about the "last will be first, and the first will be last" is never going to play well with those at the front of the line who have already been waiting patiently for their ice cream.

Perhaps the cruelest part of the parable is when those who were hired first were made to wait at the end of the line to get their pay. They had bargained for the usual daily wage--a "denarius" in the Greek--in other words, just enough money to provide for their needs for that one day. They watch as the others get paid, and they see that those who were hired last, who only worked one hour, also got the full, usual daily wage--a denarius. And then they brighten up, because all of a sudden, it's no longer a denarius for a day's work; it's now one denarius per hour! Thus, those who have worked the full twelve-hour day can now expect to be paid twelve denarii! (Barbara Brown Taylor imagines a similar scene in her sermon titled, "Beginning at the End").

Automatically, they start calculating everything that twelve denarii will buy. Some of them are planning vacations. Others, who are more prudent, are planning on how they can pay off their credit cards and medical bills. Maybe they'll even have a little left over to put into savings. And, of course, before they even reach the manager and receive their paycheck, those twelve denarii have already been spent! Imagine their profound disappointment when they, too, only receive the usual daily wage. Yes, it was what they bargained for. But it's fundamentally unfair that those who worked only one hour would get paid the same as those who worked three, six, nine, or twelve hours.

Later, when the vineyard owner asks, "Are you envious because I am generous?" The answer is "You bet we are!" That's the PG-rated answer at any rate. It's probably not appropriate for me to quote the profanity-laced answer, but who wouldn't be tempted to swear at an employer who pulled such shenanigans!?

Are you envious because I am generous? You bet we are. Of course, we are!

Perhaps it is the inherent unfairness that upsets us the most. Like Danny Radnor, we believe that every worker should get the same dollar for the same amount of work.

Others of us may be okay with the unfairness, as long as we are the beneficiaries of the unfair practices. We might not want to admit that out loud, but, as Calvinists, we shouldn't be surprised either!

Have you ever seen that bumper sticker: "Jesus loves you, but I'm his favorite"? Yes, if there is going to be a favored group, then most of us would prefer to be in that favored group.

Some of you may recall the Academy-award winning film "Amadeus." It was based on Peter Shaffer's play of the same name. The action of the play centers on the bitter, intense rivalry between Antonio Salieri, an 18th century Italian composer who was living in Vienna, and his nemesis, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. As Salieri tells us, Salieri himself was a virtuous, hard-working man. From his boyhood Salieri only wanted to compose music. As a teenage, Salieri slipped into a church and made a bargain with God; he would write God glorious music, and God would grant him fame and fortune in return. As the play begins, it would appear that both Salieri and God have kept their respective ends of the bargain. Salieri is writing church music, and he has indeed become a succesful and admired composer.

Then we meet Mozart, who as a child prodigy had composed his first symphony at the age of five. In the play Mozart is portrayed as a vulgar, notorious womanizer, who is also tactless, arrogant, rude, irreverent, and musically talented beyond imagination.

Salieri has worked hard to compose beautiful music, but Mozart does so effortlessly. The music flows from Mozart as if by grace. Salieri himself believes that Mozart's music flows directly from God, that Mozart is indeed Amadeus, a name that means "beloved of God." Yes, it's true that Salieri received the acclaim he had bargained for, but nothing near the fame and renown that Mozart would enjoy.

Are you envious because I am generous? Well, yes, if you're name is Salieri, you most certainly are! We can imagine Salieri standing at the back of the line, stewing in bitterness.

The way that Jesus teaches the parable forces the listeners to imagine themselves at the end of the line as well. All of us watch together as those who worked less hours than we did get paid the same exact wage that we were promised.

My friend and mentor Patrick Willson, a retired Presbyterian pastor, speculates that Jesus told the parable this way because Jesus wants us to view the action from the back of the line, so that we can see what is happening with everyone else. (see comments by Patrick J. Willson in Feasting on the Gospels. I am also indebted to Patrick for the reference to Peter Shaffer's play "Amadeus").

We all have a tendency to be too wrapped up in ourselves, to see everything that we receive as something we're entitled to. This is true even in the church, even among those of us who ought to know that we have received we have received through mercy and not merit. But even in the church we often look through the lens of entitlement. In one of the churches I served there was a dear saint of the church who had been a part of that congregation for forty years, and one day she confided in me that she still felt like the new kid on the block. With seniority comes entitlement, those of us who have stood around a little longer, who have been in this line a little or even a lot longer, expect more.

But as we watch from the end of the line as everyone else gets paid first, when we have honest conversations with one another, we can begin to see the goodness and mercy of God toward others.

That question, are you envious because I am generous, could be translated, "Is your eye evil because I am good?" Earlier in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus has said that the eye is the lamp of the body. We know, of course, that our eyes are receptors of light, which falls on the retina, which sends signals to the brain via the optic nerve, and then the brain interprets what the eyes see. But in the ancient world, in Jesus' day, the eye was understood to be a lamp that emits light. Thus, what you would see would depend entirely on what was already inside of you. (see comments by Thomas G. Long in Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion series).

"The eye is the lamp of the body"

Oil lamp typical of the first century.

To the extent that you are full of bitterness, you will see people and situations that make you feel even more bitter.

To the extent that you are full of gratitude, you will see people and situations that make you feel even more grateful.

So, what do we see from our vantage point at the end of the line? Perhaps we still see the fundamental unfairness of paying everyone the same wage for different amounts of work. But, if we look carefully from our vantage point, we can see signs of God's goodness and mercy.

We might see, for instance, that some of those who worked only one hour had spent the entire day in the marketplace worried sick that no had hired them. The twelve-hour workers were quick to point out that they had worked all that time in the hot sun, but which is worse?: to toil the entire time in the vineyard knowing that you're assured the usual daily wage at the end, or to spend the entire day in the marketplace, also under a hot sun, fretting that you won't find any work and won't have any pay at the end of the day? And if you had spent most of the day in the marketplace, imagine your relief when someone finally does hire you for that last hour, and to your utter amazement, you end up receiving the full, usual daily wage, which you desperately need to provide for your family. Surely, that would be an example of God's goodness and mercy.

Yet from our vantage point at the end of the line we might also see that some of the others who were hred last had indeed fritted the whole day away and didn't show up at the marketplace until the very last minute. In that instance we might insist that they don't deserve the full daily wage, but from our vantage point we can see other situations in which people have received mercy that they did not deserve. And if we look especially carefully, we will see how we ourselves have received mercies that we did not deserve.

If we begrudge others the mercies they have received which they did not deserve, then what should we say about the mercies that we have received which we did not deserve?

Preacher and writer Tom Long has a wonderful image that helped me unlock the riddle of this parable. Imagine that you, along with everyone else, are standing in a downpour, getting utterly drenched in God's mercy. Rivers of peace are flowing down your cheeks and everyone else's cheeks as well. Do you then complain that you're not getting your fair share of the rain? (from Thomas G. Long's Matthew commentary).

A friend of mine went to a very competitive medical school. The air was thick with spirit of competition. One day, as it neared the time that residencies would be announced and the anxiety about how everyone measured up seemed particularly acute, one of their professors interrupted his own lecture, looked out over the class, and asked, "Do you know what they call the person who graduates dead last in this program?"

"Doctor!"

Well, what do you suppose they call the person who is dead last in the kingdom of heaven?

A beloved child of God.

All glory and praise be to our God. Amen.

Daydreaming During Communion

This blog post is based on my sermon from March 3, 2019, which was titled, "Daydreaming During Communion."

This is all that's showing of the sermon title after Sunday night's snowfall. 

Katonah, NY, morning of Monday, March 4, 2019

Six days later, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, "Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah." While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said, "This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him!" When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome with fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, "Get up and do not be afraid." And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.                                       --Matthew 17:1-8, New Revised Standard Version

I have an honest, soul-searching question for you. Have you ever daydreamed during communion?

I'll answer that question honestly. There have been moments when I've been sitting in that chair in the chancel, doing my best to think devotional thoughts, and then the next thing I know I'm in the mountains, sitting on an Adirondack chair, and I can see four figures in the distance. Are they lost hikers, perhaps? And then I realize that those four figures are the four elders who have been serving communion to the congregation, and they are standing at the back of the sanctuary, looking at me expectantly and most likely wondering why I haven't given them the signal to come forward yet.

Perhaps you've had moments like that. You're seated in your chair, doing your best to think devotional thoughts, but you end up wondering whether you remembered to make those brunch reservations, or you're wondering if your dentist appointment is tomorrow or the next day, or perhaps you've opened the wardrobe door to peek into Narnia, and then suddenly you look around to your left and to the right, and standing on opposite ends of your row are Moses and Elijah themselves, waiting for you to hurry up already and take a piece of bread and pass the tray.

(thank you to Sue Kravits for the meme)

When I was young I was warned of the consequences of daydreaming during communion. My grandmother would quote 1 Corinthians 11:29 in the King James Version: "For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself." 

That was a frightening verse to a ten-year-old, and it quite literally scared the hell into me. Years later I learned that the Apostle Paul was actually speaking of those who indulged in the Lord's Supper while excluding others. 

Nowadays I have an entirely different take on daydreaming during communion. Now I believe that our daydreams and visions help us to understand that there is always so much more to communion than what we can observe with our eyes or taste with our tongues.

My friend and mentor Roland Perdue is a retired Presbyterian pastor, a gifted preacher, and a wonderful storyteller. He tells the story of walking by the church his family attended when he was in high school in College Park, Georgia. The door to the church was open--an unusual occurrence on a Friday afternoon. Roland started up the steps to close the door, but something caught his eye. He walked into the sanctuary and noticed that the communion table was completely bathed in red. Roland said it looked as if all the communions ever celebrated in that sanctuary had been gathered up and poured over the table, splattered on the legs, and splashed on the floors and the walls. Roland thought of the connection between the red colors of communion and the life of a man from the past, dying for him, rising in glory, and inviting him to eat with him the next time the table was spread.

And then, suddenly, the communion table was bathed in green light. It stayed green for a while, and then everything briefly turned to yellow before turning red again, and Roland realized that the entire visual effect was being caused by the traffic light outside. Common sense told him that. But he also believed that he saw the extraordinary radiance of God shimmering in the ordinary and reflected lights from the street. (from a sermon by Roland Perdue, "Painted Bunting")

I am becoming more convinced that we need dreams and visions and wild imaginations to appreciate everything that happens at this table.

(Oh, the visions we'll see when the traffic light shines through the church windows!)

We often say that the communion meal is a memorial meal reminding us of Jesus' suffering and death. But we also say that the Lord's Supper is the joyful feast of the people of God. How can it be both at the same time? 

Perhaps we need a dream or a vision to help us make the connection.

When the Transfiguration scene takes place in Matthew's Gospel, Jesus has just told the disciples that he must suffer and die. Matthew goes on to narrate how Jesus is eventually arrested and put to death, describing the crucifixion in gruesome detail. But before Matthew tells us the story of the crucifixion he tells us another story--the story of Transfiguration--a story which discloses to us who Jesus is and what his ministry means. (I'm in debt to Thomas G. Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion, p. 94, for the insight into the juxtaposition of the Transfiguration and Crucifixion stories).

So when Matthew later tells us how the soldiers gambled over Jesus' clothing, he wants us to remember that in the moment of Transfiguration Jesus' clothes were shining with glimmering brilliance.

When Jesus on the cross is surrounded by two criminals, one on his left and one on his right, Matthew wants us to remember how in the Transfiguration Jesus was flanked by both Moses and Elijah.

On the cross Jesus is taunted by people crying out, "If you're really the Son of God, take yourself down from that cross!," but in the moment of Transfiguration, there was a voice from heaven which proclaimed, "This is my beloved Son!"

In the crucifixion scene Jesus dies in humiliation with the crowds waiting to see whether Elijah will come to save him, and in the Transfiguration scene Moses and Elijah depart the scene at the end, leaving Jesus alone to shine in glory.

So, how can this meal be both a memorial of Jesus' death and the joyful feast of the people of God? It is both because whenever we think of Jesus' suffering and death we can also think of Jesus' shining splendor and glory. We can hear and understand one story in the light of the other.

When you and I daydream during communion, 

when our minds wander from one thing to another, 

when we sit in our rows passing the trays 

but our minds are racing and our hearts are grieving 

because we've just heard some devastating family news 

or received an unexpected and frightening medical diagnosis, 

even in those moments, 

when our minds are a million miles away and definitely not thinking devotional thoughts, 

all it takes is a little bit of bread and a cup to connect us with the Jesus who gently touches us on the shoulder and tells us not to be afraid.

Joanna Adams is a Presbyterian pastor who served churches in Atlanta. She tells the story of a pastoral visit she paid to a retired minister in her congregation whose mind and memory had been ravaged by Alzheimer's disease. She went to take him communion. She read some scripture, and finally set the elements before him. In a momentary fit of rage he said, "What is this?" Then he shouted, "WHAT IS THIS?!" Joanna said she was searching her mind for some way of calming him down, when suddenly he answered his own question: "This is the joyful feast of the people of God," he said, and then lifting his eyes to the heavens, he prayed, "Almighty God, we thank You for this supper shared in the Spirit with your son Jesus." And for a few moments, he was reconnected with grace and standing in the presence of glory. (from a sermon preached by Joanna Adams, when she was pastor of Atlanta's Trinity Presbyterian Church)

In a few minutes we will pass the trays. We will share the bread of heaven and the cup of blessing. 

And who knows what dreams may come.

All glory and praise be to our God. Amen.

For discussion: what do you often think about during communion? Is there a particular vision or thought that has helped you connect the sacrament to your own life?

Two Sermons on the Feeding of the Five Thousand

This blog post is based on my February 24th, 2019 sermon, which was originally titled, "The Church Is Always in the Desert."

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, beside women and children.   --Matthew 14:13-21, New Revised Standard Version

Years ago I preached a sermon on this text, and after the worship service a worshipper grabbed me by the arm and started jabbing me in the chest with the index finger of his right hand, all the while exclaiming, "I can tell you exactly what happened. There was no need for a supernatural miracle. The people had all brought food with them, but they were afraid to take it out because they didn't know whether the others had brought food or not. But once they realized that others had brought food as well, then they relaxed and were able to share as the disciples and Jesus had shared. That's what really happened."

I replied, "I think you make a very persuasive case, now will you please stop poking me!" Later I told a friend about this man's very emphatic explanation of the loaves and fishes, and he said, "Well, either way it makes a great story."

Either way, it makes a great story, and either way it could make for a powerful sermon. All last week I wondered which sermon I should preach this morning. Should I preach the we-all-need-to-share sermon, or should I preach the we-need-a-miracle sermon? Which sermon did Katonah Presbyterian Church most need to hear this morning?

I wasn't sure, so then I wondered whether I could preach both sermons on the same Sunday. After all, if the four Gospel writers had included the loaves and fishes story a total of six times, then surely I wouldn't be out of line to preach two sermons on this text on the same Sunday!

Now, the compromise I'll make with you is that each of these sermons could be about five minutes, so that with a brief wrap-up, plus the time I've already been speaking, the total sermon length should still be just under fifteen minutes.

So, here's the first sermon: We All Need to Share!

Years ago the Quaker theologian and author Parker Palmer was on a flight from Chicago's O'Hare airport to Denver's Stapleton airport, which was the old Denver airport. Now, this took place in that long ago time when there were no security lines at airports, no electronic screening, and you could carry pretty much whatever you wanted in your carryon baggage.

The plane pulled away from the gate, taxied for a very long time, and then came to a stop at a remote corner of the airport next to a chain-link perimeter fence. The captain's voice could be heard on the intercom, "I have some bad news. There is a storm front in the west, exactly where we are headed. Denver is socked in and shut down. There are no alternatives. So, we'll be staying here for a few hours. That's the bad news. The really bad news is that we have no food on board." (Now again, I should mention that this story took place in that long ago time when when people looked forward to a delicious meal on the airplane, complete with silverware and cloth napkins. I don't remember such a time myself, but I've read about it in books.) Thus, when the captain announced that there was no food onboard, everybody groaned. Some passengers became angry.

(In the days of old, when passengers feasted on airplanes)

But then, Palmer said, one of the flight attendants stood up in the aisle and took the microphone. "We're really sorry here, folks. We didn't plan it this way, and we can't do anything about it. We know that for some of you this is a big deal. You're hungry and were looking forward to a nice lunch. Some of you have a medical condition and really need to eat. Some of you may not care. So I have an idea. We have a couple of empty bread baskets up here, and we're going to pass them around. Everybody put something in the basket. I know some of you have brought a little snack along, just in case--peanut butter crackers, candy bars. Some of you have Rolaids, Life Savers, chewing gum. And if you don't happen to have anything edible, you have a business card or a picture of your kids or a bookmark. The thing is, I hope everybody puts something in the basket. And then we'll reverse the process. We'll pick the baskets up at the back of the plane and pass them around again and everybody can take out what he or she needs."

"Well," Palmer said, "what happened next was amazing. First, the complaining and griping stopped. People started to root around in pockets and handbags and briefcases. Some stood up and retrieved luggage from the overhead racks and got out boxes of candy, a salami, Italian sausage, cheese, crackers, a bottle of wine (again, this was in the long ago days when this was permissible!). Now people were laughing and talking. The flight attendant had transformed a group of anxious people focused on their need, deprivation, and scarcity into a gracious community."

The flight eventually took off from Chicago and landed in Denver, and as he stepped off the plane, Palmer found the flight attendant and said, "You know there's a story in the Bible about what you did." She said, "I know the story. That's why I did it" (as quoted in a sermon by John Buchanan, "In Remembrance of Him," preached at Chicago's Fourth Presbyterian Church, October 2, 2011).

This first sermon focuses not so much on the miracle, but on what happens to us when we are motivated to share graciously with one another. As Barbara Brown Taylor explained in a sermon that she preached on this text:

The problem with miracles is that we tend to get mesmerized by them, focusing on God's responsibility and forgetting our own. Miracles let us off the hook. They appeal to the part of us that is all too happy to let God feed the crowd, save the world, do it all. We do not have what it takes, after all. What we have to offer is not enough to make any difference at all, so we hold back and wait for a miracle, looking after our own needs and looking for God to help those who cannot help themselves (from Barbara Brown Taylor, "The Problem with Miracles," in The Seeds of Heaven).

Those who preach this first sermon emphasize the fact that Jesus told the disciples: "You give them something to eat," putting the responsibility squarely on the disciples' shoulders. That's the first sermon: we-all-need-to-share.

In contrast, the second sermon is We-do-need-the-miracle.

Three years ago last summer, another one of my favorite preachers, Nadia Bolz Weber, was speaking at a conference of Lutheran pastors and musicians. She was preaching on the Feeding of the Five Thousand. She knew that Lutheran bishops and seminary professors would be present. She wanted to be sure that she delivered a wise, funny, and learned sermon that did justice to the Lutheran theology of the Eucharist. She struggled to write the sermon. She felt like she was too much in her head. She woke up at two in the morning on the day that she was supposed to preach and rewrote her entire sermon. She decided to write the sermon that she needed to hear and not the one that she thought that the bishops and the professors were expecting.

In her sermon Nadia confessed,

I just couldn't preach a Jesus wants you to be nice and share your juice box sermon to you today . . . Not that thousands of human beings sharing with their neighbors isn't a little miraculous, it is, it's just that . . . maybe this story is too important for it to be [primarily] about people sharing their lunches.

Because miracles, and not lessons about sharing, are what we really need. So as crazy as it is--I believe in miracles--not because I think I'm supposed to but because I need to. I need to believe that God does what we cannot do (from a sermon by Nadia Bolz Weber on the Feeding of the Five Thousand, July 25, 2015, from her blog , the emphasized bold text is her own).

The disciples themselves were just as hungry and just as weary as anyone else in the crowd. They were grieving the death of John the Baptist, how he had been beheaded because the king had been so entranced by a dancing girl that the king promised to give her whatever she asked for, and the girl's mother told her to ask for the head of John the Baptist. That's a grisly story, and I'm struck by the contrast between that lavish, drunken royal banquet and the desert feeding with five loaves and two fish.

The disciples were grieving and hungry and depleted and worn out. They were in need of a miracle. As Nadia Bolz Weber said, "the most important resources that day was not the fried chicken and potato salad that people had hidden in their tunics, but the need of humanity for a God that can do miracles."

Those who preach this second sermon, the we-need-a-miracle sermon, are quick to point out that right after Jesus says, "You give them something to eat," Jesus says, "Bring them here to me."

All of you who are exhausted caregivers, any of you who feel hopelessly overwhelmed the moment that Jesus says, "You give them something to eat," can take heart in the fact that "Jesus includes you in the category of the hungry and himself in the category of bread" (Nadia Bolz Weber).

Which of these two sermons do you most need to hear this morning? The we-all-need-to-share sermon or the we-all-need-a-miracle sermon?

I suspect that some of you probably do resonate a little more with one sermon than the other, and that you may well resonate more with one sermon on one Sunday and with the other sermon on another Sunday.

What I know is that all of us--the we-need-to-share crowd and the we-need-a-miracle crowd--are here in this desert wilderness together and it is time to eat.

(thank you to Sue Kravits for the meme)

As Tom Long writes in the quote that is printed on your bulletin cover:

Indeed, the church is always in the desert, the place where it cannot rely upon its own resources, which are few. The church is hungry itself and is surrounded by a world of deep cravings, people who are lonely, disoriented, and poor in many different ways. Against the savage realities of human need, the church sees only small numbers on the membership rolls and even smaller ones in the mission budget. It is no wonder, then, that the church joins the disciples in crying, this is a desert. Send the crowds away to fend for themselves. Jesus is still the teacher, though, and there is a lesson for the disciples--and the church--to learn: God is abundantly able to provide (from Thomas G. Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion series).

At the end of the day, I don't believe that these two sermons are contradictory at all. To the extent that we know ourselves as hungry and in need of God's grace and miracle-working power, we will be surprised again and again by what happens when we pass the baskets and share what we have.

All glory and praise be to our God. Amen.

With which of these two sermons do you most resonate, and why?: The We-All-Need-to-Share sermon or the We-All-Need-a-Miracle sermon? Please feel free to use the space below to post your comments and questions.

Corruptors of the Corruption

This blog post is based on my sermon from February 17, 2019, which was originally titled, "You're Gonna Ruin My Bad Reputation!"

[Jesus] put before them another parable: "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 is grown it is the greatest of shrubs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come ad make nests in its branches." He told them another parable: "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."    --Matthew 13:31-33, New Revised Standard Version

(thank you to Sue Kravits for the meme)

There's a scene in Robert Duvall's movie, "The Apostle." Robert Duvall's character Sonny is a preacher who believes that God is calling him to start a small church in rural Louisiana. On the very first Sunday there are no more than five or six people in worship. Sonny greets everyone and says, "We're small but powerful." He then has them turn to their neighbors, and they repeat, "We're small but powerful!"

From time to time I've quoted that scene in worship, particularly on a low attendance Sunday such as a snow day or President's Day weekend. We may not have as many in worship as we normally do. We're small but powerful.

There is something very compelling in the thought of someone small being secretly powerful, or capable of growing and becoming strong.

At first glance, this would seem to be the message of a parable about a small mustard seed growing into the greatest of shrubs. Jesus seems to reiterate the point by telling another brief parable about a little bit of yeast being enough to make an enormous amount of dough rise.

Yet as preacher and scholar Thomas G. Long points out, there is a lot more happening in these two very brief parables. (see Thomas G. Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion, pp. 152-154. This sermon borrows heavily from Long's interpretation of these parables. Direct quotes are indented.)

If we read these parables too quickly, or listen to them being read in worship too casually, we are going to miss seeing the twinkle in Jesus' eye or his almost mischievous grin.

A mustard seed is small, but it's not quite the smallest of all the seeds. And a mustard bush is not really the greatest of all shrubs, and it certainly does not grow into a tree large enough for flocks of nesting birds. 

There is a reference in the Old Testament book of Daniel to the Kingdom of Babylon as a tree standing majestically at the center of the earth, with a top that reached to heaven. This tree was visible to the ends of the earth; its branches were broad enough to provide nesting space to all the flocking birds of the air; and from this tree all living beings were fed.

To a people who believed that great kingdoms or mighty empires were supposed to look like massive cedars of Lebanon or giant sequoias, Jesus offers the humble image of a mustard bush.

The main point remains the same: something small grows into something big. But another point gets made as well: this greatness does not come in the form we expect. As New Testament scholar David Garland has pointed out, the realm of heaven is breaking into the world in a disarming way. After all, we do not sing, "A Mighty Mustard Bush is our God." (David Garland, Reading Matthew, as quoted by Long). Try looking for that hymn in our purple Glory to God hymnal. You won't find it.

A Mighty Mustard Bush!

Thus, from small beginnings, the kingdom--or realm--of God grows into something great, but it is not the kind of greatness we expect.

There is an even bigger twist to he parable of the yeast. You and I might hear it as a simple cooking illustration, but that's not what's happening. You and I can go to the store and buy a little glass jar of yeast for our bread machine, and we can store that little glass jar in our pantry until we need it again without having to worry about it.

But in the ancient world yeast was not easily contained, and it was considered highly corrosive. In fact, in Jesus' day yeast was a symbol for corruption. To say something like a little yeast leavens the whole loaf was tantamount to saying one bad apple spoils the barrel. Again, as David Garland observes, saying that the realm of God is like yeast was akin to saying that it was like rust.

The other thing to notice in this brief parable about the yeast is what the woman does with the yeast. She does not simply mix the yeast into the flour, which is how the New Revised Standard Version translates that word. According to Tom Long, a better translation would be to say that the woman hides the yeast; she conceals the yeast. In the words of Tom Long:

the parable of the yeast pictures the [realm] of God as a hidden force working silently to corrupt the world--that is, to corrupt the corruption, or as the whimsical lyrics of the 1980s hit country song by Ronnie McDowell put it, "You're gonna ruin my bad reputation." One cannot see the [realm] of God pervading the world, but when its covert fermentation is accomplished, the bland flour of the world will have been transformed into the joyous bread of life. (Long, p. 154).

 Have you ever thought about our ministry in that way? That you and I, through the hidden mercies of God, can be corruptors of the corruption?

I once heard a sermon illustration about a woman named Kathleen, who was a public health nurse in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Some of you may be familiar with the story of Asbury Park, how it was an upscale seaside community in the 1940s and 50s, but by the 60s and 70s it was hopelessly mired in urban blight and corruption. Once fashionable, four-star hotels became nothing more than flop houses. In one of those flop houses there was a nursing home populated mostly by elderly people who were among the poorest of the poor. Conditions were horrific. The management wouldn't allow the public health nurses to come into the nursing home to do an inspection because they didn't want them to see the squalor, and even the city government sided with the management.

So, Kathleen, who was a public health nurse, decided to go incognito. She went down to the nursing home and got herself hired as a chamber maid. She went from room to room changing bed pans, cleaning toilets, and surreptitiously checking blood pressures and monitoring temperatures. As she went from room to room Kathleen said she could see the face of Christ in each patient. (from a sermon by Thomas G. Long, preached at the Duke University Chapel, May 2011).

Now, what can one public health nurse do in the face of urban blight and squalor? Well, what can a little bit of yeast do in a large measure of flour? Kathleen was powerful enough to be a corruptor of the corruption.

I remember another story someone once told me about a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church, who also happened to be a corporate lawyer in Midland, Texas. This particular attorney made a very comfortable living as a partner in a law firm that did a lot of work for the oil and gas industry, but he also did some pro bono work on the side in the area of landlord-tenant law, on the side of the tenants! If he got word that a landlord was up to some abusive practice, he would write a very intimidating letter to that landlord using his law firm's letterhead. That was usually enough to stop whatever shenanigans the landlord had been up to. In telling these stories, the attorney was apt to recline in his plush office chair, prop his cowboy boots atop his mahogany desk, and exclaim how he just loved working for justice! (from a sermon by Patrick J Willson, preached at the Westminster (Virginia) Presbyterian Church. I'm uncertain of the date). I think this attorney was another example of someone working to be a corruptor of the corruption.

I recently learned about the Peace Drums Project, which is an interfaith initiative in modern-day Israel, in Galilee, which is where Jesus grew up. The Peace Drums Project supplies steel drums for middle school students who are Jewish, Christian, and Muslim, and helps them make music together in a single band. The hope is that the students and parents will get to know each other and that some of the stereotypes that they have of each other will disappear as they make music together.

To learn more about the Peace Drums Project, please click here.

What can a small band of drummers do in the face of historic conflict, in the midst of rockets, tanks, bombs, and bullets? Well, what can a little bit of yeast do in a large measure of flour?

In the midst of a complex world with complex problems, you and I can go out and be corruptors of the corruption. We can spread radical gospel ideas such as we're all created in the image of God! We all have a place at the table! We are called to love our neighbors as ourselves, and to return no one evil for evil.

We can infiltrate society with these radical ideas until society looks more and more like the realm of heaven.

All glory and praise be to our God. Amen.

Please use the space below to post comments or questions. 

When have you felt like you were acting like a corruptor of the corruption? Do you believe that you are being called now in some way to be a corruptor of the corruption?

A Tale of Two Houses

(thank you to Sue Kravits for the meme)

This blog post is based on my sermon from February 10, 2019. To listen to an audio recording of this sermon, please click here.

"Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise man who built his house on rock. The rain fell, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on rock. And anyone who hears these words of mine and does not act on them will be like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on the house, and it fell--and great was its fall!" Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teachings, for he taught them as one having authority, and not as their scribes."                                                                                                                                                    --Matthew 7:24-29, New Revised Standard Version

"Now when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were astounded at his teaching." That is the first recorded reaction to the teaching of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew. The word "astounded" in the original New Testament Greek carries the meaning of "bewildered, stunned, or struck with a powerful force."

Have you ever had an intense conversation with someone and almost felt that he or she had struck you with a fist? Their words were that forceful. Perhaps someone delivered an order or gave you an ultimatum, or simply spoke a truth that left you defenseless and utterly vulnerable.

That must have been what happened when Jesus finished speaking. The crowds were astounded, stunned.

In the words of my friend and mentor Roland Perdue, a retired Presbyterian pastor, it is almost as if the "Word became flesh and punched them in the face!" (from a sermon by Roland Perdue, "Oh My Goodness!," preached at the First Presbyterian Church of Charlotte, North Carolina, February 20, 2011).

What would it take for Jesus to astound you?

What would Jesus have to say in order to astonish you?

That the one who begs or borrows is never to be refused?

That if someone strikes you on one cheek, you are to offer the other cheek as well?

That if you hate someone it's just as bad as murder?

That if you call someone a fool you're liable to the hell of fire?

That if you have lustful thoughts it's just as bad as adultery?

That if someone compels you to walk a mile, you should voluntarily walk a second mile?

That not only are you supposed to be non-violent, but more than that, you are supposed to love your enemies?

That the meek, of all people!, will inherit the earth.

(As Garrison Keillor once said, "it may be true that the meek will inherit the earth, but so far they only have North Dakota!")

Suppose for a moment that the Gospel writer Matthew had never collected different sayings of Jesus and assembled them into the Sermon on the Mount. Suppose that a preacher like me simply said them one morning from the pulpit:

That the one who begs or borrows is never to be refused.

That if someone strikes you on one cheek, you are to offer the other as well.

That if you call someone a fool you're liable to go straight to hell.

What would you say after the worship service? "Thank you, pastor, your sermon really made me think" ?

I think not! I suspect that you would be utterly astounded, like I had punched you in the face!

Through the years there's been a debate among Christians about how best to interpret the Sermon on the Mount. Did Jesus really expect us to live out these teachings, or did Jesus' teachings represent some kind of ideal that we could never attain in this lifetime, and thus serve primarily as a reminder of our need for grace?

It seems to me that Jesus, according to the Gospel writer Matthew at least, answers that question for us:

Everyone then who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise person who builds a house upon the rock.

Jesus did not say, "Well, if you're a truly wise person, then you would know not to take my words too literally, and you could pat yourself on the back for being so sophisticated."

No, instead, Jesus says "everyone who hears these words of mine and acts on them will be like a wise person who builds a house upon the rock."

In the words of preacher and scholar Tom Long:

Jesus calls those who hear his message to put his words into practice, because the Sermon on the Mount expresses God's will not just for the church but also for the world. The commands of the sermon describe what it means to be fully human, not just what it means to be religious. Only a life based upon the vision embodied in the Sermon [on the Mount] can stand firm and true when all the storms of life have done their worst.

 The house of greed washes away when the rains of economic crisis come.

The house of power collapses when the political climate changes.

The house of pragmatic living-for-the-moment slips off the foundation when life opens up with a mystery like birth, deep suffering, or death. (Thomas G. Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion, pp. 84-85). 

 But a house built upon the vision that Jesus gives us in the Sermon on the Mount is sturdy enough to stand through any storm of life.

When the Gospel writer Matthew sets up the scene for the Sermon on the Mount, he invites us to imagine Jesus speaking to two different groups--first, to the disciples, who have come near, and then, secondarily, to the crowds, who are close enough to overhear.

Jesus, therefore, is speaking symbolically through the disciples to the world, anticipating the mission of the church to teach all the nations to obey everything Jesus has commanded. (Long, p. 46)

You could say that Jesus is creating the church, giving birth to a separate reality in the midst of the crowds. The disciples are being made into a new community, the ecclesia--the called out--the word that Matthew uses for "church."

And the church is called to embody these teachings of Jesus, to show--primarily through their actions, not simply their words--that these teachings are indeed God's will for the whole world.

From time to time, I invite us to look at a statement that is printed on the Announcements page in our bulletin. It's a statement that was first used in our bulletins when Bruce White was pastor (1971-2000). Each week the statement is included in the very first paragraph. It reads:

What does it mean to be a Christian church in our time? We believe it means that we have decided to take seriously the teachings of Jesus about the Way of Life. It means that we have made a commitment to be open to the power of God's love.

As a church we have decided to build a house on rock. We have decided to take seriously the teachings of Jesus about the Way of Life. This means that we will not fit into "a crowd that seeks its security in prestige, property, or propriety." (Roland Perdue) Instead, we will be part of a group that looks to the birds of the air and considers the lilies of the field, knowing that our ultimate security lies with God.

These days our Monday morning study group has been reading short stories by Flannery O'Connor. She once wrote, "the Bible says, you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free. It should have said, you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you odd."

When we talk about the meek being blessed, or about the command to love our enemies, we will indeed seem odd.

I invite you sometime soon to read through the Sermon on the Mount. It's found in Matthew chapters 5, 6, and 7. It takes about eight or nine minutes to read through silently. Read through it and let it sink in how odd it is, but also how life-giving it is.

As a church, we--the members and friends of Katonah Presbyterian Church--have said that we intend to take seriously the teachings of Jesus, which means that we are called to do this work together.

Together, we do our best to apply the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount to our own lives and the life of our community.

We learn to talk about each other in ways that honor the child of God in each one of us. When Jesus says that if you say "you fool" you'll be liable to the hell of fire, he is engaged in a bit of word play. That word translated hell is gehenna in Greek, and it refers to the place outside the city walls where trash was burned. Don't trash-talk anyone, Jesus says, or you might be taken out with the trash yourself.

As a church, we do our best to interpret the hard sayings and difficult commands in the Sermon on the Mount. When, for instance, Jesus spoke very strict words prohibiting divorce, he was speaking primarily to a situation in which men would attempt to abandon their wives on a whim while relying on the technicality of obtaining a certificate of divorce. (see Long, pp. 58-60).

So how do we apply Jesus' words about divorce to our own day and time? As a church we should do everything we can to support couples who are doing their best to honor the commitments that they have made to each other. At the same time, the church should support those who have concluded that the most loving, most honorable path available to them is to sever the marriage ties. In both instances, we are taking the words of Jesus seriously, and doing our best to figure out what it means to follow Jesus in our own day and time.

As we take seriously Jesus' teachings in the Sermon on the Mount, we realize that the famous Golden Rule--do unto others as you would have them do unto you--is not simply another way of saying that if you scratch my back, then I'll scratch yours. Instead, in the words of Tom Long, we learn to interpret the Golden Rule in the context of the entire Sermon on the Mount.

What do the children of God want others to do to them? They want to be recognized as who they are, God's very own people, and they want to live in a world where mercy, meekness, and peace prevail. So, Jesus now calls them to treat the world in the same way, to treat the world as if it were already restored, as if it were already what it one day will surely be, a place were the merciful God is all in all and humanity is gathered at the great and joyous banquet. (Long, p. 81)

Are you astounded yet?

I know I am.

All glory and praise be to our God. Amen.

Please feel free to use comments section below to post observations or ask questions.

Consider the Lilies

     (thank you to Sue Kravits for the meme)

This blog post is based on my sermon from February 3, 2019.

Last week there was a story on the BBC about a mother and daughter in Chippenham, England. The mother has dementia, and one day the mother was being visited by her GP, Dr. Philip Grimmer. He noticed a whiteboard that had been positioned in his patient's line of sight. On that whiteboard were written such messages as:

YOU'RE OKAY.
EVERYONE'S FINE.

YOU'RE NOT MOVING.
NO ONE IS MOVING.

YOU HAVEN'T UPSET ANYONE.
YOU DON'T OWE ANYONE ANY MONEY.

When asked, the daughter explained to Dr. Gimmer that she had written on the whiteboard the responses to her mother's most frequently asked questions. The daughter said that her hope was to reduce the number of frantic phone calls that her mother made to her and to other family members, but more than that, the hope was that the whiteboard would relieve her mother's anxiety.

Dr. Grimmer told the BBC that he had not seen anything like it before in thousands of house calls. "It's caring, reassuring, and sensible," he said. "It's such a simple idea."

Dr. Grimmer had tweeted a photo of the whiteboard messages to a few of his interested colleagues, and since then the tweet has been liked over 40,000 times and has helped spark a global conversation about caring for people with dementia. (see Kris Bramwell, "Dementia Whiteboard touches hearts around the world", BBC News, February 1, 2019)

It seems to me that in the Sermon on the Mount Jesus has done something very much like taking a whiteboard and writing on it the messages that we most need to hear when our own chronic anxiety threatens to overwhelm us.

To those of us who obsessively worry about having enough--enough money, enough health, enough time--Jesus takes a dry erase marker and writes on a whiteboard for everyone to see:

DO NOT WORRY ABOUT YOUR LIFE,
WHAT YOU WILL EAT OR DRINK,
OR ABOUT YOUR BODY ABOUT WHAT YOU WILL WEAR.

IS NOT LIFE MORE THAN FOOD,
AND THE BODY MORE THAN CLOTHING?

Jesus continues:
LOOK AT THE BIRDS OF THE AIR,
THEY NEITHER SOW NOR REAP
NOR GATHER INTO BARNS,
AND YET YOUR HEAVENLY FATHER FEEDS THEM.

And then later Jesus says:
CONSIDER THE LILIES OF THE FIELD, HOW THEY GROW;
THEY NEITHER TOIL NOR SPIN, YET I TELL YOU,
EVEN SOLOMON IN ALL HIS GLORY WAS NOT CLOTHED LIKE ONE OF THESE.

As preacher and scholar Thomas G. Long points out:

At first, Jesus' words about the birds and the lilies, lovely as they are, are not very compelling. Sure, birds and lilies don't worry about life, but they also don't have mortgages, car payments, grocery bills, and college tuitions to keep them awake at night. All of us would like to be relieved of worry and anxiety, but Jesus appears to be suggesting an unrealistic strategy--"look at the birds, look at the lilies"--to which one is tempted to reply, "Yes, but look at the bills!" (Thomas G. Long, Matthew, Westminster Bible Companion, p. 75)

Jesus is not suggesting that human beings can be like birds or lilies. Instead, Jesus is using a teaching technique that was fairly common in his day--arguing from the lesser to the greater. If God so generously provides for the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, then how much more so will God also provide for you and me?

There is something else we should notice. The verbs look at the birds of the air and consider the lilies of the field are, in New Testament Greek, very strong verbs. (Long, p. 75)

Jesus is essentially imploring us to scrutinize the birds of the air and painstakingly examine the lilies of the field.

What is it that Jesus wants us to see?

The poet Mary Oliver died last month, and I'm reminded of her admonition to "pay attention," which she said is "our endless and proper work."

In her poem "Wild Geese," Mary Oliver wrote:

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert,
repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of
your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will
tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles
of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the
clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and
exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
(Mary Oliver, "Wild Geese," originally published in Dream Work, 1986)

In telling us to scrutinize the birds of the air and painstakingly examine the lilies of the field, Jesus is inviting us--no, Jesus is commanding us, compelling us--to look, really look,

at a world where God provides freely and lavishly, a world where anxiety plays no part, where worry is not a reality. Jesus [tells] us to allow our imaginations to enter such a world, to compare this world with the world in which we must live out our lives. (Long, pp. 75-76)

The rent is still due, of course.
Middle schoolers still have to contend with school bullies and all kinds of social pressure.
More than a few of us anxiously await the results of the latest medical scan.

But as Tom Long reminds us:

We have seen this other world, this world of God's gracious and tender care, and it promises to overthrow the power of anxiety. We still worry [about all kinds of things, but having seen this other world, we now know] that there is nothing in this world that can take away what God provides--dignity, a sense of worth, the confidence of being treasured in the heart of God. (Long, p. 76)

All glory and praise be to our God. Amen.

Questions for Discussion:

1. What would your whiteboard tell you to stop worrying about?

2. How compelling do you find Jesus' admonition to look at the birds of the air and consider the lilies of the field?