Second Sunday of Easter

This morning the lectionary begins reading First Peter, a letter, just 105 lines long, that was written to Christians whose suffering was known to its author.

Scholars argue about who the author was but generally it’s accepted now that it was not the apostle Simon Peter, but it was written by an anonymous Roman Christian who was familiar both with Peter’s teachings and with the circular letter form that Paul popularized in his communications to congregations. Scholars also agree that it was probably written sometime after Peter and Paul’s deaths in the 60s and after the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 CE.

This letter is addressed to churches in Asia Minor, which is modern-day Turkey, to communities of Christians who were scattered throughout the world and, like the Jews of the Diaspora (di-aspera), were living as “resident aliens”, “strangers”, or “exiles.”[i]

It’s important to note that the exclusion and hostility endured by first century Christians isn’t like anything most of us will experience in a free and democratic society, but, nonetheless,
the letter challenges us to look for the places where life and faith intersect for us, and to remember who we are as people of faith, living in the hope of the resurrection this Eastertide.

Here, in this first section of his letter, the author picks up on the same language of inheritance, that Paul employs in the eighth chapter of Paul’s letter to the Romans when he writes, “we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ…” [ii]

He declares that, by God’s great mercy, we are given “a new birth into “an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled and unfading.”[iii]

I have spoken before about how, when we are named co-heirs with Christ, we benefit from what some call the “sweet swap” in that Christ takes on all that is ours, and we in turn take on all that is his.

But here we are reminded that the cross isn’t simply a mathematical equation where we land in the black, squared up with God, or where we are declared safe by some divine umpire because of what Christ has done.

The cross does something to us, transforms us into something new.

And, in just three words, the author richly describes this new thing that God is doing for us, this precious inheritance we are given in faith in Christ:

• First it is imperishable – it won’t wither or wilt; it won’t rust out or erode; it won’t turn or decay. 
• Second, it is undefiled – pure, spotless, unblemished, pure and unstained; and, 
• Third, it is unfading – enduring, everlasting, permanent.

Often inheritances are described in terms of money and property, but they are not limited to material wealth and sometimes their worth is immeasurable.

When he died in 1974, comedian Jack Benny bequeathed the daily delivery of a single red rose to his wife for the rest of her life.

Theologian Peter Marty tells the story of another dear inheritance, recorded by a concentration camp survivor in Boston’s Holocaust Museum; the woman wrote

A childhood friend of mine once found a raspberry in the camp and carried it in her pocket all day to present that night to me on a leaf. Imagine a world in which your entire possession is one raspberry and you give it to your friend.[iv]

Still, roses and raspberries are temporal, and will not last forever. And because we have not experienced an inheritance like the one described here, too often, we succumb to the lie that God’s love for us is none of these things:

• Believing God’s love is conditional, we treat God as a scorekeeper, as if God could sour on us, if our sins are too great, or our piety too modest; 
• Believing God’s love is flawed, we blame the God who created and loves us for the suffering we inflict on each other, and the multitude of ways that we hurt each other; 
• Believing God’s love is temporary, we call God fickle (and any number of other names) when we cannot hear God speaking to us, or feel God’s presence in our lives.

The Good News this letter delivers to the struggling first-century Christians, and to us, is that even when we forget how God truly loves us, God remembers and continues to love us and remains imperishable, undefiled and unfading in his zeal for us.

Let us pray…
Risen Christ,
Lead us in rejoicing in the living hope that is ours in faith.
Fix our hearts on the inheritance you have given us,
that we would love what you command and desire what you promise,
always remembering the love of our life-giving God.
Amen.

[i] See Acts 7.
[ii] Romans 8:16-17
[iii] 1 Peter 1:4
[iv] Bartlett, David L.; Barbara Brown Bartlett. Feasting on the Word: Year A, Volume 2: Lent through Eastertide (Feasting on the Word: Year A volume) (Kindle Locations 14185-14188). Presbyterian Publishing Corporation. Kindle Edition.

Resurrection of the Lord, Easter Day

Twenty-eight years ago during Game 3 of the 1989 World Series, the San Francisco Giants were playing the Oakland As in Candlestick Park when a 6.9 magnitude earthquake shook the Bay area for fifteen seconds. It was the strongest quake felt there since the 1906 quake that set the city ablaze.

Unlike the hurricanes and tornadoes, earthquakes have no early warning system. They strike quickly, violently jarring and tossing everything upside down. Foundations collapse, gas lines explode, freeways buckle. And fear persists as aftershocks continue to make your surroundings tremble and shake. Everything you know is upended and thrown into uncertainty.

The Scripture tells us that, on this holy morning, when the women go to see the tomb, “suddenly there was a great earthquake.” It’s a detail that we only hear in Matthew’s account of the resurrection.

In Matthew’s gospel, earthquakes – σεισμός (seismos) – signal God’s presence. He uses the same word when Jesus and the disciples are at sea and a great tempest swamps their boat with waves. And he uses it again, at the crucifixion when the earth shook and the rocks split and the Roman centurion keeping watch over Jesus confessed Jesus was God’s Son.

Matthew, more than any of the other Gospel writers, writes to convey to us the power and magnitude of Jesus as Messiah, the one anointed, or chosen, by God to save God’s people.

When we proclaim, “Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again.”
we proclaim God’s presence in the face of tumult and chaos.
We proclaim God’s power over death and destruction.
We proclaim God’s promise of new life, realized in faith.

And, like the women at the tomb that morning, we rejoice!
But, if we are honest, in the midst of the joy that this Good News brings, fear lingers.

It’s understandable.
Anytime we face change of this magnitude, there is fear.
We are afraid to believe what we have witnessed because it changes everything. Against the brokenness and selfishness that we see in the world, God commands love. Against the rumble of bombs, God commands peace. Against the poverty of the world where we hunger and thirst, God gives us bread and wine and commands us to eat and drink “in remembrance of me.”

And against all of our fear and uncertainty, Jesus repeatedly tells the disciples, and us,
“Do not be afraid.”

We miss this in the English translation, but what is said is really, “Stop being afraid and never be afraid again.”

God has come into the world in the person of Jesus and in God’s perfect love for us, there is no fear.

Although more devastating events have been recorded on television and in social media since then, the 1989 quake was the first time in the U.S. that an earthquake was broadcast live, and for many, it was one of the first times when we, collectively, saw the world as we know it, change first-hand, in real-time.

For the people who expect a savior to come as a king who would strong arm their enemies,
for the people who saw Christ crucified and watched from a distance as Jesus breathed his last upon the cross,
for the people who sit at dawn wondering what would happen next, the resurrection changes everything.

The Good News this Easter morning is that every time we experience seismic changes, the kinds of changes that change everything we think to be true, God accompanies us and tells us, “Stop being afraid and never be afraid again.”

Christ has died, Christ is risen and Christ will come again! Alleluia!

Let us pray…
Holy and loving God,
Thank you for coming to us in the person of your Son Jesus and for your life-changing love that expels all fear and triumphs over death.
Teach us to trust fully in You and surrender our fears.
Strengthened by your Spirit, lead us to tell others the Good News that Christ has died, Christ is risen and Christ will come again.
Amen.

Maundy Thursday 2017

Recalling that the name given to Maundy Thursday comes from the Latin mandatum, for commandment, tonight we celebrate the new commandment Jesus gives us.

Except that it’s not really new at all, is it?

After all, in Leviticus 19, we are told to love both our neighbor and the stranger. What makes it new here is that Jesus shows us how to love: “Love as I have loved you.”

Hearing the story in John’s gospel of the last supper, tonight we celebrate the sacrament of the table and the gift that Jesus gives us in the Eucharist - his body and blood given for us.

Except that it’s not really just about Jesus and me, or you, is it?

Listening to Paul’s letter to the church in Corinth, we are reminded that in the sacrament, we are bound together in the body of Christ, no longer living for ourselves but for Christ in us.

So, tonight we are witnesses not only to a new commandment and a new rite, but to a new understanding of the God who is revealed in Jesus in his last days in Jerusalem.

On this night, we are witnesses to the weakness of God — God who suffers in the world because of God’s love for the world.

Instead of insisting on the prestige and sovereignty that would accompany a triumphant Messiah, our suffering God settles in with the outcasts and the persecuted — the ones who aren’t allowed within the walls of the temple: the Samaritan woman, the man born blind, or, in modernity, the immigrant or the refugee.[i]

Instead of exercising absolute, authoritative or imperial power over the Roman soldiers or the Jewish authorities, our suffering God stands with Jesus when he is handed over to soldiers, humiliated and beaten. God stood with the marchers on the Edmund Pettus bridge in Selma on Bloody Sunday and with the Coptic Christians just four days ago on Palm Sunday in Cairo.[ii]

Later tonight we will witness the altar being stripped and laid bare, just as the soldiers who arrested Jesus on this night stripped him of everything they could.

And yet, he was not defeated, for he remained the Son of God.

Here, the altar candles will be snuffed out,
the chalice and paten will be handed over, and
the rich scarlet paraments will be removed.
The books containing God’s Word and the instructions for our communal worship will be closed and taken away.
The cross will be veiled and the light of Christ that is the Paschal candle will be extinguished.

On this night, Jesus teaches us the art of losing,
showing us that even when everything else has been taken away, God’s presence and love remains.[iii]

God’s power is revealed in God’s weakness, and we witness how “God is a God who is present in and works in human failures and helplessness….”[iv]

Because God loves, God does not manipulate us like a puppet master, nor is God a distant watch maker who sets a mechanism in motion and leaves it undisturbed to run down. Because God loves, God does not forsake us. God is with us, accompanying us in our suffering and grief, and working good out of what was intended for evil.

God was with Joseph when his brothers discarded him, and God is with the child who is left forgotten on a front porch in the cold. God was with Israel in exile and God is with the families in Syria who were attacked with chemical weapons. God was with Jesus in the garden when his disciples abandoned him, and God is with you when you feel like no one else is.

The good news of this night, is that when everything else has been taken away, God’s presence and love remains.

Let us pray…
Holy God,
Tonight as we witness the power revealed in your weakness, the love revealed in your Son,
Transform us by the saving power of Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection,
That we would be witnesses of your grace to the ends of the earth.
Amen.

[i] John D. Caputo. The Weakness of God. 45.
[ii] ibid
[iii] Richard Lischer. “Stripped Bare: Holy Week and the Art of Losing.” Christian Century.
[iv] Rowan Williams. The Wound of Knowledge. 5.

Sunday of the Passion 2017

(as Simon of Cyrene)

I was there, you know.

My name is Simon, and I was in the city for the Passover festival.

My pilgrimage was more than 900 miles to reach Jerusalem. I knew there would be people from all over Judah, but it was even more crowded than I expected. And they weren’t just excited about the festival; there was something else in the air. There were people shouting angrily while others shrank back, whispering in fear.

I heard the crowd before I saw it surging up the street. Have you ever been in a crowd like that, where the people move like a wave, and you’re not really even touching the ground anymore?

I tried to stay out of the soldiers’ way, but I guess I failed. And then they ordered me to pick up the crossbeam for that man – the one they call Jesus.

When a Roman soldier tells you to do something, you do it.
At least,
if you want to live.

I wanted the chance to return home, so I followed their orders.

It was so heavy, probably as much as carrying both of my young sons – Alexander and Rufus – on my back.

The wood cut into my shoulder and made me wince, and I think I still have splinters in my palm.

But the weight of that cross wasn’t as heavy as the burden of others carry. They are the ones who crucified him.

The high priest here Jesus blasphemed, that he spoke against the Holy God of Israel, and there are others who say he was sent by the ruler of demons.

But, I had heard about this man Jesus from merchants at our ports back home.

They were laughing because he was heard calling people “fishers of men.” Ha!

They want to fill their nets with the catch of the day, not more mouths to feed.

But they also shared the stories of how he healed people from their diseases and sicknesses, and even revived Lazarus. They said he was a good rabbi, too; he knew the Torah and the words of the prophets of old. Some even said he was the Messiah – the anointed one, and, you know, I wondered.

I never expected to come face-to-face with him though. But there, in the street, I lifted the cross off him, and carried it beside him, as we trudged toward the place they call Golgotha.

He was exhausted, beaten and bruised, but he wasn’t defeated.

I watched with the others, as they raised him on the cross.

They mocked him calling him King of the Jews and Son of Man, but, I can’t help but look at how his life fulfilled the Scripture – from the words of the psalmist to those of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Zechariah.

A Nazarene born in Bethlehem,
He was scorned, spat on and struck;
His followers fled, scattering like sheep.

And, now,
he’s been killed.

I confess, that’s not how I imagined the Messiah coming.

I thought at least our enemies might be driven away and we would be free to worship without persecution.

I thought we might know restoration and jubilee,
but maybe we will see that in the kingdom of heaven Jesus described.

Or maybe, that is what is left for us; maybe that’s what he meant when he talked about the kingdom of heaven. He said the kingdom of heaven will come to us who are merciful and who are humble. But I don’t think that means we can shrink back in fear. Sometimes we have to walk the way of the cross, even when it means we will be reviled for our faith or persecuted for righteousness – for standing up for God and God’s people.

After Jesus was crucified, I heard the soldier call him God’s Son. And you know, I think he was right. I cannot understand why Jesus died on that cross, but I can look at how he lived, how he loved people, and how he loved God and follow him.

Shalom.

Fifth Sunday in Lent, Year A

Just like Nicodemus, the Samaritan woman and the man born blind, in today’s Gospel, Jesus’ disciples, and the sisters named Martha and Mary are bewildered by Jesus.

The disciples don’t understand why Jesus is willing to risk returning to Judea, where people were trying to stone him and arrest him.

They are afraid.

And, when he finally arrives in Bethany, four days after Lazarus died, the sisters don’t understand why he didn’t come more quickly.

They are stricken with grief.

Like the others who encountered Jesus, they pepper him with questions, trying to trace the logic and rationale of his actions and words, looking for explanations.

But faith isn’t about having the right answers or explanations.

Faith is believing God’s Word and trusting in the promises given to us by God. In John’s Gospel, especially, believing means being in relationship, or knowing, God.

The starting point for relationship is getting to know the “other.”

Throughout the fourth gospel, Jesus uses “I am” statements to point back to the God of Israel, known to his disciples and community, who declared himself to Abraham and Moses with the words, “I am.”

Jesus has already said, “I am the bread of life”; “I am the light of the world”; “I am the gate” and “I am the good shepherd.” (The last two “I am” statements – “I am the way, the truth and the life” and “I am the true vine” – will be spoken in the days before his crucifixion.)

Each statement reveals more about who Jesus is, about his character and nature.

Here, Jesus tells Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life.” (John 11:25)

Martha is still confused, thinking that Jesus is talking about a future event, but in John’s Gospel, it is the incarnation of God’s Word - in the person of Jesus, in the life of Jesus - that brings salvation to us.

In Jesus, here and now, we find resurrection and the restoration of hope.

Resurrection is seeing God’s activity hidden in our heartache.[i]

It is hearing God call to each one of us, and say, “Come out” from under the weight of what binds you. Throw off the bondage of pain or illness, of exhaustion or anxiety, of addiction or apathy, and be freed to live again.

In the resurrection life, we set our hope in Jesus, and find rest, worn out by fighting to hide from fears, to understand the incomprehensible, to live in brokenness, day in and day out.

Despite the promises of resurrection and life Jesus gives us, too often, we retreat back into old patterns of sin and brokenness, unable to experience joy and freedom in Christ. It is as though we have the grave clothes wound around our feet and around our hearts, painfully binding us.

But Jesus invites us again and again to participate in this life of freedom as Christians. Holy Communion is God’s invitation to us to enter into life with God. Jesus invites us to the table for the gifts of wine and bread, his body and blood, given for you, for me, for the world.

We can linger at the fringes, or drag our feet. We can even turn away, in anger or disappointment, but God’s invitation remains steadfastly for us.

We are invited to not merely witness what God is doing, but to participate. It’s the difference between watching the Final Four on a tv at Hickory Tavern, or sitting behind the bench on the stadium floor in Phoenix.

Last night, there was a man at the semifinal game who’s experiencing that difference first-hand. He’s well-known at USC, going to most of the Gamecock basketball games and a lot of the volleyball and softball games, too. Dressed in crimson, he waves the USC flag, cheering on the athletes, and rallying the other fans because he earnestly believes that he, and the rest of the fans, make a difference. His long hair and his zeal for all things Gamecock has earned him the name “Baseline Jesus” or “Gamecock Jesus” and last week, someone created a GoFundMe to send him to the Final Four, so he was in Phoenix last night.

God doesn’t need us to be his cheerleaders, but the rest of the world does need our presence, as his hands and feet.

So we come to the table, to be nourished and strengthened, and then we are commissioned and sent out, that through our lives, others may know Jesus as we know him. Like Lazarus, we are unbound from sin and let go into the world.

As we approach Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem, and encounter him on the cross, may we remember that Jesus is the resurrection and the life, and our very present help in all circumstances.

Let us pray….[ii]
Holy God,
Thank you for your life-giving promises.
Teach us to trust in Your Son who is the resurrection and life.
Strengthen us by your Spirit to stand firm before the forces of death and speak words of life, that all would know your love and forgiveness.
Amen.

[i] David Lose. In the Meantime. http://www.davidlose.net
[ii] Adapted from Laughing Bird Liturgical Resources, www.laughingbird.net/