Category: Sermons

Where have you found God in the forests? Or the “forest” times of your life?

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church

The Rev. Barbara Hutchinson

Seasons of Creation Year A: Forest

October 8, 2017

There are moments in our lives, sometimes fleeting or seemingly nearly beyond our grasp, when we catch a glimpse of something beyond the ordinary, when everything lines up and everything seems right. We may describe these moments as “being in the flow”, or of a sense of wholeness or peace that overcomes us, or experiencing a surge of newness, or a spark of creativity, or a place of deep and holy nourishment, or stumbling into a thin place. These come to us by grace, for we can never orchestrate them, but only enter into them when they are revealed to us. While in these states, we are experiencing what this Forest Season of Creation is all about – that living place where nourishment abounds, where both birth and death happen, where the life-force is strong, where there is a sense of being held as part of a greater whole.

Last week at our spiritual retreat at Holy Cross Monastery, I invited us to identify these moments of “forest creation” in our lives, for you see, each Season of Creation, in my understanding, aligns with a Season of Spirituality. This season of creation, the forest, echoes the Garden of Eden, that descriptive metaphor which speaks of a time when all of creation, including humankind, was in balance and in right relationship with the will of God. I took my journal, found a quiet spot, surrounded by the trees, and began my own spiritual reflection. It was not difficult for me to identify many “forest” moments of my life. In fact, that part flowed so easily that my mind naturally began to gather those moments into spiritual categories, such as moments of healing, giving or receiving hospitality, my soul being captured through the beauty of music, shared love, or handing you the bread, the Body of Christ, and knowing deep within, that I was handing the Body of Christ to the Body of Christ, an incredibly transcendent moment.

But then something interesting happened. I began to associate the word atonement, which we understand as having something to do with Jesus’ death on the cross and our salvation, with a feeling of alignment and wholeness, at-one-ment, at-one-with-God-ment, as Richard Rohr, a contemporary theologian, would explain. And I realized that some of my most painful moments were also at-one-with-God-moments. That gave me a lot to think about as I recalled a close friend of mine, who held her daughter as she died, feeling that completeness of being close to Danielle and to God, in a profound and life-giving way. In the worst possible moment of her life, there was something being offered to her by God that didn’t make everything okay, but somehow made everything holy. This is how creation and the cross fit together today. Because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, all that we might understand as separate or broken or lost or tragic, is that, but not only that. For Jesus’ resurrection means that everything that ends has a new beginning built into it. Because Jesus experienced the full joy and pain of humankind, God sanctified both, and our salvation is our journey. This is God’s invitation to a place of “forest” creation, that alive place that holds both birth and death, joy and pain, and where there is a mutuality of shared love, hospitality, and a surge toward newness. It is this paradox of Christian faith that allows us to place within our liturgy the Prayers of People we will read at the 10 a.m. service, which are full of lightness and happiness and celebration of the birds of the sky and the fish of the sea, with the Act of Remembrance after the violent act of the shooting in Las Vegas.

Our “forest” or creation experiences often do happen in the forests. One of my earliest childhood memories of sense the presence of God (although I didn’t talk about it that way then) was sitting in the tree in my backyard, for hours on end. I was a child who often sought solitude. The tree’s trunk had split, so there was a convenient, natural seat formed where the two trunks split from the main one, which seemed to be God’s invitation to sit awhile, be still and be aware of the presence of God. Maybe your “forest” experiences happen when you take walks in the woods, or as you drive Rt. 15 along the Susquehanna River and you see the brilliant yellow, gold, and red leaves shimmering against the river, and your breath is taken away. I think our forests can be a place for us to be inspired by God, to be invited by God deeper into God’s presence, to be healed by God as the wind through the branches seems to lift the heaviness in our hearts, all of which reconnects us to the metaphoric original state of wholeness, the Garden of Eden.

We can understand the relationship between our actual forests or our forest experiences elsewhere to our redemption through Jesus’ death and resurrection, because through them we are always invited back into the ongoing creative force of God, but our texts today draw us into a much broader context, where we can begin to see the relationship between our redemption and that of God’s created world.

In our text from Genesis we hear the account of creation which is chronologically after the one in which God created the world in seven days, but this one was written first. This was the original way the ancient Israelites reflected upon the world and imagined its beginning, told in a way that held their deepest values about the created world and our relationship with it. There are a few things that stand out in this passage: Humankind was made from the dust of the earth, out of which God created every other living thing. We are made from the same substance as the plants and the trees, and the animals who inhabit them. Humankind was not set above the rest of the created order, nor was humankind created in isolation from the rest of the created order, nor was earth a mere stage for human drama. Humankind was set in intimate relationship with its environment. The first “job” or vocation given to humankind was to care for God’s creation, even before humankind was instructed to “love God and love our neighbor”. Each time we work at restoring or caring for the earth, we are doing what God asks of us. Each time we pick up debris from the stream, each time we harvest the forests in sustainable ways, each time we raise organic crops, each time we attend to the amount of fertilizer we place upon our lawns, each time we plant native plants in our gardens, each time we find ways to bring back plant or animal diversity in our local area, we are doing what God asks of us, has asked of humankind from the beginning of time.

There are a lot of sad facts about our forests. There have been more forests cleared from 1850 to the present, nearly 170 years, than in all of previous history. Due to population growth and deforestation, the amount of forest cover available to each person has declined globally by 50% since 1960. One quarter of all the total animals will be lost in the next 40 years. I thought about this last year when they built that huge P&G Warehouse – where did all the animals who were living in those fields go? There are some very sad and scary facts about our changing earth, and they are important to us if we understand that God gave us the job to care for it.

And we can take inspiration from and hear an invitation to participate in the restoration of all of the created world, humankind and all else, all formed from the same matter, the dust of the earth, from our gospel today. It’s the familiar story of Nicodemus, a rabbi, who feels a draw toward Jesus, without understanding why. He senses truth within Jesus and begs to understand, and Jesus seems to speak in riddles. What does “born again” mean? In John’s gospel, this term does not refer to a “spiritual or individual” rebirth, but rather to a new way of living in the world here and now. This isn’t eternal life that Jesus is referring to, as we might interpret it, meaning immortality in heaven, but rather as experiencing God’s presence here and now—and then living into it. This is describing our atonement moments – our ‘at-one-with-God-moments’ which draw us back into the original creativity of God, our original vocation or job given to us by God of caring for the Earth, that life-force of God which continues to unfold in our lives and in the lives of all created beings. The job God gave us was to care for creation, so that means we need to work to be open to these at-one-ment moments, to move into the creative life-force of God, so that we can be active agents to support God’s plan of salvation, for us and for all creation.

There’s one story I’d like to tell you, that I believe puts this all together for us – the fact that we’re made of the same matter as the rest of our created world, the fact that our first job is to care for our world (the plants, the animals, the forests, and the sea), the fact that because of the cross, Jesus sanctified us and all creation to be active participants of God’s salvation plan for the world, which doesn’t just include us, and the fact that our redemption means that new life can always come from what we believe to be endings.

Last month, Bill and I travelled to the Adirondacks, where I had the honor marrying two amazing people, Daniel and Kristin, whom I knew from a different part of my life. That invitation alone was pure joy, joining in a celebration where God is making something brand new, something whole and complete, out of what is already wonderful. A week or so before the wedding, Daniel reached out to me and asked if I would do “double duty”. His cousin, aged 54, had died that past year, sadly carrying on the legacy of premature heart problems. Daniel asked if I would be there when they buried his ashes and say a prayer. Of course I would. That’s a true and deep honor to meet people in their moments of deepest need. I arrived at the set time in the morning, travelling down a dirt road to reach the final destination, a family cabin on the lake, which had witnessed love born again and again, lives changed and shared, hopes grown, life experienced in its fullness. I wore my clergy collar, a pair of black jeans, and a warm sweater as cool air drifted off the lake. I met the mother of the son who died, as she held in her hands a seedling of a tree. My heart melted. We hugged, we shared, we know we could get through this together. We walked to the front of the cabin, looking at the water, encompassed by the living world around us – the trees of all shapes and sizes. The mother was carrying what appeared to me to be a seedling to plant on top of the ashes we would bury. This was not true. The container was one which held the ashes of her deceased son, settled in the bottom, so the seedling’s roots could be settled around them and planted together. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Lots to think about. The whole family gathered to choose the right spot for the burial and the planting of this tree. They settled on a spot, which they had cleared so there would be enough light for the seedling to grow. When one of the men took the strong shovel, and pierced the earth, what appeared was a fibrous network of roots, strong and true, roots that were supporting the large giant trees nearby. All of the soil was rich compost, of an earthy color, not like the dark brown seemingly manufactured compost we buy at Lowes. It was full of life’s energy, yearning to create new life, full of priceless nourishment. The mother planted the seedling, tapped the soil around it so it would stay in place. Someone else had fashioned a cross out of splintered  wood found nearby, and placed it purposefully and with reverence near the seedling. We held hands, said the Lord’s Prayer, and felt renewed. I will never look at Ash Wednesday the same way again. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust has a new meaning to me, now having a visual to attach to what the redemption of us as people and the redemption of the created world looks like. God did not create us in isolation from the earth; God did not create the earth to be the stage for our drama. God created us to care for the earth and all its inhabitants. May we always grow in our understanding of how to do that, to live into those at-one-with-God moments, so that we may return to the ongoing life-force of creation within each one of us, which connects us to our Creator. Amen.

 

 

 

Give us this day our daily bread.

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church

The Rev. Barbara Hutchinson

Proper 20 Year A: September 24, 2017

Give us this day our daily bread. These are familiar words we pray together every Sunday, right before the bread is broken in the Eucharistic prayer. Have you ever wondered why we pray these words at that particular moment? Right before Jesus’ body is broken so each and every one of us can receive and take within us the holy presence of Christ? Why does it matter to us that this particular prayer is on our hearts when the sunlight from the altar window shines upon the bread, which seems to glow with holiness as I break it apart, so we can each be fed with this sacred meal?

Give us this day our daily bread. We don’t say, “Give me this day MY daily bread” –  this prayer sets us within a community. The prayer is spoken by all of us, for all of us.  It draws us into a place of understanding that we are all equal – equal in God’s love, equal in our share of God’s abundance, equal in the blessing we take out into God’s world, God’s vineyard. One doesn’t get more if one has had an exceptionally faithful week of prayer, scripture study, and good deeds. Nor does one get less if one is kneeling at the rail for the first time in 20 years and had somehow forgotten about God all that time. It is this fact that makes the invitation to the Eucharist so appropriate and poignant, “So come, you who have much faith and you who have little, you who have been here often, and you who have not been for a long time or ever before, you who have tried to follow and all of us who have failed.”

Give us this day our daily bread. This prayer articulates the reality that in God’s eyes, through God’s grace, and with each other, we are equal to one another. This is the image God has of and for us: equality. What I receive and what each of you receives is the same, and it’s enough, for it contains a completeness that only God can give.  Our yearnings to receive this nourishment may differ, but wherever we are, God meets us and gives us enough for that day.

The manna sent down by God to the Israelites in the wilderness was also God’s way of reminding these people that God will provide what they need, not more, not less, each day. Each person ate their fill, regardless of their position, leader or servant, regardless of the amount of work they did, whether they worked all day long or had little to do, regardless of their ability, whether they were able-bodied workers or disabled. They each received all that they needed. God was using the bread to fashion a people who were leaving a system of domination, wealth, and power to build a new way of life where all received what they needed. God used the daily bread offered to the wilderness wanderers to teach them each day. God is present to them each day, God will give them what they need, each day, God regards them as equal in their need and desires to provide for them. We can imagine that, regardless of how others perceived their worth, God wanted to teach them that since God would care for each one, that all are worth the same, all are beloved children of God, and therefore should be beloved to us.

Give us this day our daily bread. Jesus extends the use of bread to form people into a new way of being where all are cared for, when he stood on the hill overlooking the Sea of Galilee, took bread, blessed it, and broke it apart, for all of the 5000 men, women, and children gathered to eat. He didn’t serve just some, for example those who had been listening to him all day long, but he served all who came as the afternoon sun was setting – he served those who were paying attention the whole time and those who were not. Jesus used bread to show the truth that all people are valued, all people are equal in the sight of God.

It’s the “equal” part that we push up against in today’s parable of the laborers in the vineyard. It just doesn’t seem fair. We feel as though a mistake has been made. Surely, each worker should not be equal in the pay owed them, for they didn’t all work the same amount. We can feel the outrage of the workers chosen early in the morning and believe it is justified. We might momentarily imagine the joy that the last-hired felt when they realized that they too would have what they needed to feed their families that evening, and feel good about that, but then the cynical part of us often surfaces, and we play out the parable just a bit more, and imagine the other group of laborers, who, though by the time they arrived at the vineyard the work day was over, they too got paid for a full day’s work, and then we’d imagine a different song in the hearts of the last-hired workers whose joy and gratitude may quickly turn to outcries of “It’s not fair!”

Give us this day our daily bread is prayer that everyone is equal in their deservedness and worthiness, regardless of their ability, capacity, or number of hours worked for the kingdom and that everyone will be given what they need. God wishes fullness for each one of them, and for each of us. God is fashioning a new people, us, who understand this deep truth of God’s love and generosity. If this parable triggered a negative response in you, this may be an invitation to see what needs to be loosened up within your soul that allows you to value fairness more than equality for all people and God’s desire for all people to have what they need.

Give us this day our daily bread is God’s way of fashioning us as a people who have love and compassion in our hearts, especially for those who have been told by society that they are not equal, they are not of the same value as those who are younger, stronger, able-bodied, smarter, richer, of the preferred gender or sexual orientation, or any other distinction which has placed them on the wrong side. Think about the people who stood at in the market place and had been passed over, time and time again throughout the day. We probably all remember times when we weren’t chosen for something, whether it was in elementary school and we were chosen last for the volleyball team, or whether it was in our adulthood and we weren’t chosen for a job, even though we were more than qualified for it. It is likely that the experience of those hired at the eleventh hour was desperation, discouragement, or having a hard time holding on to hope. For not being chosen is terribly difficult for our souls, our sense of self-worth, our sense of well-being. When we have the energy, passion, and desire for leading productive lives and no one lets us do that, when we don’t feel equally cared for, we can begin to question God’s love for us. But our parable reminds us that, always and forever, we are equal in God’s love to everyone else, and God will give us all that we need this day.

This parable is not actually about judgment or justice. It is about goodness. Payment is made not on what is deserved, nor even on what is needed, but on what the One who is good gives. This is what the kingdom of God looks like: bringing forth the goodness of God, the One who gives only good, the One who provides for all, the One who loves all. The Kingdom of Heaven is God’s overwhelming generosity, God’s compassion for those who are beyond hope, discouraged, last in line, or at the bottom of all the advantages and opportunities. It may not be fair in human standards, but it is good and it is of God. The now present Kingdom of God Jesus inaugurated is about the equitable distribution of our resources to all the people of God.

Our prayer, “Give us this day our daily bread” is what shines the light in our hearts, and which allows us to receive the abundant grace of God through the body and blood of Christ that gives us all that we need, that sends us out into the vineyard of God’s kingdom, here and now, to do God’s work.

This prayer is what led our young people and adults to pick up trash in the Middle Spring Creek yesterday, so that, by our work, our streams will be cleaner, our watershed healthier, and this will allow someone further down the stream to live more abundantly, whether it’s the oystermen in the Chesapeake Bay who can work fruitfully all day to bring home the daily bread for their families, or by freeing the stream of debris, we can care for the natural habitats of local fish and animals, who can now thrive and our ecosystem can be more alive.

You may be aware that our Eucharistic service has two main parts: The Ministry of the Word, when we hear and break open the Word of God, and the Ministry of the Table, when we break open the saving love of Jesus, in the expectation that we will be changed and made new. And the reason for the yearning of that transformation is so we can be sent out into the world, with these words, “Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.” When we come forward to receive the Eucharist, we are being chosen by God, we are being brought into the vineyard, we are being sustained as the Israelites were in the wilderness, with something that isn’t fancy or luxurious, but merely basis sustenance, and it is also all that we need. And then our work is to go and find all the laborers not chosen, the laborers who no one will employ, the laborers who feel themselves unworthy, the laborers whose hopes are dashed, whose minds are flooded with worries about how to feed their families that evening, and to say “come, let me bring to you what is good”, and to offer them the same joy given to the laborers who arrived late in the day, in knowing that they too will have all they need, when they come into the vineyard. What we have received is a gift, and that gift is intended equally for all. Amen.

 

 

Wallowing in the messiness!

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church

The Rev. Barbara Hutchinson & James Williams

Proper 19 Year A

September 17, 2017

MOTHER BARBARA

When we come across challenging texts, sometimes classified as “texts of terror”, as we have today in both our Old Testament and Gospel reading, we have to decide how to approach them faithfully. It is tempting to embrace one of two less-than spiritually healthy responses – one, to ignore the tension or negative characterization of God and choose not to see or believe it, or, two, to focus on the harsh and judgmental portrayal of God and imagine that wrath to be thrust upon our enemies or those who disagree with us and believing that this is God’s will.

Dealing with challenging texts reminds me a bit of wading through a stream, kicking up the sediment at the bottom, the dirt and the debris and the broken glass, so that, for a brief moment, the water is muddied and filled with litter, and in the first situation, rather than looking at and into the messiness, we strategically look away for a split second, while the dirt and debris settle once again, so that when we return our gaze, the water appears sparkling clean, as light from above dances on it. We choose not to see the negative or dangerous parts of the river, or of God.

If we were to take that approach with today’s passages, we would glance away from God killing the Egyptians, and when that image settles at the bottom of our minds, we only see the freedom offered to the Israelites, and we get to stay with the image of the God we like better and are more comfortable with.

Or we would divert our attention away from God’s fury toward the servant who refuses to forgive another’s debt, even though he himself was just forgiven a debt of greater magnitude, and discard the notion of God’s sending him off to be tortured for the rest of his life. This is such a scary thought that what goes around comes around, and if we chose not to forgive, we will be not be forgiven by God, that we may want to block this thought completely from our mind, burying it deep below, so it can never resurface, and focus rather only on the exuberant mercy of God showered initially on the slave in debt to his master. This glancing away from the hard truths in our passages is one approach, perhaps a survival tactic to keep our image of a wholly loving and compassion God intact, but I fear it’s not a complete and faithful response. We need to look into the messiness.

Another way to avoid the messiness is to move with gusto into the hard parts and call upon the wrath of God to crash the sea upon our enemies, and forget that mercy part. For example, we may want to believe that God will smite our enemies, will right the wrongs done to us by punishing those who inflicted pain upon us, that God will destroy the peoples who oppress us, that God will show up with power and might to eradicate the people who we imagine are on the other side of the line we have created in our stance of judgment. And truth to be told, if I had had relatives living in Florida or Texas and the hurricanes were approaching, or if I lived at the edge of the encroaching forest fire in the Northwest, I would have prayed my heart out for God to use God’s holy power and might to push that hurricane out to sea or rain down upon the fire until was extinguished. There are times when we want a powerful and mighty God to act on our behalf, eradicating those who oppose us or that which threatens our safety.  But then we have situations like Charlottesville, and although there is one side of the confrontation whose beliefs I disagree with, I don’t imagine I could call upon God to destroy these people with an opposing point of view, asking God to cause them to be lying dead, as the Egyptians were along the shore, for that would go against the other part of God I know, the loving God, for somehow, I can’t forget that part of God too. Here we are in the messiness. If I want a God of power and might to always line up on the right side of my judgment and take decisive divine action to eradicate my enemies, then I have to imagine that I might be on the opposing side of someone else’s judgment, and then I would want God’s exuberant mercy to be upon me, so I must in turn, want God’s exuberant mercy to be upon them. We need to look into the messiness.

It is complex to know how to read faithfully these texts that tell us that YHWH brings both life and death and that our lack of mercy to one another rescinds God’s mercy toward us. Somehow, we need to hold those truths together with God’s power which is always about liberation and always with exuberant mercy, which are also shown in our stories.

I needed some help in making this real to you, in helping you figure out how to walk into the swirling waters, before the dirt and debris settles out of sight, so I’ve asked my friend James to help, for he has worked out how to hold the hard truths of God together with the desire of God for us to be made whole. So I turn the homily over to James now, who will draw us into the story of Moses and then share his own poignant truth.

JAMES –

In the Old Testament story today, the angel of the Lord was going before the Israelite army wherever it moved, and the pillar of cloud took its place right behind them too. God was protecting them, in the front and in the back. But then both armies, the Egyptians and the Israelites, were facing each other, head to head.

So the cloud was all alone by itself in the darkness yet the pillar of fire lit up the battlefield. It seemed to keep the armies apart because they didn’t come near one another all night long.

In the morning, Moses stretched out his hand and the sea divided, and after the Israelites came through the opening, Moses stretched out his hand again, and the sea came crashing back together again. All of Pharaoh’s horses, chariots, and chariot drivers were killed. Many people died because God was protecting the Israelites.

Maybe you think that God’s power is for good, but how then did this happen to the Egyptians? How was the killing of these people good?

Here’s what I am thinking.

God is about creating life, but when people do things that destroy other people’s lives, God works to destroy that desire in people, or in the case of the Egyptians, since their hearts would not change, God destroyed them.

I remember one time someone inadvertently hit me in the face with a basketball. Now, instead of asking if I was okay, he laughed at me. Oddly enough, that same thing, except worse, happened to him. So, I think that, when that basketball hit him, it probably took away the anger that had made him hit me, because God works to take away wrong desires in our hearts, sometimes by helping us experience what we caused someone else to experience. God didn’t necessarily hurt him, but God gave him a chance to see what it felt to be hurt.

Returning to the Old Testament story, the Lord saved Israel that fateful day from the Egyptians, and they saw their captors, the Egyptians lying dead on the shore. The people of Israel saw the amazing power of the Lord and believed in the Lord and in his servant Moses. They learned a lot that day.

MOTHER BARBARA-

They learned that God’s power is mighty, and God is always in control of what happens, and God’s strength is always used to free the oppressed, and that, when God is involved, it is always a birth to freedom. And they learned that they were worthy of God’s love, that God was entrusting this ragtag group of people who had been beaten down with building a nation which would carry YHWH’s name, and draw the whole world into relationship with each other and with God.

This is true for us too. These messy stories, with both the light and dark characteristics of God, told in hyperbolic fashion, are for us an invitation to grow in our faith, by allowing them to stir our imaginations from a spiritual numbness of an always-easy-to-like God, by allowing the chaos of the messiness to seep into our hearts, to allow God’s goodness and mercy to find those hard and vengeful parts within our souls and loosen the bonds on the goodness within.  The messy stories remind us of the chaos out of which God created order in our Genesis stories. They remind us that God is creating with us all the time. Growing in faith involves us imagining ourselves as capable of more than we believe ourselves to be, a better person than we’ve ever been before, a person strong enough to bear the costs of forgiving others, a person able to acknowledge our own faults and shed our protective self-image, not so God can find our most vulnerable spot and destroy us, but so that Jesus’ resurrection power can create something holy within us. This is the resurrection power of Jesus given to us in our baptism and nourished through the Eucharist—the vision that we are worthy of God’s love, entrusted with God’s mission, forgiven through God’s mercy, and infused with the power of new life. This power is neither contained nor owned by us, but passes through us into others. Our work is to open our eyes to this power in our lives. And here’s a good way to do that.

JAMES –

At my summer camp, we had a high school group counselor offer a devotional. He talked about when he went to a different country. His morning started like any other day – he left his home and went about his day. Then, everyone met at night. They were asked, “Where did you see God today?”. That question really stuck with me. It made me wonder how I would answer that question. Where did I see God today? The Israelites saw God that day when they were saved from what was hurting them. Sometimes we see God that way too. Sometimes we see God in the caring others show us, or that we show them. Sometimes we see God in our own hearts, when we see how we may have hurt someone else and we feel sorry. Sometimes we see God in all the good things that happen to us. I’ve thought a lot about this question. I see God in a lot of places throughout each day.

My question to you is, “Where did you, or where do you expect, to see God today?

MOTHER BARBARA –

God’s power can show up in powerful and mighty ways, as in the crash of the waves which separated the Israelites from their enemies, or in a quiet moment of revelation, as shared in James’ story of the boy’s heart who had done harm, only to have harm done to him. God needs just a sliver of spiritual space for God to make a change happen. It can be in a tiny whisper, uttered in a time of gentle intimacy, or in a clap of thunder, erupting during explosive conversations, in bright flash of lightning, when it seems that our pain is exposed for the world to see, or in the breathless vacuum set around a gently falling autumn leaf, as when people transition from life into death, for even there, we are held by God, and if held by God, then loved by God and showered with God’s mercy.

Look for God today in the places where you’re asked to forgive; when your heart is telling you to forgive; when you have even been asked for your forgiveness and you think it’s going to cost you too much; where you need to be forgiven; in places where you can set people free, or where we are in need of mercy or in giving mercy.

Look for places where God shows up in your life, create sacred spaces for God to enter and grow us in our faith. Imagine a person, a way of life in which we are more capable, more faithful, and more dedicated than we could ever have believed. That’s the resurrection power within you that takes the chaos of the messiness of our sacred stories and of our own humble lives and creates for good. Amen.

 

Putting on our own Christ-garment

September 10, 2017
14th Sunday after Pentecost Exodus 12:1-14 / Romans 13:8-14 / Matt. 18:15-20
The Rev. Carenda Baker preached at St. Andrew’s, Shippensburg

Last week I was on my way home from Chambersburg and I stopped at the Sunoco station on Walnut Bottom Road, just where the entrance/exit ramps to Rt. 81, exit 29 are located. When I went inside to pay for gas, the friendly cashier greeted me, and then said, “Are you a chef?” I had no clue where that question came from, but I laughed and said, “No, in no one’s wildest imagination would I ever be a chef!” Then she said, “Are you a baker?” Still clueless about her line of questioning, I said “No, but my last name is Baker”. Then I said, “I am an Episcopal priest”. I was wearing a black clergy shirt. As I sometimes do on the way home, I had slipped out of “uniform” by removing the detachable white collar. Without the collar, it was just a black shirt, so I finally understood why she was asking about my occupation. After apologizing to me, the cashier launched us into an incredible theological conversation. “Since you’re a pastor, let me ask you a question”, she said. “What do you think about Muslims who believe Jesus is the Son of God?” Talk about a curve ball! I told her I knew that some Muslims believe Jesus was a prophet of God. Tentatively I asked, “Is it important to you that Jesus is the Son of God?”, to which she replied emphatically and with a hint of impatience, “Yes, he is God’s Son.” She continued, “I am a Muslim and I believe Jesus is God’s Son. A lot of people tell me this can’t be. That I can’t be a Muslim and believe Jesus is God’s Son”. I responded, “I believe it is the same God we worship but in different ways. I don’t see a problem with your believing Jesus is the Son of God”. She thanked me profusely and said that I was the only Christian besides her sister she had ever met who thought we worshiped the same God, adding “and my sister is really into her Jesus as Lord and Savior”. She went on to say that her father was Muslim and her mother was Christian. Her father had told his children that he didn’t care what faith they practiced, as long as they practiced one. Just before I left, she said – gesturing toward her co-worker – “Pray for us.” I asked her name, and told her I certainly would pray for them. The exchange left me scratching my head – and smiling.

Do you know the cliche, “Clothes make the man / clothes make the woman?” When we put on a uniform of any kind, it makes a statement. Whether it’s a cap and gown, a sports, band, or military service uniform, nurses’ scrubs, a doctor’s “white coat” or a priest’s collar, how we dress says something about who we are and what we value in life.

Each of today’s Scripture readings offers us a wake-up call to become “fashion conscious”. The good news today is found in the thread that runs through the biblical story of God and humanity, and what it looks like when a God of love acts. “God is love” are words we’ve heard and read in Scripture. But this can be awfully confusing because the culture we live in believes we can love just about anything: ice cream, the Phillies or Pirates, the flowers in our garden, a certain piece of music, making money. Most often when the word “love” is used outside a community of faith, it’s referring to sentimental or romantic feelings. But love in its Christian understanding is an “action word”. It is not the same as simply liking someone or something, or having pleasant feelings. Love for Christians is made visible through actions.

We pick up the Exodus story today where the Israelites have been enslaved in Egypt for many years, and God has called Moses to lead them out of slavery. Moses tells the people something big is about to happen. At first, the passage sounds like it’s all about rules they must follow in a carefully choreographed religious ritual – sacrifice of a lamb, blood on the doorposts and lintel, eating a meal together with specific foods. And those directions are there, but the directions are all for the sake of being prepared to act. God is about to act powerfully on their behalf and they have a part to play in what will happen. They need only the essentials, because they are about to become extremely active people riding the freedom train out of Egypt. Time cannot be wasted. They dare not be weighed down with multiple layers of clothing, or have a bunch of bling jangling at their wrists and swaying round their necks. We’re talking simplicity here, minimalism. Fully dressed and ready for action. Sandals fastened and a staff in hand to help them move swiftly over a lot of rugged terrain in a short amount of time. The God of love and justice is going to liberate them. They need to be dressed for liberation.

Thousands of years later, Paul writes to the Christians in Rome, reminding them that they follow one who was willing to be completely undressed, if you will, figuratively and literally. Jesus let himself become totally vulnerable as a human being to show that the God of love acts to reveal – reveal everything that is sick, sinful, evil, divisive, and self- serving in the world – in order to save and heal the world. The Christians in Rome know the story of Jesus’ life – about his preaching, teaching and healing. They know, too, about his death and resurrection. They have chosen to follow Jesus’ as the Way, so they have “put on” Christ in their baptism.

Paul reminds the Christians in Rome what he had taught them, and what their baptism meant. Their old way of life has been stripped away, and they are newly clothed in the Spirit of Christ. God’s people do not wear spiritual “hand me downs”. Always there is a fresh and promising expression of Christ’s life in the person who is baptized.

This radical and life transforming cleansing bath, this sacrament of baptism has gone through many changes in the 2,000 year history of Christianity. In the early medieval age, between the years 300 and 400 C.E. baptism involved a two to three- year period of instruction called the catechumenate. During this period candidates to be baptized participated only in the first part of worship, the service of the Word. They were dismissed from the assembly before Holy Eucharist. Following that intense two to three year period of instruction, and after thorough examination – including an exorcism pronounced over them to insure that Satan truly had been put to flight – when the day finally came for the candidates to be baptized, usually on the night of the Easter Vigil , the men and women were separated into two different areas, because they entered the baptismal waters completely naked to be immersed. Plunged under the water – just as vulnerable and naked as the day they were born – they symbolically went with Christ to the grave in his death, and came up out of the water, raised to new life with him in his resurrection. As they emerged from the water after being baptized, each newly baptized Christian was dressed in a clean white garment, symbolic of the love, light, and life of Christ they had just put on. They now belonged to a community, Christ’s living body, the Church, and were welcomed to their first experience of receiving Holy Eucharist.

We need reminding sometimes, too, just like the Christians in Rome did. The apostle Paul tells them to “put on Christ “. What that means for us is that we readily admit we cannot conjure up Christ-likeness all by ourselves. “Putting on Christ” requires humility and vulnerability. It is not a do-it-yourself self-improvement project. It means seeking to live more and more with an undefended heart that is open to the Holy Spirit’s influence. Putting on Christ is a process and a way of life. It requires intentionality and being formed through the disciplines of prayer, Scripture reading, worship and participation in the Sacraments, and commitment to sharing ourselves and our gifts in the life of the faith community. “Putting on Christ” is what enables us to love our neighbors as ourselves, to act towards others the way we want to be treated.

In another of the epistles, the letter to the Colossians, the writer describes even more clearly what being clothed in Christ looks like. Listen to Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of Colossians 3:12-14 in his book The Message:

“So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be even tempered, content with second place, quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It’s your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it.”

The God who is love has clothed us in a gracious and spacious garment of reconciliation, restoration and right relationship. It is a garment woven with the fabric of God‘s own love. It needs no sequins, no flashy “bling”, no matching accessories to make it stand out and be noticed.

The God of love and hope acts, drawing us into the future where all things will be reconciled and made whole. And this work of reconciliation is what Jesus describes in the gospel reading from Matthew. Jesus assumes that where there are people, there will be conflict and disagreement, even among the faithful. He offers practical and wise direction about how we can, in love, care for relationships with our brothers and sisters in the faith community, how we can practice loving our neighbor as our self. The way to deal with conflict is not through separation, exclusion, punishment, or “ex- communication”. It is not about three strikes and you’re out. It is not about forgiving only a prescribed number of times, and then dusting off our hands and saying, “Oh well, we tried”. The love in action Jesus describes here means doing the hard work of tending relationships by speaking the truth in love when we disagree, while keeping our open hand extended toward the other.

We all know there are times when we just don’t like some people very much. It’s true in our families, it’s true in the culture around us, and it’s true in the life of congregations. Love does not mean we will always have feelings of pleasantness, ease, and comfort in our interactions with each other. Continuing to love in times of disagreement and conflict is neither easy nor comfortable, but it’s necessary. The fact that Jesus says when two or three are gathered in his name, he is there among them means that God is present witnessing the interactions, the efforts, the negotiations we offer to care for the community. God cares and wants to help us. Building, restoring, and maintaining relationships of truth, love, and forgiveness are that important.

The God who is Love acts – to liberate and save, forgive and heal, acts to empower us to join God in creating that future where everything finally will be reconciled and made whole. So let’s take a look at the condition of our own Christ garment. Where is it frayed, wearing thin, or maybe even starting to tear? Perhaps you are in need of liberation from something that’s dragging you down, holding you back from mirroring Christ’s love. Maybe you have difficulty accepting the fact that God believes you are worth saving. Or maybe there is a situation, a sin, a habit with which we repeatedly wrestle. Perhaps we need assurance of forgiveness and the courage and faith with God’s help, to begin again. Maybe there are tender wounded places in us that need healing, which we keep well hidden. Most of us will have at least one situation where we need the Spirit’s help to put love into action, to let Christ’s light shine through us.

We have been clothed with the Spirit of Christ, dressed like royalty in new and abundant life. The risen Christ is God’s designer label. Christ is God’s handmade wardrobe for us. Our Christ-likeness is practical, absolutely appropriate year-round wear, ready for any weather. This clothing will never go out of fashion. If anything, this garment of Christ-likeness will become even more valuable and precious the longer we wear it and grow into it.

So what do you think? Do clothes make the woman or man? Let’s take our holy fashion sense out into the world this week and see! It just might be that Christ’s light will shine so brightly in us that others will recognize Gods’ love in our actions, and they, along with us – will give glory to God in heaven. Amen.

Civil Disobedience which changed the world – Sermon 8/27

August 27, 2017
12th Sunday after Pentecost, Year A Exodus 1:8-2:10
The Rev. Carenda Baker

What would you think if I were to say to you: “WHAT YOU DO THIS WEEK WILL CHANGE THE WORLD”? Before you make a hasty judgment about this crazy notion, I invite you to just let that statement simmer on the back burner of your minds and hearts for the next few minutes: What I do this week will change the world.

Two women once made a decision, took a risk, and changed the world. It was simultaneously a small gesture and a heroic act. They disobeyed the law of the land. And through their act of disobedience God moved to rescue a people from oppression. Their names are Shiphrah and Puah, names that are not familiar to us, but names that belong among the most well known of our foremothers in the faith.

The book of Exodus opens on a chilling note. There is a new Pharaoh in town, who is concerned about the growing population of the Hebrew people, and their potential for gaining power and joining forces with Egypt’s enemies. Pharaoh seems unaware of his own country of Egypt’s history – that for generations the Hebrew people, whom he has pegged as a looming threat, had been considered allies and honored guests. He “did not know Joseph”, the Hebrew slave, who became a trusted leader, and helped save Egypt from famine. He did not know or did not care about his country’s history.

So this new Pharaoh, driven by his ignorance, insecurity, and fear first enslaves the Hebrews, and then turns to even more sinister means to stop the population increase of Hebrews. He orders these two Hebrew women Shiphrah and Puah, who are present at and help with the birth of babies, to kill all the Hebrew boys that are delivered.
Ironically, it is the girls and women in this opening chapter of Exodus – apparently of no account to Pharaoh, of whom he should be afraid, because first these two Hebrew midwives, and then three others – Moses’ mother, his older sister Miriam, and Pharaoh’s own Egyptian daughter – prove to be his undoing. And please take note, that

Moses’ sister and Pharaoh’s daughter would likely have been young – probably teenagers.

Just think for a moment about those two midwives Shiphrah and Puah. Their daily work is to help deliver babies, to witness new life come into the world. Their daily work is to watch these tiny miracles arrive. They are the first to see and touch God’s promise and possibility, cradled gently in their hands. And now? Now they are expected to become death dealers, to participate in state-sponsored killing, to spread Pharaoh’s wave of control and terror? What are they to do? They have a decision to make. They are women of love and compassion. They deal in life and hope, in God’s dreams for the future. They decide to actively exercise their God-given wisdom and courage. They become creatively subversive. They make up a story to tell Pharaoh about why his plan to reduce the Hebrew population is not working: “We’re sorry your Majesty, but the Hebrew women are just not like Egyptian women. The Hebrew women are hardy and give birth too quickly, delivering the babies before we can get there. The Hebrew women are rough and ready, begging your pardon your Highness, so different from your genteel and delicate Egyptian women”. Shiphrah and Puah take action to de-rail the killing of Hebrew baby boys using non-violent resistance.

It is a courageous act of civil disobedience that helps change the tide of history. They are the first two links in a chain of many people who will eventually be lead out of slavery and oppression in Egypt by Moses. Liberation starts here, with two women willing to say “no” to an act of cruelty and injustice.

These two women likely never considered that their actions would change the world, but they did – by remaining faithful and doing what was in their power to do. Of Shiphrah and Puah the text says they “feared God”. They recognize the ultimate power of God over empire, and they show loyalty to God. They continue to do their life-giving work with integrity and help save a people by following the dictates of their hearts, and by heeding the call of conscience.

Maybe you’ve heard about another rescue story that happened earlier this summer on July 8th in Panama City, Florida. Roberta Ursrey, along with her two sons, 8-year old Stephen and 11-year old Noah, her mother, and other members of her family were enjoying a nice summer day at the beach. The two boys were in the water swimming when suddenly they found themselves swept away from shore by a strong riptide. The boys were suddenly unable to swim back to shore and began yelling for help. There was no lifeguard on the beach. Their mother quickly swam out to try to help, but was soon overwhelmed by the current as well, and also found herself unable to get back to shore. Her mother, the boys’ grandmother, followed them into the water in an attempt to reach them, along with other family members, and eventually others who wanted to help. Soon there were nine people unable to get back to shore, all in need of rescuing and in danger of drowning. As each minute passed, the situation became more frightening.

Someone dialed 911. Eventually a police officer arrived and called for a boat rescue, but there was grave concern that the boat would not arrive in time. It was at that moment that Jessica and Derek Simmons, both strong swimmers who had just arrived at the scene, came up with a rescue plan. They knew that even though they were strong swimmers, there was no way they could save nine people by themselves, and so they gathered the crowd on the beach into a rescue team. In a matter of minutes, first 12, then 25, then 50 and eventually 80 people worked together to form a human chain, one that reached out through the water far enough to reach the nine people at risk of drowning.

One by one the nine people were carefully passed along the human chain until all of them were brought safely to shore. The chain had been formed just in time. Roberta, the boys’ mother, had just started to black out when she was reached. She later reported that she was sure she was about to die moments before help arrived. Roberta’s sixty-seven year old mother experienced a heart attack as she was being brought to shore, and was rushed to the hospital. She is now recovering well. Surely without the quick thinking and cooperative efforts of the people on shore, lives would have been lost.

After the rescue, Roberta Ursrey said: “I am so grateful. These people were God’s angels that were in the right place at the right time. I owe my life and my family’s lives to them. Without them, we wouldn’t be here.”
Jessica Simmons, one of the quick-thinking lead rescuers said: “I knew we had to do something. To see people of different races and genders come into action to help total strangers is absolutely amazing. People who didn’t even know each other went HAND IN HAND IN A LINE, into the water to try and reach them. Pause and just IMAGINE that.”

Strong riptides and dangerous currents come in many forms, and at any moment, any of us can find ourselves in need of a human chain of support, or can find ourselves with the opportunity to be a part of such a chain.

Might it be possible that we regularly underestimate the power of our actions, and the difference we can make in the world?
Friends, our job as people of faith is to listen closely for where God is calling us to act, individually and as part of a chain with others to help bring new life into our world.

Maybe it will be when we seek reconciliation in a relationship with a family member – a friend – or a co-worker.

Maybe it will be when we admit we are holding on to a stereotype of some person or group that is false, and we ask for God’s forgiveness and help to change our thinking.

Maybe it will be the moment we find our voice to challenge another when some person or group is being mistreated. This could include a face to face encounter in person. Or maybe you will find your voice and take a stand to support the victim of cyber-bullying.

The diocesan youth and leaders serving here this weekend among the residents and staff of the Episcopal Home have worked enthusiastically to share God’s light and love. So how will each of us join in spreading that wave of goodness, faithfulness, and joy in the coming week?

Dear people of God: we have been challenged here by God’s living Word, and will receive nourishment and strength at God’s table. Let us pray to be the vessels used by the Holy Spirit to breathe hope, healing, and reconciliation – to bring the good news of liberation – that will change us and this world – to the glory of the God of our salvation. Amen.

Negative Space and God’s yearning: Sermon for 8/13/17

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church

The Rev. Barbara Hutchinson

Proper 14, Year A

August 13, 2017

In art, negative space is defined as the space around and between the subjects of an image. Negative space may be most evident when the space around a subject, not the subject itself, forms an interesting or artistically relevant shape, and such space is occasionally used to create an artistic effect as the “real” subject of an image. The negative space, the empty space, becomes what we should be looking at or attending to, or where we find that which inspires us, and amazingly, our brain seems to leap to see this image in the negative space rather adroitly.  I’m sure we’ve all seen the image portraying a white vase and have been fascinated when our eyes seem to quickly shift to see the profiles of two silhouette faces looking at each other. The negative space is what we were actually supposed to see.

Negative space can draw our attention and reveal the truth in art, as well as, I believe, in relationships, in family dynamics. After all, don’t you often find that the family secret is what really drives the dynamics in a family? That which will never, could never be shared, contains the power to control behavior for generations to come. Sometimes you may find it is not what is said in an argument that really matters, but rather what goes unsaid. Or the absence of the same sweet tone in the mother’s voice to the son who feels less favored, seems to speaks volumes to everyone. The negative space, that which is not spoken, that which is not given, that which is lacking in response or emotion, I believe can strongly influence family dynamics.

Negative space in the way a story is told can also be a powerful tool to reveal the truth the author is inviting us into. This is true in our narrative about Joseph this morning. His father Jacob loved Rachel. It is one of the few places in the bible where love between a husband and wife is mentioned so clearly and succinctly. Jacob loved Rachel, from the moment he set eyes upon her at the well. Yet he was tricked into first marrying her sister Leah. The negative or empty space that drives this narrative is in Jacob’s heart. His other wives, the one he was tricked into marrying and the slaves given to him for procreation of children, bore child after child to him. Ten sons and one daughter were born through women he didn’t love. I imagine he felt some attachment to the children. I imagine he delighted that the promise of God was being fulfilled that he would carry forward the blessing of God to become the father of nations. And I also imagine, when he looked at the family gathered in the evening by the kitchen fire, and he looked from one to the next son, and there was a negative or empty space, always present, where he yearned for one of his own, one born from his love of Rachel. I imagine the boys picked up on this, saw the wistful look in their father’s eyes as he looked at them and then beyond them, staring off into space, and even in that fraction of a second of the gaze, they knew they weren’t enough. The empty space in Jacob’s heart held the truth that they always knew, but never talked about, they were not enough. Jacob loved Rachel. He wanted their union to bear fruit, so he could love their child with a love he not yet experienced with his other children. He longed to know how the depth of his love for Rachel, the wife he loved, would be deepened by bearing a child together.

It is no wonder that the brothers despised Joseph. Upon his birth, they saw the lift in their father’s spirit, they noticed the adoring way their father looked upon this baby. His face would shine with a gladness they had never seen before, they noticed the increased closeness between Jacob and Rachel, which had not ever been seen between their mothers and Jacob. Jacob’s empty space had been filled with Joseph’s birth. The empty space, the negative space, the space filled with longing for their father’s love and affection, within the brothers had been amplified. The negative space of longing for love drives the action in this story.

Maybe Jacob could have, should have, kept his favoritism more hidden. His blatant display of this special love of Joseph in the gift of the fancy long-sleeved coat, which signified a special status, one that reversed the cultural norm that the eldest son typically held, didn’t help. And Joseph sharing his dreams where his brothers would all bow down to him, may not have needed to be said in that way, with Joseph naively expecting them to be delighted in that fact, that the one called to be their helper would become their master. After all, hadn’t he heard the wisdom that if it’s not kind nor necessary, then don’t say it? What was he thinking? Or maybe Joseph sensed his brothers’ negative space, the unspoken bad energy, and Joseph wanted to get back at them. The only way to combat their hatred of him was to claim a sense of dominion and privilege, and we know that’s always a slippery slope.  And maybe Joseph didn’t have to come back and tattle on his brothers and be the righteous one in a way that further separated him from his brothers. But I bet none of that mattered. The fullness Jacob felt at the birth of Joseph set this plot in motion. The loneliness, the yearning for more, the emptiness in the hearts of the brothers each time Jacob looked at them and then beyond toward whom he wished for, the one he would love upon Joseph’s birth, drove the action in this story. The set up for the confrontation experienced in our narrative this morning happened way before Joseph’s dreams and his stumbling upon the brothers out in the wilderness, away from their father’s protection.

We have negative space, that which is not spoken, that which reveals the truth, that which drives the action, here in our story before Joseph is born, during his life with his brothers, and after their selling of him to the Midianites, off to Egypt.

Just imagine for a moment the horror of the family life after the brothers return without Joseph? The negative space, the words not to be spoken, that words which hold the truth that can never be shared, that the brothers came home with when they allowed their father to come to the incorrect conclusion that Joseph had been killed? The brothers may have gotten rid of Joseph physically, but he was still there in the household. I can’t imagine that any of those brothers could ever have looked their father in his eyes again, for they would see the emptiness they saw before Joseph was born and they could not bear it, because they have now caused it. Emptiness, deception, despair, this empty space ruled the household and drove the action.

There are two challenging questions for us in this story. I’ll let you pick which one fits you right now.

The first one is: Does God, like Jacob looking at and beyond his 10 sons, when looking into our souls, want more from us? Does God see our incompleteness or our unwillingness to give all that we have and all that we are to our life in God, and yearn for more from us? Do we need to look at whether we love God with all our heart, mind, body and soul? Is there more that we can give, more whom we can love, more to whom we can reach, more within us to stretch, more within us to care, space within us to move beyond ourselves. I believe God wants us to go there, until the space within us has been wholly given over to be God’s space, when all possibilities are explored, when all doors are thrown open, when we no longer quiver in fear of not having enough if we give it all away, and we embrace the love of God. God sees the negative space in our soul and doesn’t want that to be our truth.

However, of course, these challenging questions beg the larger question – does God love us in our incompleteness? In our allowing of ourselves to not be fully who we can be? Absolutely yes. As Desmond Tutu says, “There is nothing we can do to make God love us more, and there is nothing we can do to make God love us less.” Yet, that statement should not lead us into a place of complacency, for I do believe that God is yearning for what we have not yet birthed in our lives, as Jacob yearned for Joseph before his birth, so that the negative space, the unspoken parts of our lives no longer drive the action of our lives, but rather it is the God part of our souls, the creative positive part of our souls, that drives the course of our lives.

Our best chance of changing negative space to God space in our hearts is when we allow ourselves to be transformed, when we allow our faith to go from our head to our heart, when we stretch out our hand and receive something life-giving from Christ, his body and blood, and we change, and we love. As Christians, we want our actions to speak louder than our non-actions. We want the truth we claim as members of the body of Christ to be stronger than the secrets we hide.

So, the first challenging question is: does God see the emptiness or negative space in our souls and yearn for us to become more? or birth more of God’s goodness in our lives? The answer to that question for each one of us is “absolutely yes”.

The second challenging question is: rather than seeing the emptiness or incompleteness that we need to fill, does God see the negative space, wishing that we have it all? Does the generous and abundant God want to give us more? The answer to that question is undoubtedly “yes”, but the question to ourselves is “Can we receive that?” Can we take it all from God? For that will involve opening ourselves, creating a space for vulnerability, for change, for radical reorientation of our lives, to letting grace cling to and release pain, to finding ourselves worthy of God’s love.

Each challenge is right and hard, whether it is allowing ourselves to be transformed to become all that God desires of us, or whether it is allowing ourselves to be transformed to receive the fullness of God’s love. Negative space has power, but God’s love has greater power. Let us allow that, God’s love, to be what drives our lives. Amen.

 

Sermon for the Feast of the Transfiguration by Jim Smith

St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church

Mr. Jim Smith

The Feast of the Transfiguration

August 6, 2017

Good Morning. For those of you who do not know me as well, my name is Jim Smith and in two weeks I will be heading to Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, where I will be pursuing degrees in Geography and International Relations. During my seemingly brief five years at St. Andrews, I have had the pleasure to serve on the Vestry, sing in our choir, and find meaningful worship opportunities that have shaped and strengthened my faith. As I look out on my parish family, I feel an overwhelming sense of community, the very feeling that gives me comfort sharing my thoughts, feelings, and reflections upon this set of scripture. My goal today is not to prophesy, but as Peter in our Epistle today suggests instead, share thought-provoking analysis guided by the Holy Spirit as we celebrate Christ’s transfiguration.

I want to first think about the miracles of God. They are wondrous and infinite; I am looking at a room full of them right now. More specifically though, we must think of the miracles of God through Christ. What first comes to mind when we begin discussing Jesus’s miracles? Christ walking on water in the stormy and turbulent Sea of Galilee, his feeding of the five thousand with few loaves and fishes, raising Lazarus from the dead, his many healings, treating those afflicted with anything from blindness to leprosy, turning water into wine? All of these miracles and the countless others were all performed for the same core purposes: to make others believe in the glory of God, to strengthen the weak of faith, and to teach vital lessons and values to the crowds of all kinds watching these unbelievable feats. I can just imagine an entire village of curious observers watching a strange man, a carpenter’s son from Nazareth, performing these acts, seeing the astounding truth of God for the first time. This miracle though, is different.

Widely considered by religious historians and scholars one of Christ’s great miracles, the Transfiguration was not performed or made known to the same type of audience. Peter, John, and James, Jesus’s most faithful and outspoken disciples, were already believers, already witnesses to the truth and power of the Lord. Why else would they have even been present? This particular mountain, Mt. Tabor in Galilee, was a treacherous climb in a rugged and inhospitable landscape. These disciples would not have journeyed over one hundred stories skyward over this craggy terrain just to pray if it weren’t with the Son of Man. So, we must then look at context, the events that surround this miracle to understand why God felt these disciples needed to witness it.

We need to look no further than the previous verses in the book of Luke, the event that Luke tells us took place six days before this one: Jesus telling his disciples of his impending death and resurrection. In Luke 9:22,

“The Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised.”

As one can imagine, upon hearing this the disciples must have been aghast and alarmed. Their Jesus? Their god? Suffering, rejected, killed? This was first time they were clearly told that the Prince of Peace was to meet his ever-so-violent end. This could have occupied days of conversation… “No Lord, you must not go, you do not deserve it. You don’t have to die; your work has just begun.” But Jesus finished this dialogue with his resistant devotees with a curious foreshadowing. Luke 9:27 tells us,

“But truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God.”

And Jesus, as always, was exactly right. When on the mountain, two significant figures, Moses and Elijah, came down from heaven as apparitions in dazzling white. This was the aforementioned Kingdom. But it made them no less objectionable to Jesus’s fate, who was speaking to his fellow prophets about that very subject– his departure. But then, when the cloud encompassed them, they too were thrust into God’s conversation.

“This is my son, my chosen, listen to him!”

And although these words from God the Father certainly didn’t make them fonder of Jesus’s fate, it made them less resistant. The miracle of the transfiguration was not to establish faith in Christ, but faith in his future, so that he could live and die for our salvation.

But what can we, two-thousand years later, take and learn from this episode? For the mortals in this encounter, specifically Peter, seeing and hearing their God in a brand-new way was a peak moment in their already-strong faiths. And how does he react to this mountaintop experience? By trying to hold onto it, trying to artificially extend his time with three of God’s greatest servants ever to live. Can we blame him for this response? What would you do in the face of Moses, Elijah, and Christ himself? Instead of being continuously paralyzed with awe, as many would be, Peter spoke, made a suggestion, unafraid of being wrong. Peter saw the kingdom of God and wanted more time in it, as we all would.

This sequence of events reminds me of a semi-often occurrence in my own life. Some of my closest moments with God and God’s kingdom are in my dreams, that weary, vulnerable state where we have seemingly no control. But then, just as in a frightening dream, I suddenly awake at the first sense of consciousness and excitement due to a closeness to God. Frustration replaces wonder as I realize what has happened. I may aggressively push my head into my pillow, trying once more to fall asleep, quickly attempting to reconnect and pick up my dream, my experience with God right where I left off. To my dismay this never seems to work.

The lesson we learn from these phenomena is a vital one. We mustn’t try to hold on to these mountaintop experiences. Whenever we see glimpses of the kingdom of God and reach these mountaintops we must let them shape us, our actions, our faith. How was Peter different as he journeyed down that treacherous trail? By letting our intimate encounters with God shape us, however brief or fleeting they may be, we afford ourselves the opportunity to live as servants of the Lord.

The transfiguration allowed Peter and the others an understanding of the future of Christ– no not just his suffering, rejection, death, and resurrection, but this our worship and modeling of the values he so tried to teach. My parish family, this the future of Christ!