Tag: sermon

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Sermon: Proper 22 RCL C – “Mulberry Tree”

TreePhoto by Do Photography on Unsplash

Did you know that the longest fingernail (actually a thumbnail) is 6 feet 4 inches? Did you know that the loudest burp by a female is 107 decibels (the equivalent of being close up to a jackhammer)? Did you know that the longest kiss lasted over 58 hours? And did you know that the greatest distance to catch a thrown grape in the mouth is 354 feet? World’s records. If someone is willing to do something crazy, there’s bound to be someone around to measure it. There are also some remarkable human feats that have been accomplished.

A few weeks back, ten of us came together as a team—St. Matthew’s Saints—and walked the 5K at the Great Land Run. For those not proficient in the metric system (myself included), 5K (kilometers) is roughly 3.1 miles. You’ll be happy to know that as a team, we came in second place out of six. The only team to beat us was the EHS Cross Country runners. I’m OK coming in second behind them.

Not only do they keep track of teams, but they track by age groups. For the St. Matthew’s Saints, Frank Baker came in first in his age group, Mary Henneke came in third in hers, and Max Baker came in third for the shorter folks. I… well, I came in 172nd out of 195 runners, and I lived to tell about it. My time for walking 3.1 miles was 54 minutes and 7 seconds, an average of 17 minutes and 46 seconds per mile. There are some remarkable human feats… that was not one of them; however, at the Berlin Marathon held earlier this week, Eliud Kipchoge ran a full marathon (26.2 miles) and set a new world record: 2 hours 1 minute, and 9 seconds. I walked a mile in about 18 minutes. This man ran 26 miles at a pace of 4 minutes and 37 seconds per mile. That’s the difference between running a bit over three mph compared to 13 mph. Eliud set a world record. I did not.

This is only one of the amazing number of remarkable feats accomplished by humans. Still, in all that the human race had done, I’ve never come across a single person who has said to a mulberry tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea,” and had it obey them. Yet, when the apostles said to Jesus, “Increase our faith!” Jesus said if you had faith the size of a mustard seed—in other words—if your faith was the equivalent of my 18-minute mile—you could move that mulberry tree, so perhaps Jesus did not mean for us to understand this literally but was instead using a figure of speech to make a point.

This past week during our Wednesday night study, we discussed the use of a metaphor in Holy Scripture. A metaphor is a word that symbolically refers to another. For example, we see many times in scripture where God is referred to as a rock, but we know this doesn’t literally mean that God is a rock. To have faith the size of a mustard seed and be able to move a tree from one place to another is not a metaphor. Still, it is also a figure of speech: a rhetorical hyperbole—an over-the-top exaggeration, yet when Jesus uses it, he speaks of a greater truth.

In the nineteenth chapter of Matthew, we are told of Jesus’ encounter with the rich young man. The man came to Jesus and asked what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus says to him, “If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” The young man asks, “Which ones?” Jesus replied, “You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Hearing this, the young man becomes excited. He’s on his way, so he says to Jesus, “All these I have kept. What do I still lack?” Jesus tells him, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” Jesus said, “All you need to do is say to that mulberry tree, be uprooted and planted in the sea, and you will inherit eternal life.” And the young man went away sad because he could not do that.

If that were the end of it, then in all likelihood, we would all go away sad because there is a mulberry tree in all our lives that we can’t seem to move. Think about it. I can pick many mulberry trees in my life. Things that I’ve worked to change, sins that I’ve attempted to overcome, anger that I think I’ve set aside that keeps welling up… run through the list: pride, hypocrisy, gluttony—It’s all there. Spin the wheel and see which one pops up today. All of them are like that young man and his wealth; they are mulberry trees with roots into my soul that just won’t give an inch. If eternal life depended upon my ability to move them, I would catch up to that young man so that we could commiserate together because, in the end, we would both be damned. Fortunately for us, that is not the end of the story.

After the rich young man went his way, Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” Jesus said, “Truly I say to you, only with difficulty can someone who is unable to move the mulberry tree gain eternal life. It would be easier for Father John to squeeze into a pair of skinny jeans than for such a person to enter the Kingdom of God.”  When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God… with a faith in God that is no larger than a mustard seed… all things are possible.” Moving the mulberry tree and gaining eternal life is not about what I can do. Instead, it is about my faith in what my God can do—and all things are possible through Him. As St. Paul says, “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Corinthians 15:56-57) And again, he says, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?”—who will move this mulberry tree in my life?—“Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:24-25a)

There are things in our lives that we strive to change and overcome, and so often, we fail. They are like trying to move mulberry trees into the sea. However, just because we fail does not permit us to stop trying and pushing forward, but those failures are not a reason to walk away sad and defeated. We must go at it again. Yet, we can rest in confidence that, in the end, Jesus has already moved the mulberry tree for us. As St. Paul said, the Lord Jesus gives us the victory.

One final note—a bit of an aside: I said that moving the mulberry tree and saying you could move it into the sea was a rhetorical hyperbole, an over-the-top exaggeration. Fine. However, I am not one to limit God, so I firmly believe that should God ever need such a remarkable feat accomplished, it will be done, for if he can raise a man from the dead, moving a tree, no matter how deeply rooted, will never be an issue.

Let us pray: Holy God, we come to you with humility, knowing that the answer to our challenges is not wholly within us. We come with steadfastness and faith, knowing that your love for us is everlasting. And we come with hope, knowing that all things are possible in you. We come to you and give you thanks for the victory you have won for us. Amen.

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Sermon: St. Michael and All Angels

Tomorrow is the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels, and Sunday, October 2nd, is the traditional date for celebrating the Feast of the Guardian Angels. We’ll combine those two days today.

My friend, St. Josemaría Escrivá, had a special devotion to his guardian angel. He would say, “For years I’ve experienced the constant and immediate assistance of my guardian angel, even in the smallest material particulars.” For example, it was his habit to wake at 6 a.m. every morning, so when his alarm clock broke, he turned to his guardian angel and asked for assistance. That angel never failed him, waking him at the correct time every day. Escrivá would refer to him as, “My dear watchmaker.”

At another time, he and friends were playing bocce ball. When it was his turn, Escrivá threw particularly well but immediately declared, “That doesn’t count—I was helped by my guardian angel. I won’t do that anymore.” Later he would confess how ashamed he was for asking his guardian angel to help with such a trivial matter.

And one more: while in seminary, a professor told them how priests, in addition to their guardian angels, have a ministerial archangel that watches over them. This he took to heart. His friend and biographer, Alvaro del Portillo, writes that whenever “[Escrivá] was leaving the room, he would pause, almost imperceptibly, before going through the doorway” to allow his two angels to go before him. Alvaro said, “This was a tiny detail, unnoticed by the others, which showed how he lived in relationship with his guardian angel and ministerial archangel.”

Referring to angels, the Catholic catechism states, “The existence of the spiritual, non-corporeal beings that Sacred Scripture usually calls ‘angels’ is a truth of faith.  The witness of Scripture is as clear as the unanimity of Tradition.” It further states, “From infancy to death human life is surrounded by their (the angels) watchful care and intercession. Beside each believer stands an angel as protector and shepherd leading him to life. Already here on earth the Christian life shares by faith in the blessed company of angels and men united to God,” and St. Thomas Aquinas writes, “The angels work together for the benefit of us all.”

Not only do they watch over and guard, but they are also God’s messengers. The word angel is derived from the Greek word angelos, meaning messenger. Perhaps the most important message being delivered by Gabriel to Mary announcing the Incarnation. Throughout scripture, we hear of their work: the angel that freed Peter from prison, the grand visions of them by Isaiah and John in his Revelation, and how they ministered to Jesus following the forty days in the wilderness.

Like Escrivá, you don’t have to go far to find or hear stories about angels. There are many, many books of accounts and encounters (some of which claim that angels are, in fact, space aliens, but we won’t go down that road.)

We do not worship them. Upon seeing one, John tells us, “I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel…but [the angel] said to me, ‘You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.’” We do not worship them, but we do honor and celebrate these ‘fellow servants’ of the Lord. We celebrate their unswerving obedience to God and the many kindnesses they show: watching over and protecting us, bringing us God’s messages, and saving our behinds when we do something especially stupid.

Remember that these guardians and messengers are with you, and give them pause to go before you and protect you.

Let us pray: Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil; May God rebuke him, we humbly pray; And do thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God, thrust into hell Satan and all evil spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls. Amen.

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Sermon: Proper 21 RCL C – “To Proclaim”

A poor fella wants to attend church on a Sunday morning, but when he arrives, he sees that everyone is all nice and clean, but he’s a bit dirty. They’re wearing nice clothes, but his have holes and are patched. They’ve got nice shoes on, but his are so worn that his big toe sticks out on both shoes. So, when he tries to gain entry, he’s told he’ll need to clean up a bit first and put on some nice clothes. He’s told that he’ll need to be proper, and then the door is closed on him. As he sits on the front steps, listening to them sing songs about the love of Jesus, he complains to God about not being allowed in. Then he heard God say, “I know how you feel. They won’t let me in there either.”

From our Psalm this morning:

Praise the Lord, O my soul!
     I will praise the Lord as long as I live…

Who gives justice to those who are oppressed,
     and food to those who hunger.

The Lord sets the prisoners free;
     the Lord opens the eyes of the blind; *
     the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;

The Lord loves the righteous;
     the Lord cares for the stranger; *
     he sustains the orphan and widow,
     but frustrates the way of the wicked.

Have you ever read passages of scripture like this and wondered what all those types of individuals think? I mean, the scriptures say God will give justice to the oppressed, but there are so many who are still oppressed. It says he’ll give food to the hungry, but there are still so many who hunger. I suppose those who don’t believe can’t complain, but what about the believers—those who call on the name of the Lord but who are still oppressed, blind, hungry, and so on? If I found myself in such a position, I might be one to say, “Excuse me, Lord, but would you fulfill some of those promises in my life?” I know you’ve done these kinds of things before.

I read about the crippled woman bent over (bowed down); you healed her. There was the blind man you restored sight to. You cared for plenty of strangers: the ten lepers, the guy whose friends lowered him through the roof, the crippled man in the temple. And you fed the hungry: feeding of the 5,000. Feeding of the 4,000. The miraculous catch of fish. Yes. You’ve done all these things before, so, yeah, I’ll take some of that, but… nothing.

At such a point, we can say, “To heck with all this God business,” or we can look more deeply and discover what is really being said. We can listen, not just to the parts we want to hear, but to all of what scripture says. And that understanding begins at the inauguration of Jesus’ work when he said,

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
    and recovering of sight to the blind,
    to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

“He has anointed me to proclaim.” There’s also the time he got up early in the morning, after healing many the day before, and went away alone into the wilderness. Later, Simon finds him and reports that everyone is looking for him and Jesus said, “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out.” “The reason I came was to proclaim the Kingdom of God.”

As we’ve discussed before, the miracles were not the reason for Jesus’ coming. They were signs of his authority in proclaiming the forgiveness of sins. Remember when he healed the paralytic? Jesus said to the man, “Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven,” but the scribes became angry, so Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, “‘Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’—he then said to the paralytic—‘Rise, pick up your bed and go home.’”

The message—the proclamation of the gospel and the forgiveness of sins was his primary purpose, and even his death upon the cross announced it. This is part of what made Jesus so unpopular with religious leaders. He was proclaiming the Kingdom of God was available to everyone—tax collectors and sinners and all, but the religious leaders believed you would have to pay for your sins. You couldn’t be forgiven just because someone said you were, so when Jesus declared that all who repented were welcomed into the Kingdom… well, the religious leaders got their knickers in a twist. He pointed this out in the parable of the prodigal son.

You know the story: a father with two sons. The younger son asks for and receives his inheritance, then goes out and squanders it. When he hits bottom, he says, “Self, you should go home and work for your father; at least there, you’ll have something to eat.” So he returns home. Dad sees him coming and orders a party to celebrate the return of the lost sheep—his son. However, the older brother—and keep in mind the attitude of the religious leaders who object to Jesus—older brother throws a snit fit and refuses to go to the party. The father implores him, but the son replies, “Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!”

The religious leaders complained to Jesus: we are the ones that are following God’s ways, yet you declare the forgiveness of sins to those who are furthermost from God. That’s not right, they said.

Now, come forward to our Gospel reading for today, which was told almost immediately following the parable of the prodigal son.

We can understand today’s parable in terms of a moral teaching, which it should be. We are called on to care for those in need and we will be partially judged by how we do, but there is more being said, and it relates to the prodigal son and the attitude of the religious leaders.

The poor man, Lazarus, begs at the city gates day and night, and the dogs are more compassionate toward him than the rich man. Eventually, they both die and receive justice: Lazarus to heaven and the rich man to Hades. Seeing Father Abraham, the rich man asks if Lazarus could bring him one tiny drop of water to cool his tongue, for he was in agony in flames. That, of course, is not possible. Hence, the rich man asks if Father Abraham would send someone to his brothers to proclaim the truth so that they might repent and not be punished as he was, but Father Abraham replies, “If they do not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.”

This is a story about the proclamation of the Kingdom of God: the tax collectors and sinners were the ones, not at the city gates, but at the Temple gates, crying out daily for a single drop of cool water to cool their souls—some sign of hope, compassion, mercy from those who were supposed to be rich in God’s word, the religious leaders, but those religious leaders wouldn’t even look at the sinners, associate with them, or speak with them. Jesus is saying to the religious leaders, “Because, in this life, you refused to give the tax collectors and sinners a single drop of the Good News to cool their souls and help them gain the Kingdom of God, then you will receive punishment in the next.”

The parable is a morality story, but more importantly, it is a message for the church. We are the rich. Within us is not just a drop of cool water, but Jesus tells us, “Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” When that poor man complained to God that they wouldn’t let him in church, God said to him, “I know how you feel. They won’t let me in there either.” You are not that kind of church, but let us always be on guard against it. Like Jesus, we want to be about the business of proclaiming the Kingdom of God. As the church, that is our job, so as His church, let us continue to be a place where all who are thirsty and in need of forgiveness and repentance can come and receive Jesus, the Savior of us all.

Let us pray: Everliving God, whose will it is that all should come to you through your Son Jesus Christ: Inspire our witness to him, that all may know the power of his forgiveness and the hope of his resurrection; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

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Sermon: Heritage Sunday / Feast of St. Matthew

The Inspiration of Saint Matthew by Caravaggio

A farm boy got a white football for his birthday. He played with it a while and then accidentally kicked it over into the neighbor’s yard. The old rooster ran out, looked at it, and called the hens to see it.

“Now look here,” the rooster said, “I don’t want you girls to think I’m complaining, but I just want you to see what they are doing next door.”

If I were a chicken, I don’t know if that would motivate me or get me to cross the road and find a less demanding farm.

When it comes to cats, I don’t believe there is anything that motivates them. They do what they want, when they want, although The Queen is motivated to have a nip of scotch when I pour myself one. On the other hand, dogs can be motivated by all sorts of things: affection, play, food (I would make a good dog), and other games they enjoy. People also have motivators. Food, money, fame, power, love, and such, but we are also motivated by negatives: shame, societal expectations, fear, and more. Whether positive or negative, human or animal, a motivator is an external factor that stimulates a desired response and is something learned. In addition, if the motivator is removed—the reward is no longer given, the fear is no longer present—the person or animal may revert to who they were before. If a person is motivated by money and you cut their pay or their hours, then you’ll likely see their productivity decline. That great motivational speaker, Zig Ziglar, said, “Of course, motivation is not permanent. But then, neither is bathing; but it is something you should do on a regular basis.” Motivation is good.

What is similar to motivation is inspiration, but where motivation is an external force that pushes in hopes of attaining a specific response, inspiration is an internal awakening that draws us and pulls us to something greater. The reward or punishment is not present with inspiration. It is nice if there is a reward, but if you’re inspired, you’ll do whatever it is, regardless. Leonardo Davinci didn’t paint the Mona Lisa because someone offered him a cookie. It was an inspiration, something within him that needed to express itself.

Our life with God is the same. Some are positively motivated—they want the reward of heaven—and some are negatively motivated—they’re afraid of hell. That’s one way to do it. These external factors push us toward the desired response: I want to go to heaven, or I want to avoid hell, so I’ll behave in a certain way. However, to be inspired to follow God and his calling on your life is to be drawn in—not for the reward or avoidance of punishment—but by love, by desire, by passion, by relationship.

The image on the front of your booklet this morning is named, The Inspiration of St. Matthew and is located in the church of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome. When we study it, we begin to see the inspiration of God at work.

The angel is making several points, ticking them off with his fingers, and Matthew is staring up at him. Although his pen and tablet are on the desk, Matthew only has eyes for the messenger of God. His focus is singular. Matthew is not concerned with himself—you can’t see it all, but he is standing at his desk with one knee propped up on the seat. The seat itself is tilted and about to fall over, yet Matthew is not concerned with his discomfort or the precariousness of his position. His hand is poised for action, ready to write. And notice the background of the painting—it is all black. Nothing else matters other than the angel and the message. Matthew is not motivated—he’s not looking for a reward or in fear of punishment—Matthew is inspired, and he wasn’t only inspired to write a Gospel. He was inspired from the very moment Jesus walked into that tax collection operation and said, “Follow me,” for we are told, “[Matthew] got up and followed him.” Jesus did not promise him heaven or threaten him with hell. Jesus’ words and presence filled Matthew with such a deep inspiration, a deep sense of call, that without hesitation or any concern for self, discomfort, possessions, danger, and everything else that accepting a call from the Savior can produce, he got up and followed Jesus with his entire self. 

Question: why are we not inspired in such a way to follow Jesus so passionately? I can come up with a few answers but I think, for the most part… we simply won’t allow it. We want to follow Jesus with complete abandon, but we will not give ourselves permission to do so. We say, “Yes, Jesus, I will follow you, but… but I’ve got a family. But I’ve got a job. But I’ve got responsibilities. But I’m afraid of what people will think.” That’s a pretty big “but.” But! what we fail to understand is that Jesus is not asking us to abandon family or job or responsibilities, etc. Jesus is asking us to abandon our lives to him so that he can inspire our life with family, our life at work and with our colleagues, and in all those other areas of responsibility. The Lord does not want our day-to-day life to be separate from our life with Him. So often, in following Christ, we think we’ve got our life with him over here and our life in the world over here, with this nice barrier between them keeping them separate. To be inspired by Jesus as St. Matthew was is to remove that barrier and allow Jesus into every aspect of your life. In doing so, you will no longer feel as though there is this conflict between the two but will instead experience peace in knowing that your life is entirely under the kingship of Christ.

It is not in the prayers we have today, but in our Rite II service each Sunday, the last sentence of the Post-Communion prayer is, “Send us now into the world in peace, and grant us strength and courage to love and serve you with gladness and singleness of heart….” It is that peace, that gladness, and that singleness of heart—our daily lives—that enters us when we allow Jesus to inspire the entirety of our lives. 

Jesus says, “Follow me.” Be inspired, be passionate in your walk with Jesus, and follow him in every aspect of your life.

Let us pray: We thank You, heavenly Father, for the witness of Your Apostle and evangelist Matthew to the Gospel of Your Son our Savior; and we pray that, inspired by his example, we may with ready wills and hearts obey the calling of our Lord to follow him; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever, Amen.

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Sermon: Holy Cross

Preaching Cross at Ruthwell Scotland

The Rev. Nicky Gumbel, the creator of the Alpha Course, discusses how so many Christians wear crosses. Still, he asks a rather interesting question: what if Jesus had been executed during the French Revolution? Would we all wear small guillotines around our necks? Or we could ask: what if he were executed in the United States? Would we all be wearing reproductions of an electric chair? The point is that the cross was a means of execution, not glory, but with all things, God took that means of execution and redeemed it for his purposes, and where there was once shame and horror, there is now glory and love. So, we take this very special day, the Feast of the Holy Cross, and celebrate this great work of our God.

I’ve told you before about the preaching cross discovered in Ruthwell, Scotland, but it is such testimony to the cross of Christ that I’d like to share it with you again.

The cross in Ruthwell is eighteen feet tall and made of stone.  It marks the place where an itinerant priest or monk would come to proclaim the word of God.  Carved into this particular cross are scenes from the Bible, decorative vine work, and eighteen verses of an old English poem.

For centuries it was thought that the eighteen verses comprised the entire poem, but in 1822 a 10th-century book was found that contained the complete text.  The poem is titled “The Dream of the Rood.”

In the poem, an unknown poet dreams of encountering a beautiful tree.  It is the “rood” or cross on which Jesus was crucified.  The cross is gloriously decorated with gold and gems, but the poet can still see ancient wounds inflicted upon it.  The rood tells the poet how it had been forced to be the instrument of Christ’s death, describing how it, too, experienced the nails and thrusts of the spear. 

The rood explains that the cross was once an instrument of torture and death but is now the dazzling sign of humanity’s redemption. Finally, the rood charges the poet to tell his vision to everyone so that all might be redeemed of sin.

Then the young hero – God Almighty – stripped himself.
Firm and unflinching he mounted the high cross.
brave in the sight of many, for he intended to redeem humanity.
I trembled when the young hero clasped me,
but dared not bow down to the earth
No – I would not fall to the ground; I knew full well I must stand firm.
As I, the cross, was raised up – I bore aloft the mighty king – the Lord of Heaven – I dared not stoop.
They pierced me with dark nails – the wounds can still be seen in me – gaping gashes of malice.
I dared do nothing to seal them up, for they mocked us both together.
I was drenched with the blood shed from the man’s side after he had sent out his spirit.
I endured many hard trials on the hill.
I saw the God of hosts violently stretched out.
Darkness with its clouds had covered the Lord’s corpse, the fair radiance,
a shadow moved in, dark beneath the heavens.
All creation wept – all lamented the King’s death.
Christ was on the cross!

Christ and the cross endured the crucifixion, and you and I must endure our own spiritual crucifixion so that, as St. Paul, “If we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin.” (Galatians 6:5-7)

Submit yourself to Christ; do not be afraid to take up the cross he offers and follow him.

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Sermon: Proper 19 RCL C – “Rejoice with Me!”

Photo by MI PHAM on Unsplash

A little something different for you today, and you’ll see the humor in that statement here shortly. I’ll also apologize for the amount of reading I have, but…

The liturgy we follow during our service is almost the same every week. The exact words, same order, even those serving are in the same places wearing the same vestments. For some, this is just boring, but for many of us, the liturgy—the ritual of a Sunday morning—brings comfort. We don’t have to worry about what we’re going to do next, which frees us up to worship without fretting over what we should be doing. It brings comfort. The same idea applies to children.

Even those without children know that many children like to hear the same story repeatedly. Read a bedtime story to them, and the following night, there’s a good chance they’ll ask for it again. Why is that? Those who study such things tell us that it is ritual. The repetition of crawling into bed, pulling up the covers, snuggling in, and hearing the same story becomes a ritual that brings comfort. I suppose I haven’t gotten past the comfort of this type of ritual because I’ll read the same books over and watch the same movies time and time again, even if I only recently finished them. I know how it will all play out, so all I have to do is sit back and enjoy. All this to justify the story I’m about to tell you. It is a story about me and one I’ve shared before when we worshipped with our AME friends. I’m not sure if I’ve shared it here before.

When I was a junior in high school, I attended St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Shreveport, Louisiana. I was active in youth programs, but some unfortunate circumstances rolled around, and I found myself sitting alone at the Christmas Eve Mass. For many reasons, that upset me, so just before the service began, I walked out and didn’t step foot in another church for over a decade. What brought me back? 

I had several Christian friends who would talk to me about Jesus, but I more or less laughed at them and changed the subject; however, some of them were quite persistent. Because they knew I loved to read, they constantly gave me Christian-based books, all of which went unread until one Friday night when the bookstore had closed. There was nothing else to read in the house but those books, so grumbling, I took one off the shelf: This Present Darkness, a novel by Frank Peretti. It is all about spiritual warfare, angels, and demons; crazy fun to read—I highly recommend it to you all. It was such a fun read—and that’s all I saw it as—that I wanted to read the sequel, Piercing the Darkness.

This one was also fun, but what made it also interesting and more than just fun was the main character, Sally Beth Roe.  The life this woman had lived was remarkably similar to mine. Reading about her life was a bit like reading an autobiography of my own life, so I engaged with the book on a different level. Toward the end, when it came to the critical climax of the story, Sally Beth Roe recognized her need for a Savior—for Jesus—so she went into a secluded area and prayed, “Jesus… I want You to come into my heart.  I want You to forgive me.  Please forgive me.”   

As I said, the book was about angels and so on, so Peretti always told you what was going on in the spiritual world while things were happening in our world, so other things were happening while she prayed. He writes:

“All around her, like spokes of a wondrous wheel, like beams of light emanating from a sun, angelic swords lay flat upon the ground, their tips turned toward her, their handles extending outward, held in the strong fists of hundreds of noble warriors who knelt in perfect concentric circles of glory, light and worship, their heads to the ground, their wings stretching skyward like a flourishing, animated garden of flames.  They were silent, their hearts filled with a holy dread.

“As in countless times past, in countless places, with marvelous inscrutable wonder, the Lamb of God stood among them, the Word of God, and more: the final Word, the end of all discussion and challenge, the creator and the Truth that holds all creation together–most wondrous of all, and most inscrutable of all, the Savior, a title angels would always behold and marvel about, but which only mankind could know and understand.

“He had come to be the Savior of this woman.  He knew her by name; and, speaking her name, He touched her.  And her sins were gone….”

At this, the angels of the Lord began to shout with joy and strength, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain… He has purchased Sally Beth Roe,” and at the same time as I read those words, I believe an angelic shout went up around me, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain. He has purchased John Forest Toles.”

In the novel, a lost sheep was found, and so was I. 

The book may just be a story to some, but it is one that I like to retell to myself because from the moment I read those words, “He has purchased John…,” my life has never been the same.

Our Gospel tells us that the religious leaders were angry with Jesus because he ate with tax collectors and sinners. He ate with Sally Beth Roe and John, and through the workings of the Holy Spirit, they believed in his word, so there was this angelic rejoicing in Heaven. As Jesus said, “I tell you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” Because of the work that Jesus began in my life, what Saint Paul said to Timothy, I can say to you, “I am grateful to Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me because he judged me faithful and appointed me to his service, even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.”

Saint Peter tells us, “In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you.” This is my defense and the reason for my hope. 

Jesus tells us the story of the lost sheep and the lost coin, both of which were found, so Jesus says to us, “Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost, my coin that was lost.” Jesus says, “Rejoice with me because I have found a soul—a part of me and a part of you—that was lost. Rejoice with me.”

When I look at the world around me or read the news, I see all the work that must be done, and much of it will only be done through the response of us fulfilling our responsibilities and calling as a Christian people. Because of this, I tend to preach sermon after sermon on choices, serving, sacrificing, caring for souls, preparing the soul, and so on. I firmly believe that these are necessary messages and these things must be said and accomplished, but… I can sometimes get so caught up in the needs and the work that I forget: “Rejoice with me!”

For our offertory hymn this morning, we’ll be hearing, Morning has Broken. The last stanza:

Mine is the sunlight! Mine is the morning
born of the one light Eden saw play!
Praise with elation, praise every morning,
God’s re-creation, of the new day!

The day the angels sang for me and the day they sang for you is a day of re-creation. Every day since is a day worthy of rejoicing and praise, for we were purchased and re-created as God’s own children. Continue with all the work set before us, but don’t forget to rejoice, for you have been given a great gift in Jesus who redeemed you and made you his own.

This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.

Let us pray: Precious Blood and Word of God, You are our eternal salvation. Lost in sin, You liberated us. You lifted us from eternal punishment. Treasuring our lost souls, You excused our constant failings. Forever, we are indebted to You. Your cost can never be repaid, for You bought our freedom with your very own Blood. We will always seek You out, Lord, Who are our beloved Deliverer! You are the Lamb of God! Amen.

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Sermon: Constance and the Martyrs of Memphis

Many of the saints we celebrate seemed to have lived in lands far from here hundreds of years ago.  However, Constance, an Episcopal nun, and her companions that we celebrated today are known for their work in Memphis, Tennessee, during a Yellow Fever epidemic in 1878.

The epidemic in that year was the third in a decade, and by the time it reached its height, 30,000 people had fled the city, and some 20,000 remained.  Death tolls averaged 200 per day, and in the end, 5,000 died.  Constance and many others who worked alongside her succumbed to the disease because instead of fleeing with so many others, they remained and cared for the sick, dying, and many orphaned children.  The High Altar at St. Mary’s Cathedral in Memphis is a memorial to Constance and her Companions and a reminder of their sacrifice.   

Until the COVID pandemic came rolling through, it didn’t seem like such events would ever come around again, but COVID showed us that there are still many out there willing to put their lives on the line for the sake of others. Even so, not everyone is in the position to do such great works, but our call to serve one another and to serve God is not always measured in extraordinary events. Quite often, it is the smaller day-to-day activities that have the most significant impact.  Mother Teresa said, “Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.”  True.  You may never be called to die while serving others, but we are all called to serve in the small things performed in great love.

When I read at night, it’s almost always brain candy.  One that I completed a while back and that they are making the movies from is the Divergent series by Veronica Roth.  Towards the end of the final book, Tobias, one of the main characters, says, “There are so many ways to be brave in this world. Sometimes bravery involves laying down your life for something bigger than yourself, or for someone else. Sometimes it involves giving up everything you have ever known, or everyone you have ever loved, for the sake of something greater.  But sometimes it doesn’t.  Sometimes it is nothing more than gritting your teeth through pain, and the work of every day, the slow walk toward a better life.” 

Those like Constance and her Companions, those Martyrs of Memphis that made the ultimate sacrifice, become our inspiration and help us make the smaller sacrifices of day-to-day living.  The types of sacrifices that allow us to set aside ourselves and love those around us.  Sometimes those sacrifices don’t seem like much; they may just be a part of our everyday lives—going to work and doing an excellent job so that we might provide for our families, volunteering for a few hours at places like Loaves and Fishes, or sending a few dollars to Episcopal Relief and Develop so that they can purchase mosquito nets to fight disease—but those small sacrifices add up.  In the words of Veronica Roth, those small sacrifices make up “the work of every day,” bringing all to a better life.

Look to Constance and her Companions as inspiration for the daily sacrifices you are called to make and realize that amid even the most difficult ones, our Lord will be with you; and in all these works, great and small, He is glorified. 

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Sermon: Proper 18 RCL C – “Choices”

Photo by Victoriano Izquierdo on Unsplash

Tee Boudreaux is 24 years old and still living at home. Boudreaux and Chlotile are starting to worry about what he is going to do with his future. Boudreaux tells Chlotile, “Cher, let’s do a little test. We goin’ to put a ten-dollar bill, a bible and a bottle of Jacque Daniel on de table, and when Tee Boudreaux comes in, we gonna be able to figure out what he’s gonna do. If he takes de ten-dollar bill, he’s gonna be a businessman, if he picks up de bible, he’s gonna be a preacher, but if he picks up de booze, I’m afraid he’s gonna be a bum de rest of his life.” So they put the stuff out and hid in the closet when they heard Tee coming in. Tee walks by the table, picks up the ten-dollar bill, looks at it, and puts it in his pocket. Then he picks up the bible, flips through it, and puts it under his arm. He picks up the Jacque Daniel, takes a healthy swig out of it, and walks off with the rest of the bottle. Boudreaux and Chlotile were watching all of this through the keyhole, and Boudreaux sighs, “Mais Cher, it looks like our son is gonna be a dang politician!”

Mark Twain was not kind to politicians. He wrote, “Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.” One of the places where so many politicians shine is in their campaign promises, but what if, instead of promising forty acres and a mule, they were honest? Or what if those promises were so negative that no one would vote for them? N.T. Wright says, “Imagine a politician standing on a soapbox addressing a crowd. ‘If you’re going to vote for me,’ he says, ‘you’re voting to lose your homes and families; you’re asking for higher taxes and lower wages, you’re deciding in favor of losing all you love best! So come on—who’s on my side?’” But as Wright points out, what Jesus was saying in our Gospel isn’t all that much better: “Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple… So, therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.”

When you hear those words, is the first thought that comes to your mind: “Sign me up!” “He’s got my vote!” Hardly. Most likely, the first thought is: “I think I’ll vote for the forty acres and a mule.” But what if N.T. Wright’s politician has something else in mind. What if, instead of just some random goals, that person is asking you to give up family and friends, possessions and homes, and possibly your very life to follow him on a dangerous journey, but a journey that will provide the answer to the millions in this world that are hungry? Not just some pipe dream, but a “for fact” answer. If you go, risking everything, you will be a part of feeding the world, even though you may die in the process. Would that change how you viewed the offer? Yes. I think it would. Many would see it as a difficult choice, but many brave souls would see that the value for humanity far outweighs the cost, even if the cost is life.

This is the type of offer that Jesus is making. It sounds horrible—leave everything, give up your life, follow me—but it is an offer to be with him and have eternal life through the resurrection. The only problem, we see everything we’re being asked to do and none of what is to come. St. Paul writes, “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, and your faith is in vain… If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile, and you are still in your sins… If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” If none of what Jesus has promised is true, we are fools, and even though we have faith in those promises, there can still be this inkling of doubt, and that inkling can have more significant sway over our lives than all our faith, which always leads to a choice: follow God or follow the inkling. In our reading of Deuteronomy, Moses put it a bit more bluntly, “See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity.” He says, “If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God… the Lord your God will bless you… if your heart turns away and you do not hear but are led astray… you shall perish.” It is a choice. Moses says we are choosing between life and death, which means we are choosing between following Jesus and following the desires of self. So how does self lead us away from Jesus?

On Wednesday night, we’ve begun the study of Eat this Book by Eugene Peterson. This past week, Peterson was talking about choices. “By the time we can hold a spoon,” he writes, “we choose between half a dozen cereals for breakfast, ranging from Cheerios to Corn Flakes.” From there, he points out that throughout our lives, we are given all sorts of choices: the clothes we wear, the music we listen to, courses in school, career planning, on and on; and so he concludes, “We enter adulthood with the working assumption that whatever we need and want and feel forms the divine control center of our lives.” The self is leading the way. 

The result, Peterson says, “My needs are non-negotiable. My so-called rights, defined individually, are fundamental to my identity. My need for fulfillment, for expression, for affirmation, for sexual satisfaction, for respect, my need to get my own way—all these provide a foundation to the centrality of me and fortify myself against diminution.” (di•mi•nu•tion: had to look that one up. It means decreasing in size or importance.) “My feelings are the truth of who I am.” (P.31-32)

Self leads us away from Jesus, away from God, because we won’t allow God or anyone else to interfere or even question our desires, so when Jesus says, “Give up everything—your possessions, your life, your will, your self—for the promises I have made to you and follow me,” combined with that inkling of doubt concerning those promises… we end up making poor choices.

In Mere Christianity, C.S.Lewis tells us, “Every time you make a choice, you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long, you are slowly turning this central thing either into a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature: either into a creature that is in harmony with God, and with other creatures, and with itself, or else into one that is in a state of war and hatred with God, and with its fellow-creatures, and with itself. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other.” (p.92)

The promises of Jesus are not like the promises of a politician. The promises of Jesus contain life itself. The path he calls us to walk is not always easy; it can be quite difficult and, more often than not, requires the exact opposite of the choice the self wants to make. So, as the man building a house or the king facing war, sit down and calculate the price. Not so that you can decide if following Jesus is worth it—that would be foolishness—but so that you can prepare your heart and mind to be obedient even in the most costly of times.

Let us pray: Loving Father, faith in Your Word is the way to wisdom. Help us to think about Your Divine Plan that we may grow in the truth. Open our eyes to Your deeds, our ears to the sound of Your call, so that our every act may help us share in the life of Jesus. Give us the grace to live the example of the love of Jesus, which we celebrate in the Eucharist and see in the Gospel. Form in us the likeness of Your Son and deepen His Life within us. Amen.

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Sermon: Aidan

The Abbey at Lindisfarne

Along the Northeast coast of England was the kingdom of Bernicia.  It changed hands several times between Christian and pagan kings, but in 633, it was conquered by Oswald, a devout Christian.  Having the desire to spread the Good News throughout his kingdom, Oswald sent to Iona for a Bishop.  The abbot of Iona agreed and sent to Oswald a bishop named Corman.  He failed and returned to Iona, declaring that the “English have no manners; they behave like savages.”

So concerned was the abbot that he convened a synod of the monks.  After hearing Corman’s report, one of the monks said, “I think, brother, that you may have been too severe for such ignorant listeners and that you should have led them on more gently, giving them first the milk of religion before its meat.”  Agreeing with him, the abbot sent that priest, Aidan, back to Bernicia, where he engaged in the work of God among these savage English and was quite successful.  His story was recorded for us by the Venerable Bede.  

Bede wrote: “He neither sought nor loved anything of this world, but delighted in distributing immediately to the poor whatever was given him by kings or rich men of the world. He traversed both town and country on foot, never on horseback, unless compelled by some urgent necessity. Wherever on his way he saw any, either rich or poor, he invited them, if pagans, to embrace the mystery of the faith; or if they were believers, he sought to strengthen them in their faith and stir them up by words and actions to alms and good works.”

One story tells how the king, seeing Aidan traveling everywhere on foot, gave him a royal horse to ride; however, Aidan did not keep it long.  He came across a beggar and, without hesitation, dismounted and gave the beggar the horse.  Upon hearing this, the king was angry. He said that had he known that Aidan was going to give the horse away, he would have given him a less expensive one, but Aidan, full of wisdom, replied, “Do you mean to say, sire, that yonder son of a mare is dearer to you than the son of God to whom I gave the horse?”  Recognizing the truth, the king repented, saying, “I will never speak of this matter again, nor find fault with you for giving as much of our wealth as you wish to such sons of God.”

Just off the coast and within eyesight of the castle was the island of Lindisfarne.  The king gave the island to Aidan, who established a monastery, which became a great center of learning and writing.   These may be fighting words for some, but of Aidan, one English scholar said, “It was not Augustine, but Aidan, who was the true apostle to England.”

There are many ways to convey the Gospel message so that those who do not yet know the Lord will listen and hear with their ears and hearts.  Fortunately, Aidan recognized that those savage English would not hear it by being beaten over the head with the message, but they would hear it through mercy, truth, righteousness, and peace. 

We owe all those saints that have gone before us, but we are particularly indebted to Aidan because it is partly due to his work and methods that you and I are here today, worshiping in an Episcopal / Anglican church.  I give thanks that you all are not still those savage ill-mannered English or Oklahomans!

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