LENT

It WAS About Grace

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Psalm 32 (Lent 1A)

1Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

2Happy are those to whom the Lord imputes no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit.

3While I kept silence, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long.

4For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah

5Then I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not hide my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and you forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah

6Therefore let all who are faithful offer prayer to you; at a time of distress, the rush of mighty waters shall not reach them.

7You are a hiding place for me; you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with glad cries of deliverance. Selah

8I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will counsel you with my eye upon you.

9Do not be like a horse or a mule, without understanding, whose temper must be curbed with bit and bridle, else it will not stay near you.

10Many are the torments of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds those who trust in the Lord.

11Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart.

Well, you can tell it’s Lent when we keep talking about confession and repentance and forgiveness.  Most people in our modern-day society sort of squirm with those subjects.  I mean, can’t we just put these on the top shelf next to the hellfire and brimstone theology and the decree claiming that women can’t read the Scripture in church?  I mean, how about we talk a little about grace?  Isn’t that what we do?  We’d rather hide the shortcomings away or shift the blame to someone else or change the environment so what we did is perhaps now acceptable.  I mean, admitting we’ve messed up is hard.  It’s uncomfortable.  And what if everyone knows about it?  And so, we walk around full of guilt, full of questions, full of something that could just as easily be cleared away.

Let’s get this straight.  God is not sitting there waiting for us to confess, waiting for us to repent before God loves us.  There are those who will couch it like that (probably the same ones pulling the hellfire and brimstone material out) but, and this is me talking, I think that’s not the way it is at all.  Maybe God doesn’t even really care whether or not we do it.  Oh, but I think God does.  You know why?  Because God loves us.  See, confession, admission, breathing out the wrongs we have done, the people we have hurt, the ways we have blamed others for the peril of our lives is not to please God.  It is, rather, to make room for us, to clear a way so that we can grow and prosper and find a new way.  And because God loves us more than we can even fathom, God’s desire is that that happens—not for God but for us.

The psalmist warns against our silence, warns against us hiding ourselves away and not talking about it, not facing the truth.  And the psalmist exhorts us to confess, to admit our wrongdoing, to claim responsibility for our sins.  We no longer need to hide.  Because it is God who will step in, who will hold us in our discomfort, who will comfort us in our peril, who will stand with us as the consequences of whatever harm we have wrought, whatever hurts we have brought, rain down on us.

See, we know God forgives.  The part we miss is that God will stay with us through everything that comes after.  Breathe out your confession.  Make room.  And breathe in forgiveness and newness and the very presence of God through it all.

I must confess that I was not excited about writing this one.  I mean, it sort of sounded like a downer.  Now I realize that it WAS about grace.  Breathe out confession and breathe in grace.

In the Name of Jesus Christ you are forgiven…

Forgiveness is the act of admitting we’re like other people.  (Christian Baldwin)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Map Quest

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Matthew 4: 1-11 (Lent 1A)

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2He fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished. 3The tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” 4But he answered, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” 5Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6saying to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” 7Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” 8Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; 9and he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” 10Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! for it is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’” 11Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.

The wilderness story…we read some version of this in the first week of every Lenten season.  It makes sense.  It is the beginning of our journey.  It is the beginning of Jesus’ journey to the cross.  And it leaves a lot of really good fodder for discussion.  Oh, we could talk about the usual subjects.  We could talk about the way Jesus did not fall prey to the temptation to be powerful or protected or relevant.  Instead, Jesus let all that go.  He just was. And he started walking.

But where was he?  He had been led into the wilderness.  There was no map.  There is a faint remnant of a road that moves and flows and ebbs like waves as the winds blow over the sands.  The way is dim, sometimes non-existent.  You might be able to navigate if you knew the mountains well, if you knew which ones rise first and tower higher over the others.  You might be able to navigate when you think about where the beating sun is sitting, where it rises, where it falls.  But the way is not dependable.  The way is the way.  There is no map.

That is hard for us.  We want to know where we’re going. Oh, we’ve moved beyond maps for the most part.  There is instead a voice in the car or a voice on our phone that tells us where to go, that takes all the guesswork and most of the journeying out of the trip.  And with that, we have become dependent upon the voice, dependent upon being told the way and we soon find that we have somehow ceded our navigation to something that limits us, to something that controls us, to something that doesn’t allow us to deviate from the path.

I grew up with a dad that, I swear, knew every back road that was to be known.  He always had a “shortcut”.  And we always had maps.  I loved maps.  I was fascinated by them as far back as I can remember.  I remember navigating from the back seat with the tattered map that I never knew how to fold back the way it was meant to be.

Soon after I lost my dad, a friend and I drove to Taos, NM so that she could officiate at a wedding.  I just went along for the ride (and, apparently, navigation support).  It dawned on me that there were probably places in rural West Texas that might not respond to my GPS.  There was an excitement in me when I realized I needed a map!  Oh, I had a map!  It was the map my dad gave me when I went to college in 1980.  OK, maybe I needed a new map.  So, I went to Amazon and ordered maps for Texas and New Mexico.

Fast forward to rural West Texas.  Yep, there it was…that gray slice of nothingness in the middle of my iPhone straining to form a map.  So I pulled out the paper version.  And I began navigating.  One of those jaunts included a missed turn.  Not a problem…I have a map.  So, we drove down a barely-paved county road toward the road we meant to turn onto.  There were delightful farmhouses and beautiful vistas and the most wonderful 19th century Spanish church and cemetery.  And we would have missed it all if we had had the GPS.  I remember commenting, “oh my goodness, Billy Don Williams is SO proud of us right now!”

The journey is not about the way; the way IS the Way.  So what do we breathe out?  We breathe out needing to follow a plan.  We breathe out needing to always know where we’re going.  We breathe out anything that gets in the way of the Way.  The journey is not mapped.  It’s a faint pathway and the winds may blow the sands so that sometimes it is concealed.  Keep walking.  What is the way?  It IS the way. Just listen. You’ll know where to go.

There is a journey you must take.  It is a journey without destination.  There is no map.  Your soul will lead you.  And you can take nothing with you. (Meister Eckhart)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

This Thing About Sin

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Man walking towards storm

Romans 5: 12-19 (Lent 1A)

12Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death came through sin, and so death spread to all because all have sinned— 13sin was indeed in the world before the law, but sin is not reckoned when there is no law. 14Yet death exercised dominion from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam, who is a type of the one who was to come. 15But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died through the one man’s trespass, much more surely have the grace of God and the free gift in the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for the many. 16And the free gift is not like the effect of the one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brings justification. 17If, because of the one man’s trespass, death exercised dominion through that one, much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness exercise dominion in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. 18Therefore just as one man’s trespass led to condemnation for all, so one man’s act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all. 19For just as by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous.

Well, I really, really thought about changing the passage but, alas, it’s the lectionary for this week.  SO…I guess we have to talk about sin.  In this passage, Paul mentions sin or some form of it (sinner, transgression, disobedience, etc.) sixteen times by my count.  In fact, five of the mentions are in the first sentence!  Do you think he was trying to make a point?  Sin, I’m afraid, is a fact of life.  It is part of all us.  We claim that perhaps our own sins are not that bad.  You’ve heard all the claims and the questions:  So, if I don’t KNOW I’m sinning, is it really sin?  So which sins are the “unforgiveable” ones? I mean, really, it was only a little sin, just a little “white lie”.  Yes, in the big scheme of things, it was probably nothing more than a veritable sigh of a sin.  And then there’s the ultimate from our friend the Pharisee:  “Well, thank God I’m not like that tax collector!”

But in our interconnectedness, sin affects us all.  And even the smallest of sins can release such a force that none of us can control it.  Now don’t get me wrong.  I do not in any way believe that “sin” is something outside of us.  It is not a “force to be reckoned with”, so to speak.  I’m pretty clear that when I sin, it is me.  It is my bad choice.  It is me that has messed up, that has not honored myself or my place in the beauty of this interconnected Creation, rather than it being caused by some sort of little red man with horns or something.  I have to own it.  It is mine.  It is mine, that is, until it is done.  And then it spills into Creation and begins cutting a path with a force more powerful than anything we’ve ever imagined.

So, you’re expecting me to exhort us to “breathe out” sin in this posting, to just quit doing it.  Yeah, I don’t think that’s the way it works.  Sin is a part of our existence.  Now, even though Paul dances around this, I don’t really believe in “inherited sin”, the “sins of the father”, so to speak.  And yet, it’s bigger than me.  Sin was part our existence before we came to be and will continue after we are gone because part of our human condition is that we mess up.  We try, but we mess up.  Sadly, it just is.  Maybe it’s not so much whether or not we do it but, rather, what we do after it.

Barbara Brown Taylor wrote what I think is the quintessential book on sin called Speaking of Sin.  In it, she speaks of sin as our only hope. (WHAT?!?)  She describes it as our only hope because realizing our sin, realizing our shortcomings, empowers us to set things right again.  It makes sense.  If we ignore our sin or if we somehow excuse it away, even dismissing it as the act of our “mere humanity”, we have failed to acknowledge the very hope that sets us right again, the springboard that leads to redemption, to righteousness, to getting back on the pathway that we’re trying so hard to traverse.

In forgiveness, we do not find innocence.  We do not find a way to put things back like they were before (remember that innocent garden thing has sailed!).  What we find is a pathway to a better way.  So, breathe out…breathe out ignoring your sins, breathe out not wanting to change, breathe out not accepting the grace of forgiveness and the gift of beginning again.   

In the Name of Jesus Christ, you are forgiven!

In Christian language, to be truly human is to shape our lives into an offering to God. But we are lost children who have wandered away from home, forgotten what a truly human life might be. When Jesus, our older brother, presented himself in the sanctuary of God, his humanity fully intact, he did not cower as though he were in a place of “blazing fire and darkness and gloom.” Instead he called out, “I’m home, and I have the children with me.” (Thomas Long)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Don’t Listen to the Talking Snake

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Genesis 2: 15-17; 3: 1-7 (Lent 1A)

15The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.  16And the Lord God commanded the man, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; 17but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”

3Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden’?” 2The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; 3but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.’” 4But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die; 5for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

6So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. 7Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.

This is always such an odd little story.  What do we do with it?  Yes, it’s known as the “Second Creation Account”.  It’s actually probably the first one.  This one is out of the Yahwist tradition and the “first one” (the one organized into “days”) is probably more from the Priestly tradition, which would have come a little later.  I guess the canon-compilers were going for drama.  I don’t know.  So, what do we do with it?  Well, it’s obvious no one has ever known what to do with it because over the centuries, the tradition slowly morphed into “Eve-blaming”.  Oh, yes, let’s blame the girl!  Because the guy had nothing to do with it.  Are you kidding me?  Personally, I think the most obvious lesson is don’t listen to talking snakes.  I mean, that seems pretty straightforward, right?

So, first of all, let’s all admit that it’s a story (a good one with lots of special effects but a story nevertheless).  I don’t think there was an Adam and Eve.  I don’t think there was some sort of secret utopian garden to which we’re trying to return.  And, for me, the jury is still out on the talking snake.  But the lessons?  The lessons are real.  The Truth is real.  Adam (Adamah) means “man” or “human” (or man of the earth).  So, this a wonderful parable or fable not about the birth of one man but rather an attempt to explain how we humans came to be.  Adamah is formed from dust (resembling that dust that was smeared on your forehead yesterday).  And Eve?  The name Eve (Chavah) means “living one” or “source of life”, perhaps even “breath of life”.  OK, that’s beginning to make sense.  Those are things we’ve seen before.

And then there’s this garden.  There they were in the garden, innocent, yes, but also unknowing, unthinking, not quite yet human.  See, it was the beginning.  It was not the place where we were meant to be.  God created us to go beyond where we are, to go beyond that “safe” place, rather than to live in some sort of controlled environment where nothing can touch us.  But the mistake that these “first humans” made was assuming there was a different way to do that.  According to the story, they jumped the gun a bit.  We all do it.  We think we know best.  We think we can figure it out on our own.  We think the rules are not for us because, obviously, we know better.  (Or maybe we’ve mistakenly listened to a talking snake!)

We are not called to be innocent.  That’s just dumb.  We’re human.  We’re complicated.  God made us that way, filled with dust and new life, darkness and light, regret and grace.  Again, we’re not called to be innocent.  We’re called to be redeemed, renewed, and recreated.  That story of that garden was only the beginning.  Several modern theologians and writings have referred to it as the “kindergarden of eden”.  It was how we began to understand ourselves.  And I think the point of it was not the creation of the human creature, the innocent and obedient one, but rather the realization by that creature that he or she was indeed human, that we are both flawed and glorious, that we are made of dust and the very breath of God.  The key is that we have to let go, breathe out, if you will, of the need to be in control, the need to go our own way.  Because, life is full of talking snakes.

I claim credit for nothing.  Everything is determined, the beginning as well as the end, by forces over which we have no control…We all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible piper. (Albert Einstein)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Breathing Out

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Matthew 6: 1-6, 16-21 (Ash Wednesday)

“Beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them; for then you have no reward from your Father in heaven. 2“So whenever you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be praised by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 3But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

5“And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 6But whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. 

16“And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward. 17But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face, 18so that your fasting may be seen not by others but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

19“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; 20but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

This is always such an odd day in our church calendar. In fact, if we were to back away from the notion of it a bit, far enough to watch ourselves getting the remnants of burned leaves smeared on our foreheads while at the same time told that we are no better than the very ashes that are dripping down into our eyes and settling on our shirt, we, too, would think that was a very, very weird practice.  Because in terms of where we stand in this society, in this culture, this is indeed very, very bizarre.

And I think that may be the point.  Just like the passage from the Gospel account by the writer known as Matthew that we read every Ash Wednesday, we are being reminded that the “normal” way we do things, the things that are accepted by our society are not the things that bring us closer to God, that bring us closer to the vision that God has for us.  We cannot align with the ways of this world and at the same time become the one that God envisions.  The two ways are incompatible.  Where the world wants to build walls and borders to control who is in and who is out, Jesus called us to welcome the stranger, release the prisoner, feed the hungry,…you know, all those Sermon on the Mounty-type things.  We cannot hold both ways within us.  We will metaphorically, spiritually, and certainly explode.  You cannot breathe everything in at once.

That is often the problem for many of us.  We breathe in when we should be breathing out.  It is, on some level, a sort of “spiritual asthma”.  When a person suffers from asthma, it is not, as many people think, that they cannot get air into their lungs; it is that they can’t get air out.  And, as a result, their lungs are too full to receive life-giving oxygen.  The breathing cycle is disrupted and the person, swelling with over-inflation, begins gasping for breath. 

This spiritual asthma is a similar dilemma.  If we hold onto those things with which we fill our lives, to our habits and our fears and our misconceptions of what our life should be, to those plans and those preparations that we’ve so carefully laid, there is no room left for the life-giving breath of God.  And we are left with dust and ashes.

But there is more.  This is not just a day of morose belittling of ourselves.  A rabbi once told his disciples, “Everyone must have two pockets, with a note in each pocket, so that he or she can reach into one or the other, depending on their needs.  When feeling high and mighty, sort of overinflated, if you will,one should reach into the left pocket, and find the words: “Ani eifer v’afar; I am dust and ashes.  But when feeling lowly and depressed, discouraged or without hope, one should reach into the right pocket, and, there, find the words: “Bishvili nivra ha’olam…For my sake was the world created.”  That is the breathing in and the breathing out.  And they are both necessary for the journey.

On this Ash Wednesday, breath out…breathe out the ways of this world. Breathe out the norms to which you are accustomed.  Do this so that there is room to breathe in…to breathe in who you are supposed to be, to breathe in life.  Lent is not just about giving things up; it is about emptying your life that you may be filled.  Lent is not just about going without; it is about making room for what God has to offer.  And today is not about clothing yourself in the morbidness of your humanity; it is about embracing who you are before God.

So…remember…you are dust and ashes…breathe out…..

For you the world was created…breathe in….

BIG BREATH…Amen.

Grace fills empty spaces, but it can only enter where there is a void to receive it, and it is grace itself which makes this void. (Simone Weil)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

It is Finished

shelliwilliams Christ, CRUCIFIXION, Death, Golgotha, Good Friday, Holy Week, LENT ,

???????????Scripture Text:  John 19: 14-30

Now it was the day of Preparation for the Passover; and it was about noon. He said to the Jews, ‘Here is your King!’ They cried out, ‘Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!’ Pilate asked them, ‘Shall I crucify your King?’ The chief priests answered, ‘We have no king but the emperor.’ Then he handed him over to them to be crucified.

So they took Jesus; and carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of the Skull, which in Hebrew* is called Golgotha. There they crucified him, and with him two others, one on either side, with Jesus between them.  Pilate also had an inscription written and put on the cross. It read, ‘Jesus of Nazareth,* the King of the Jews.’ Many of the Jews read this inscription, because the place where Jesus was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew,* in Latin, and in Greek. Then the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, ‘Do not write, “The King of the Jews”, but, “This man said, I am King of the Jews.”’ Pilate answered, ‘What I have written I have written.’ When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they took his clothes and divided them into four parts, one for each soldier. They also took his tunic; now the tunic was seamless, woven in one piece from the top. So they said to one another, ‘Let us not tear it, but cast lots for it to see who will get it.’ This was to fulfil what the scripture says,  ‘They divided my clothes among themselves, and for my clothing they cast lots.’  And that is what the soldiers did.

Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, here is your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.  After this, when Jesus knew that all was now finished, he said (in order to fulfil the scripture), ‘I am thirsty.’ A jar full of sour wine was standing there. So they put a sponge full of the wine on a branch of hyssop and held it to his mouth. When Jesus had received the wine, he said, ‘It is finished.’ Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

It is finished–all the announcing, all the birthing, that star over the manger, the shepherds, the wisemen, the ministry around the lake, the welcoming, the pushing, the encouraging, the healing, the teaching, the last meal–it is finished.  What would we do for just one more moment, one more moment to kneel at the feet of the Savior and worship and love and learn and bask in a Presence that we can’t even explain?  What would we change about how we had done it, how much we paid attention, how much we were aware?  What would we tell Jesus that we did not? What would we do rather than betray him, betray his trust, his love, his faith in who we are and what we can do?

This is the most difficult for us Protestant Christians, those of us who have chosen to spend the whole of our church year bowing before the “empty Cross”, the depiction of Christ’s Resurrection and the promise of our own salvation.  And while I’m not willing to trade the large gleaming empty cross at the front of the sanctuary and permanently replace it with a Crucifix, I think that we do miss part of what the Cross means if we choose to never enter the pain and the suffering that is Christ’s.  In fact, Howard asks, “Where, suddenly, is the theology that teaches that because the Savior did it all, we thereby are reduced to the status of inert bystanders?”  Because, truthfully, when the chips were done, the people stood by.  WE stood by.  We stand by and we let Christ suffer, wait for Christ to finish up this whole messy ordeal, hand us a lily and a pretty bonnet, and invite us to joyfully sing “Christ the Lord is Risen Today” and go on about our business.

The season of Lent, though, is about entering the experience of the Cross—the whole experience.  Because how can one understand the joy of Resurrection without experiencing the pain and suffering and even the death of Crucifixion?  The two cannot be separated.  We are called to enter and bear all that is Christ—the pain, the suffering, the death, and, just when we think “it is finished”, the joy of rising to eternal life, to an eternity of oneness with God.  If we are to truly understand what that means, we must, then, embrace the entirety of the message of the Cross.  And so, perhaps, if only for awhile (maybe 40 days or so!), we should spend this Season of Lent truly looking at the “pre-Easter” experience of the Cross.  You will be amazed what that Easter morning Cross, gleaming in the sunlight of a newly created day, looks like if you understand how God created it, if you have experienced all that is God.

So, in this moment, in this moment when it is all finished, the moment that, for now, our journey ends, what do we do?  What is next?  You know, this thing would have been a whole lot easier to piece together and market if Jesus had died a hero.  But Jesus did not come as a hero; Jesus came as a servant, a humble human servant, to show us what life means.  So, were you there?  Sometime I wonder if I was.  Sometimes I’m too busy or too tired or too convinced that I already have it figured out.  Sometimes I forget to be there.  I have taken this whole journey wanting so badly to be near Jesus, wanting so badly to be connected, to be one.  But sometimes I forget to be there.  Sometimes I want to jump ahead and set up for the Easter celebration.  But today, in this moment, we are called to be there, to stand, perhaps alone, and be with Jesus on the Cross, to be there when it is finished.  Hard as it may be, we have to live the end, to live the “it is finished” before we can live the beginning.  So sit here at the Cross, in this moment, this finished moment.

After the Crucifixion, this defeated little band of disciples had no hope. As you can imagine, they had no expectation of anything else to come. Everything in which they believed, in which they had invested their lives, had died on the cross. It seemed to them that the world had been right and they had been wrong. Joan Chittister says that “the road behind us becomes what frees us for the road ahead.” In this moment, God was already freeing them from grief and recreating joy.  And us…there is something in all of us that struggles with the thought of God suffering. We instead imagine a God that stands apart from us, shielded from pain, and prepared to pick up the pieces of our lives when we need it. But God, in God’s infinite wisdom rather recreates our lives from the inside, from the point of our deepest pain and suffering, from the cross, and even we become new Creations whether or not we can see it now. The cross is the rebirth of humanity in all its fullness. In this moment, it is death that dies.  Truthfully, it is DEATH that is finished.  It is hard for us to see right now. It is hard to see clearly through the tears of grief. Christ died on a cross in immense suffering and pain. And those who love him grieve a grief such that they have never known.  And just when nothing else makes sense, it is in that moment that your eternity has begun.   There is Light ahead but for now, just for a moment, we sit here at the Cross.  It is finished.  It is in this moment that we finally just let it be.

There will come a time when you believe everything is finished. That will be the beginning. (Louis L’Amour)

This is the moment.  This is the moment that you begin.  Jesus did not die a hero to emulate; he died to give us Life.  No longer a bystander, we are called to enter that Life.  What does that mean?  Go forward…you can’t see it just yet but your eternity has begun!

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

 

The Last Time

shelliwilliams Awareness, Eucharist, Holy Week, JESUS, LENT, Maundy Thursday, Presence of God, Remembering ,

 

"The Last Supper", Jesus Mafa

Scripture Text:  John 13: 1-17, 31b-35

Now before the festival of the Passover, Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. The devil had already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon Iscariot to betray him. And during supper Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he had come from God and was going to God, got up from the table, took off his outer robe, and tied a towel around himself. Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was tied around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?” 7Jesus answered, “You do not know now what I am doing, but later you will understand.” Peter said to him, “You will never wash my feet.” Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no share with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” Jesus said to him, “One who has bathed does not need to wash, except for the feet, but is entirely clean. And you are clean, though not all of you.” For he knew who was to betray him; for this reason he said, “Not all of you are clean.” After he had washed their feet, had put on his robe, and had returned to the table, he said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call me Teacher and Lord—and you are right, for that is what I am. So if I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you. Very truly, I tell you, servants are not greater than their master, nor are messengers greater than the one who sent them. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.

“Now the Son of Man has been glorified, and God has been glorified in him. If God has been glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself and will glorify him at once. Little children, I am with you only a little longer. You will look for me; and as I said to the Jews so now I say to you, ‘Where I am going, you cannot come.’ I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Sometimes life spins a little out of control. Sometimes things don’t go exactly like the carefully scripted plan we have in our own minds. Sometimes we have to let go or leave behind those in our lives before we’re actually ready to do so. Our lives are full of “last times”, those special, much-too-fleeting moments that we spend with those we love. It is those times when all we can do is trust that the groundwork has been laid for what must continue. That had to be a little of what Jesus was going through on this night. Think about it…he had spent his ministry gathering those around him, teaching them, loving them, and indeed shaping them into who they were. And now…here he was completely out of time…the end was approaching. Night had begun to fall. All he could do was trust that the seeds he had planted in his followers would continue to grow and flourish even in a new environment and a new time. So on this night, he invited all those who love him—this somewhat motley crew of misfits and ordinary ones to sit around the table and enjoy their time together. He knew what was about to happen. He knew that this would be the last.

That is where we enter the story…in the midst of this evening meal…this Passover meal…the last meal. The feast is prepared. The loved ones are gathered together. We have visions of a perfect meal and a perfect time together. But, as all of us know, that is not always the way that family meals come together. This was no exception. Nestled beneath this wonderful feeling of closeness and fellowship were chords of betrayal and distrust, signs of denial and misunderstandings, and an all-too-constant stream of arguing among the disciples. Does that sound familiar?

But in this Passover meal that we have come to call the Last Supper, Jesus chooses to share himself—his very body and blood with all of those that were gathered—this denying, betraying, bickering, and beloved lot. It was a way of giving them something to remember him so that they would not feel so alone without him. He gave them something to hold onto—to touch and to taste—something to do to keep Christ close in their hearts, to feel the very real Presence of Christ forever. On this night, Jesus gives the gift of himself and a way for all of us to remember who we are.

Our culture probably doesn’t do well with “lasts”.  We seem to be always rushing to the next thing, not wanting to hurt or grieve or even hold on to what may be somewhat painful moments in our lives.  We rush to get “over it”, to move on.  As many of you know, I am dealing with my own set of “lasts” right now.  As I prepare to close my chapter at St. Paul’s and begin a new chapter at FUMC, Cleveland, Tx, the “lasts” seem to be coming in a flurry right now.  I am such that I tear up and sometimes even blatantly bawl at the emptiness and, yet, I really want to savor it, to feel every moment of it, to remember it, to make it a part of me, and to leave a part of myself.  That is what Jesus was trying to do.  I don’t think he was trying to “get them through it” and he was definitely not wanting to rush for it to be over.  He was wanting them to experience it, to savor it, indeed, to remember it.  Do this in remembrance of me.  The beauty of this last meal was the intimacy and the relationship.  These were friends dining together–friends who had loved and argued, celebrated and cried, friends who had been called together one by one.  They were all different, coming from different lifestyles with different gifts to offer.  They were us.  We are them.  And this was the moment that they would remember when everything had changed.

For on this night of nights, Jesus drew them in, not to take care of them, but to help them remember. They had to remember enough to hand the memory on.  The Greek word for it is anamnesis.  We would translate it as remembering.  But it is more.  It is not merely remembering those things that happened to us; it is remembering what came before and what was passed on, remembering what was part of our tradition and our heart.  It is finding a memory of what came before that leads you on your journey beyond.  We often tout “institutional memory” as if it is a way of remembering what happened to whom and where and when.  But it is more.  It is a way of imparting what is important, what matters, what gives life to those that come next.  It is a way of giving it wings to fly and breath to survive.  That is why this night was so important.  Jesus did not choose to shut himself off and grieve what was coming but instead immersed himself in a circle of friends so that he could live through them.  Experiencing a “last time” alone is painful; experiencing a “last time” with a gift of friends and a meal will remain forever.

This is the night we remember, the night that Jesus broke the bread and shared the cup, the night that Jesus knelt and washed the feet of the disciples, the night that Jesus forgave betrayal and welcomed life.  A few hours later the soldiers would come and the end would begin.  But the memory of that last time will last forever.  Do this in remembrance of me.

The glad hosannas are no longer heard.  The shouting is over, the palms are gathered; the shadows lengthen; the plotting begins in earnest. Knowing the outcome, we come with heavy hearts.  And what do we hear?  An unchanged and unchanging message of love; God’s love, a poet’s love, a woman’s love.  God’s love, foretold by Isaiah, in the shape of a servant.  (Moira B. Laidlaw)

On this night of nights, we remember.  But we also experience our own “lasts”.  What memories have been imparted to you?  What do you remember that makes you?  What can you impart to those that come after you?  Embrace your lasts, hold them, love them, and then pass them along.

Grace and Peace,

Shelli