Jesus

Jesus Loves Me, This I Know

shelliwilliams Breathing Out Series , ,

(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Scripture Passage:  John 3: 14-17

14And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, 15that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. 16“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. 17“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 

This is it: THE verse.  So, what we do with THE verse?  It’s on street corners and billboards and T-Shirts and tattoos and faces and signs at sporting events.  I think it is often read as some sort of great reward for doing the right things, the recognition of a narrow and exclusive pathway.  You know, if you do everything you’re supposed to do, you’ll be rewarded when it’s all said and done.  And if you don’t, well you’re just out of luck.  You messed up.  So, look at me…do what I do, go to church where I go, be what I am, look like I look.  I’m saved; are you?  (Define that!  Do we really understand what that means?)

Really?  Truthfully, I used to hate this verse.  The way it was taught did not make sense to me.  I mean, why would the guy that welcomed all those thousands of people on a hillside (or a plain if you’d rather read it in The Gospel According to Luke) suddenly say, “nope…just this group”?  Yeah, I think we’ve read it wrong.  (Cue the lightning bolt, I guess…) For God so loved the world—not the ones in the right church or the right country or the right side of the line—but the WORLD.  God loved the world, everything about the world, everyone in the world, so much, so very, very, VERY much, that God came and walked among us, sending One who was the Godself in every way, to lead us home, to actually BRING us home, to lead us to God.  Are you saved?  Yes…every day, every hour, over and over and over and over again.  I’m being saved with every step and move and breath I take.  I think that’s what God does.  God loves us SO much that that is what God does.  God is saving us.  God came into the world to save the world.  So why would we interpret this to mean that God somehow has quit loving some of us or that we have to somehow bargain with God to begin loving us or that “being saved” is a badge of honor?  See, God loves us so much that God is saving us from ourselves—all of us, as in the WHOLE WORLD. 

The reference to the snake refers to Numbers 21:4-9.  It is the account of the Lord sending poisonous serpents into the wilderness that can be countered by making a serpent and putting it on a pole so that everyone who looks at it will live even though they were bit by a poisonous snake.  (OK….whatever!…I’m not really a snake person.)  So, essentially, it’s like this:  You think your main problem is snakes?  I mean, THAT’S your problem? Alright, here it is.  Look at it hanging there on the tree.  Quash your fear, let your preconceptions go.  There…no more snakes.  You don’t have to fear snakes. 

So, this time?  You have let the world order run your life.  You have become someone that you are not.  You have allowed yourself to be driven by fear and preconceptions and greed.  You have opted for security over freedom, held on to what is not yours, and settled for vengeance rather than compassion and love.  You have conjured up wars against each other. I created you for more than this.  I love you too much for this to go on.  Look up.  Look there, hanging on the tree, there on the cross.  Stare at the snake.  Stare at the Cross.  Enter the Cross.  See how much I love you.  In this moment, I take all your sin, all your misgivings, all your inhumanity and let it die with me.  All is well.  All is well with your soul.  There…no more death.  You don’t have to fear death.

Many people read this verse as the depiction of a narrow way, a way that is defined by the Jesus that they imagine.  I don’t think that.  I read it not as a narrow pathway to God but one that is wide and welcoming, one that is merciful and grace-filled, on that each of us can find a way to walk.  That’s Jesus’ message for me:  “Come, THIS way…I’ll show you!  Because that is how much you are loved.”

There are so many of us that are quick to define who is “in” and who is “out” as far as God is concerned.  Really?  Are you sure?  I mean, isn’t that a little above your holy pay grade, so to speak.  For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. So, come all you that are searching and those that are lost.  Come all who struggle with being accepted in the church, all who have been shunned and made to feel that they are less than.  Come ALL of God’s children.  You are loved.  You are so loved that God walked this earth in the form of a human to show us all the way.  And, yes, I think that is REALLY, REALLY good news.

So, for today’s breathing exercise…Breathe out what the world tells you about who is “in” and who is “out”.  Breathe out the vision of a church and a Kingdom of God that only includes those who believe the “right” way, who walk the prescribed path.  Breathe out hatred and exclusion and xenophobia of God’s children, no matter who they are.  Then breathe in…breathe in that great, great love of God that Jesus showed us.  Breathe in that you are so deeply and incredibly loved that you can’t even fathom its depth.

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

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Scripture Passage:  Matthew 15: 21-28

21Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and Sidon. 22Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.” 23But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.” 24He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” 25But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” 26He answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” 27She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” 28Then Jesus answered her, “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

Sometimes we don’t exactly know what to do with this passage.  It tells us that Jesus travels to a place that is not his, to an unfamiliar place some distance away.  It’s not the wildernesses that we’ve come to know but it IS a wilderness.  When we journey through unknown territory, through places that are not our home, through places that are not ours, places that we have not planned or planted, even places for which we feel totally unprepared, there is a certain wilderness aspect to them. 

And in this unfamiliar place, this woman appears to Jesus begging that he heal her daughter.  Her appeals got louder and louder and more and more insistent.  So, what was Jesus to do?  He wasn’t there for her.  She was Canaanite.  She was not Jewish.  (The Markan version of this story depicts her as Syrophoenician).  Either way, she was “the other”.  And at this point, Jesus understood that his mission was to the Jews.  This would not be right.  She was not one of them.  But the woman kept insisting.  (I will tell you, the reference to “dogs” is not a nice one.  Without offense to the dog-lovers and dogs among us, in 1st century Jewish society, dogs were looked upon as unclean, as scavengers.)  And, yet, even Gentiles, even the “bottom of society”, even the “dogs” gather the crumbs from the masters’ table. 

But, then, Jesus changes.  He stops, he listens, he changes.  See, this woman gets it.  Her faith sees Jesus as a sign of what’s to come.  This moment is, in effect, a turning point for Jesus.  (And we need to realize that that turning point is the reason we’re here.  We ARE the ones to which Jesus’ mission turned and broadened to include.)  I’m actually grateful the writer didn’t try to “clean up” the story.  This shows Jesus’ humanness, his searching, his exploring, his changing, his realization that there was something (and someone) more.  In this moment, there, in the wilderness, in the place that was not his, Jesus saw a broader vision of God and who God called him to be than even he had before.

I think that’s why Lent tends to be this sort of wilderness journey.  Traversing through places with which we are unfamiliar, places that perhaps do not feel like home, perhaps will never feel like home, gives us a new perspective.  Maybe we’re not called to make ourselves at home at all.  Maybe we’re rather called to continuously journey through newness, continuously open our minds and our hearts just a little bit more with each turn of the pathway.  I don’t believe that God calls us to stay planted where we are; otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many pesky wildernesses in the stories of faith and in our own lives.  The wilderness is where we change our course, where the road turns if only one small degree and, unsettled though we are, we turn with it and continue our journey with minds broadened and hearts opened.

We can’t hold on to the familiar.  We can’t just associate with those who look like us and think like us and believe like us.  That’s what’s wrong with the world right now.  That’s what’s wrong with our society, our country, our relationships with each other.  We need to hold fast to what we believe but not at the expense of relationships.  That’s what Jesus teaches us in this passage.  Jesus listens to the woman and backs away a bit.  He doesn’t retreat; he gets a different view.  He gets a broader view.  He looks at the world the way God does.  God made the world diverse.  Why in the world would we be meant to stay in our own little bubble?  And yet, we’re arguing over the use of DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion)?  I don’t get it.  We need to breathe out needing to surround ourselves with comfort, with those who are like us.  I mean, Jesus wasn’t even like us!  He was a dark-skinned immigrant who was Jewish.  What does that tell us?  So, we need to breathe in the way the world is—diverse and God-made—all of us.

He drew a circle that shut me out.  Heretic, a rebel, a thing to flout.  But Love and I had the wit to win.  We drew a circle that took him in! (Edwin Markham)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Chaos Theory

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(part of the “Breathing Out” Lenten Series)

Scripture Passage:  Mark 8: 31-38

31Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, “Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.” 34He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”

We are very good at imagining who we intend to be.  We are very good at attempting to write the story that makes sense for us.  So, what do we do when we find out that the story is about to change?  See, Peter had it all figured out.  His whole identity was wrapped up in who he understood Jesus to be and who he understood himself to be in light of that.  Sure, I think Peter got that Jesus was the Messiah.  He knew the words.  He had been taught the meaning probably from his childhood, the idea that this Messiah would come and bring victory and glory. Put yourself in his place.  Here is this great man who you have grown to dearly love.  This ministry that he has begun has been great.  He truly IS the Messiah for which you have waited so long.  What great plans for the future Peter must have imagined! 

But then Jesus starts talking about his own coming suffering.  This wasn’t the plan that Peter envisioned.  This wasn’t the way the story was supposed to go.  Most of us identify with Peter here.  This cannot be!  There is no way that it is time for Jesus to leave us.  This was our Messiah sent here to save us, the Messiah for which we have waited for generations upon generations!  Jesus’ harsh statement to Peter jolts us into reality, though.  For we do often limit our thinking to things of this world.  We want to protect and possess this Messiah.  We want a Messiah who will save us on our terms, someone to be in control, someone to fix things, someone to make it all turn out like we want it to turn out, someone to make our lives safer and easier. 

Now, contrary to the way our version of the Scriptures interprets it, I don’t think Jesus was accusing Peter of being evil or Satan or anything like that.  Who could blame Peter?  He’s just like us!  Listen further…If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.  We’ve all read that verse before.  We’d like to make it read a little easier.  We would rather skip through the end of Holy Week and go straight to Easter morning.  That’s why this season of Lent is so difficult.  It won’t let us do that.  The cross is not something that we look to only in the past.  The cross is not something that we look to at the end of our lives.  This is not some goal for farther down the road. This is not some plan laid out for our lives.  This is here; this is now. It’s talking about the journey.  It’s talking about our listening to God’s calling us in our lives now.  It’s talking about letting your life go NOW! If this were easy, then we wouldn’t need Christ.  We’re not asked to just believe in Christ; we’re asked to follow…all the way to the cross.

I know what you’re all thinking.  I’m not so sure I signed up for this.  What happened to that Messiah that was going to take away all our troubles—you know calm all the storms and such?  What happened to that Savior that would solve all of our problems so that life wouldn’t be so hard?  Ooops! Wrong Savior! Maybe we don’t want a Messiah at all.  Maybe we were confused.  Maybe what we REALLY want is a superhero, you know…more of a “and they lived happily ever after” ending. 

That’s not how the story is written.  Oh, don’t get me wrong, I in no way believe that everything has already been laid out for us as some sort of pre-ordained path.  I’m not that Calvinist.  It’s much more nuanced than that.  Some of you have heard me say this, but I once had the opportunity to be a part of a discussion group with John Irving (yes, THAT John Irving).  One question that was asked was predictable:  How did he write his stories?  But his answer was unusual.  He said that he writes the ending first and then rolls out the plots, themes, and chapters that will end the way he has envisioned it.

I think that’s a lot like the way this story is being written.  God has a vision.  We’ve been given clues and the small pieces of it that we can grasp.  But the story is still being written by God and by us.  God has invited us into this work.  But the story is not linear.  It’s not something we can predict or for which we can plan.  Instead, it probably more closely resembles chaos theory.  Chaos theory is a scientific and mathematical discipline that embraces patterns, rather than linear lines.  The assumption is that whatever happens is a product of multiple things, including choices, weather, science, and the things that came before.  You’ve heard of the “butterfly effect”.  That’s chaos theory.  It’s not random.  And it’s not chaos.  It’s ordered.  Isn’t that what God does?  God takes this veritable chaotic swirl of happenings and orders it.  And it is very very good.

Jesus had that vision.  Jesus knew the story.  He was trying to help Peter understand that the chapters that would unfold were not random.  They certainly weren’t chaos.  But they weren’t controllable.  They weren’t predictable.  They weren’t the story that we would probably pen on our own.  God is writing the story and invites us into it to help write it.  But we need to breathe out needing it to be predictable, needing it to be what we want or envision or write for ourselves.  Forget that.  Breathe in the story…the one that God is writing with you. 

God…leads us step by step, from event to event.  Only afterwards, as we look back over the way we have come and reconsider certain important moments in our lives in the light of all that has followed them, or when we survey the whole progress of our lives, do we experience the feeling of having been led without knowing it, the feeling that God has mysteriously guided us. (Paul Tournier)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

To Be Blessed

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Matthew 5: 1-12 (Epiphany 4A)

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain; and after he sat down, his disciples came to him. 2Then he began to speak, and taught them, saying:

3“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 4“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. 5“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. 6“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. 7“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy. 8“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. 9“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. 10“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 11“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

In these words, a part of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, arguably the greatest sermon ever given, Jesus was laying before us an alternate way of being, a way that God calls us to be.  It was a reversal of the usual value system.  He was calling us to expect something different than what we see around us.  It can’t have been accepted all that well.  I mean, he was telling them that the way the world was was not really working, that the society that they had built was not the way it should be.  You and I both know–people don’t like that.

Each beatitude begins in the present and moves to the future.  So, start now but expect it to result in something different.  Expect that when God finishes this new creation, justice and righteousness and peace will finally and always prevail.  And in our seemingly small way, by living in this life now, by living a life of gentleness in this time of violence, a life of pure devotion to God in this time of competing allegiances, and a life in which we truly hunger and thirst for that day of expected justice and righteousness for all, we will become the future. 

No longer can Christianity be seen as a philosophy of life that would make us healthy, wealthy, and wise.  That whole prosperity gospel thing that is so prevalent right now, where if you pray and do right and say the right things and vote the right way, God will somehow reward you with a life of ease and plenty and you will come out on top is totally and completely debunked with this Scripture.  It instead shows us a way of walking that is different from what we know.  And we are expected to do something to make that happen. 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer said this:  Humanly speaking, we could understand and interpret the Sermon on the Mount in a thousand different ways.  Jesus knows only one possibility:  simple surrender and obedience, not interpreting it or applying it, but doing and obeying it.  That is the only way to hear his word.  He does not mean that it is to be discussed as an ideal; he really means us to get on with it.

The promise is not that being blessed means that our lives will become easier.  It doesn’t have anything to do with having a nice house or a good job or living a life of ease and plenty.  Being blessed means having a bless-ed relationship with God and with God’s people who share this planet with you. It means seeing yourself not as better or nicer than others, but as one who is a part of God’s bless-ed Creation. And from that standpoint, the beatitudes are meant to be not instructive but descriptive of that relationship.   They are not meant to be a checklist of what makes us a better person.  They are a vision of a community—an alternative community than the one in which we live.  Truth be told, being “blessed” has more to do with being used by God than it does getting stuff or having your life be easier.

Christ’s coming into this world as our Messiah brought about for us the conception of what Shalom is, the vision of what God’s full and final Kingdom looks like.  And even as the world groans with pain, we get a sense that perhaps some of it are the pains of birthing God’s Reign into being.  We are in the midst of a holy labor, a holy gestation as God’s vision comes to be.  And in our expectation of what will come to be, we find our faith.  And in the meantime, what part do we play?  What is expected of us?  How are we supposed to live as people of faith in this sort of chaotic world in which we find ourselves now?

We live in a time when people tell us to live well and do well.  But Jesus says, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.

We live learning ways to make our life the best we can. But Jesus says, Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. 

We live in a society that tells us to stand up for ourselves, to put ourselves first.  But Jesus says, Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

We live trying to satisfy ourselves in every way. But Jesus says, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

We live in a place that teaches us to hold onto what we have and protect it. But Jesus says, Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

We live in a place that calls us to fill our minds and live within the morals we know and the rules we have designed.  But Jesus says, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

And we live in a country that is trying so desperately to protect itself and its wa of life, so desperately to put itself first.  But Jesus says, Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

It’s hard because it’s not what our world looks like.  We live by expecting to be blessed not in this world but in the way that God envisions we will be.  We are blessed not because we draw close to God but because God draws close to us and because of where we are, we notice.

I won’t take no for an answer,” God began to say to me when God opened his arms each night wanting us to dance.  (St. Catherine of Sienna)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

Come and See

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John 1:29-42 (Epiphany 2A)

The next day he saw Jesus coming toward him and declared, “Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! 30This is he of whom I said, ‘After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.’ 31I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.” 32And John testified, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. 33I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, ‘He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.’ 34And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.” 35The next day John again was standing with two of his disciples, 36and as he watched Jesus walk by, he exclaimed, “Look, here is the Lamb of God!”

37The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. 38When Jesus turned and saw them following, he said to them, “What are you looking for?” They said to him, “Rabbi” (which translated means Teacher), “where are you staying?” 39He said to them, “Come and see.” They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon. 40One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. 41He first found his brother Simon and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated Anointed). 42He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas” (which is translated Peter).

So, last week, the Scripture led us through Jesus’ Baptism and the notion of God’s claim on his life. But you know what?  Jesus didn’t become who God called him to be when he was born.  He didn’t become who God called him to be when people began to flock into his presence.  He didn’t even become who God called him to be in that moment of his baptism. Jesus became who God called him to be when he stood, wet with the waters of baptism, and claimed it for himself.  Because in that moment, as he responded, his ministry began.

It is the same for us. It is the moment when, for each of us, God calls us and God reminds us that we are a son or daughter of God with whom God is well pleased.  So, what now?  What happens next?  What happens after we are baptized, after the Spirit descends into our lives.  I mean, we can’t go back to the way it was before.  So we have to go forward.  We have to do something.   So, what is it?  What is next?   

Come and see…

So, John the Baptizer comes with two of his disciples, points them toward Jesus, and then he sort of drops out of sight.  He’s still part of the story but we know that he had no doubt where the story was to go next.  So, the two that were with him wanted to know more.  They began looking for Jesus.  And Jesus’ response?  It wasn’t an interview or a test of who they were.  It was an invitation.  “Come and see”, come and experience what God has for you.  It says that they remained with him all day, no longer just hearing about Jesus, but getting to know who he was, and, in essence, becoming a part of the story themselves.  In those hours as they spent time experiencing the Christ, they became disciples.

The passage tells us that it became 4:00 in the afternoon of the next day and they wanted to know where Jesus was staying.  Many scholars think that that time of day and the fact that Jesus was apparently leaving to go stay somewhere implies that it was probably the Sabbath.   And that’s important.  Because, as you know, Sabbath was a practice that they did every week—not when the weather was good, not when they didn’t have something else to do, not when there was not a sports event.  It was their way of practicing to be an artist in their spiritual walk.

So, they ask Jesus where he was staying.  It’s a way of getting to know who he was, because Jesus would have stayed with his relatives or possibly some close friends for the Sabbath.  It’s sort of like asking someone who their people are.  And Jesus tells them to “come and see”.  In other words, come go with me, come experience what I experience, come enter my life, come encounter who I encounter.  Come be a part of my story.  But the clincher is that BECAUSE it was the Sabbath, wherever they went, they would have to stay there.  They couldn’t travel on the Sabbath so from sundown Friday evening to sundown Saturday evening, they would be, essentially, locked up with Jesus.  There was no going back. Once you’re locked up with Jesus, I’m pretty sure your life will dramatically change.

Come and see…

You know, years ago, the evangelism and church growth “gurus” came up with something called an “elevator talk”.  Their claim was that, as Christians, as those called to lead people to Christ, we should have in our metaphorical back pocket a 20 second “sound bite” that would lead people to Christ.  Really?  Are you kidding?  I also thought that was bizarre.  I mean, I’m not sure trapping strangers in an elevator and giving them your 20-min treatise of what you think it all means is the best method.  Jesus never told anyone to do that.  I mean, tell me what sound bite you’re going to use to capture the essence of all the Scriptures, all of Jesus’ life, and everything that God is.  Jesus didn’t do sound bites; Jesus did relationships.  Come my friend, come and see…

Come and see…

And then we are told their names.  So, why does that matter?  Because God doesn’t just throw a blanket over humanity to see who will pick it up.  Think about it.  Nowhere in the Bible does God really ask and wait for volunteers.  Nowhere do we read of God pointing at someone and yelling, “hey, you”.  Because we know that “hey, you” does not create relationship.  No, God is much more intimate with us than that.  God gives us a name, a holy act of creation, and we are called to live into that name.  Jesus called each of these people one by one.  And has done the same with us.  Each of us has a unique part of the story to tell. It’s all there.  Just come and see—all of you.

Come and see…

The Lord plays and diverts [the Godself] in the garden of Creation, and if we could let go of our own obsession with what we think is the meaning of it all, we might be able to hear God’s call and follow…When we are alone on a starlit night…when we see children in a moment when they are really children; when we know love in our own hearts…such times…provide a glimpse of the cosmic dance. (Thomas Merton)

[Verse 1]
Come and see
Come follow me
Back to the place where He’s staying
And He’ll not mind
For there you will find
All that your faith has been waiting

[Verse 2]
Come and see
Come follow me
To a road where believing is seeing
There’s work to do
And words of Truth
To find in your heart for the speaking

[Chorus]
Come and see
Come and see (ooo ooo ooo-oo oo oo ooo)
Come and see
Come and see (ooo ooo ooo-oo oo oo ooo)

[Verse 3]
Come see the Way
The Truth, and the Life
Come see the Light that is living
Come now and see
How the truth sets you free
Come live the life He is giving

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

A Deserted Place

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Scripture Text: Mark 6: 30-34, 53-56 (Proper 11B)

30The apostles gathered around Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught. 31He said to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. 32And they went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves. 33Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them. 34As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things.

53When they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored the boat. 54When they got out of the boat, people at once recognized him, 55and rushed about that whole region and began to bring the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was. 56And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplaces, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.

You know, sometimes discipleship is just downright exhausting.  Oh, who are we kidding?  Sometimes just being a normal person trying to keep your head above water is downright exhausting.  Sometimes it seems too hard or too much or too complicated.  Discipleship (and life, for that matter) is really sort of a balancing act.  It is full of rhythms of converging order and chaos, beginnings and ending, and pulsing light and dark and sometimes we struggle to somehow balance all those aspects of life as we continue our journey forward. 

This passage depicts a time in the life of the disciples not unlike that.  Remember that the verses preceding the ones we read are the account of the death of John the Baptist (Why did we read that again?).  And at this point, we are told that the apostles return from sort of their first tour of service and gather around Jesus, telling him everything that had been happening with their mission.  They are excited.  They have wonderful stories of healings and teachings and people that are really listening to them.  They are becoming witnesses of the Gospel and things are beginning to change!  And yet, they are realizing that this discipleship thing is hard; it’s exhausting; sometimes it’s just frustrating.  And during this time, John the Baptist had been brutally executed.  This is certain to have cast a somber shadow over their elation at the success of their mission.  This had to be scary.  After all, John had been part of Jesus’ work.  John had, essentially, been one of them, doing what they’re doing.  But, as we know, we cannot always control or predict what happens in life. And so, in the midst of their shock and sadness and grief, and probably fear, Jesus tells the apostles (and himself), to “come away and rest”.  He tells them to go to a deserted place, a quiet place.  It was a place of Sabbath.

Now, probably with very little effort, we, too, will identify with this busy life, the throng of demands, the ongoing needs of those around us, and, possibly, even with the dangers that somehow impede our journeys.  We can even identify with those times when, like these disciples, we feel that we can’t even take time to eat, those times when there’s so much going on, when there are so many balls being juggled, that you feel like you can’t even breathe.  You’ll notice here that there were verses that we skipped in this week’s prescribed lectionary passage.  They are the account of the feeding of the five thousand.  Yeah, I’m thinking that wasn’t a time of rest, that was NOT a deserted place.  As much as the disciples wanted to serve, wanted to BE disciples, that was hard.  You can imagine that they wanted so badly to go off and rest, to go off and be by themselves to grieve, to reflect, to be.  So, Jesus tells them to stop, desist, take some time to care for themselves, and not to feel that they have to immediately respond to every cry in the world.  Yeah, Jesus got it!  Jesus knew we were human.

It is a lesson for us all.  It is part of the lesson that Jesus is trying to make the disciples realize.  They are not God; they are not the saviors of the world; they are limited human beings who need to rest.  They are not called to do all the work themselves.  Remember, they are the ones that are called to call others who call others who call others.  We are not in this alone.  This is part of human reality and, more importantly, it is part of that rhythmic dance of creation to which we all belong.  And so, the disciples did what Jesus had said to do and got into a boat and went to a deserted place.

But, as we all know, just because we choose a time to sail away does not mean that the rhythm of life stops.  We are told that there were people on the shore who recognized them and hurried to greet them.  (Don’t you hate that?  Leave me alone!)  But these people needed something—they were hungry for what Jesus offered.  Jesus responded to their needs, teaching and caring for them.  The disciples were there too, perhaps a little miffed that their “deserted place” had now become a somewhat public arena.  In the verses that the lectionary omits, they wanted to send them away.  This was their time; this was when they were supposed to rest.  But Jesus told them, “no, give them something to eat, sustenance for their bodies and food for their souls.”  So, in a way that is so familiar to us, he took the food, and blessed it and gave it to the disciples to serve the people around them.  Rest would come.

In her book, Sabbath Keeping, Donna Schaper says that “Sabbath is a way of living, not a thing to have or a list to complete.  By observing it we become people who both work and rest, and who know why, when, and how we do either.  We also recognize the occasions on which we do both at the same time.  We know how to pray, how to be still, how to do nothing.  Sabbath people know that “our” time is really God’s time, and we are invited to live in it.  We are living our eternity now—this Tuesday and Wednesday, this Saturday and Sunday.”  Isn’t that what we are trying to do—find that rhythm of life to which God invites us, that balancing act, if you will, that is God’s call to us?  This is the way that our time and God’s time converge and become one.  This is the way that our hearts beat the heartbeat of God and our ears hear God’s music.

The Jewish culture in which Jesus and the disciples lived was one that embraced time much more than space.  The understanding was that, contrary to the way we look at time, all hours were not alike.  Each hour was unique and the only one given at that moment.  Each hour held its own identity and its own purpose and within all of those hours, the Sabbath, those times when God calls us to rest and renew and return to our deepest relationship with God, were like great cathedrals, the Holiest of Holies, that sanctified time from which God then sent us into the world.

But we have lost that rhythm of being sent out into the world and renewed within God’s sanctified time, as God’s work prepares us to be sent forth again.  We are so busy doing our own work that we’re not allowing God to do God’s work on us.  It is wrapped in this holy time of rest with God that we get this glimpse of the holy and the sacred that exists for us even now.  It is what gives us the vision to do the work that needs to be done.  It allows us a chance to once again get in touch with God’s purposes for us and for the world.  It is a way of emptying ourselves.  Mother Teresa once proclaimed, “Let us remain as empty as possible so that God can fill us up.”  This is the way that God fills us up.  It is the way of becoming Sabbath, the Holiest of Holies, consecrated for God.  It is part of being a disciple.

This idea of the Sabbath being holy is not new.  In fact, ancient Judaism saw Sabbath rest and eternity as one, of the same essence.  Abraham Heschel relates a legend that claims that “at the time when God was giving the Torah to Israel, [God] said to them:  My children!  If you accept the Torah and observe my commandment, I will give you for all eternity a thing most precious that I have in my possession.  And what, asked Israel, is that precious thing which Thou wilt give us if we obey Thy Torah?  The world to come.  Show us in this world an example of the world to come.  The Sabbath is an example of the world to come…The Sabbath possesses a holiness like that of the world to come.”

I know.  Sabbath is hard.  There is just too much to do.  There are just so many hours in the day.  There are too many people depending on me.  If I don’t do it, it won’t happen.  Are any of these resonating with any of you? John Westerhoff, who is a well-known theologian, calls the phrase “if I don’t do it, it won’t happen” a proclamation of atheism.  Wow!  None of us are in this alone.  If you don’t do it, either someone else will or it just wasn’t meant to happen.  If you believe in the God who is always with you, always holding you, always guiding you; if you believe in the God who created you and loves you so much that this God would give you this gift of Sabbath to make you aware of that, if you believe in the God who calls us into this household of believers where we support each other into becoming the Body of Christ, then why don’t you believe that God will somehow empower you to find a way to get everything done that needs done?  Go back and read the Gospel passage again.  There was work to be done—LOTS of work to be done–and the disciples waited in the boat. “Come away and rest.”

In 1951, Rabbi Abraham Heschel wrote what I think is the quintessential classic entitled The Sabbath.  In it, Heschel says that “unless one learns how to relish the taste of Sabbath while still in this world, unless one is initiated in the appreciation of eternal life, one will be unable to enjoy the taste of eternity in the world to come.  Sad,” he says, “is the lot of the one who arrives inexperienced and when led to heaven has no power to perceive the beauty of the Sabbath…”

The traditional Jewish Sabbath begins at sundown, the Christian Sabbath with morning worship.  In both, Sabbath time begins with the lighting of candles and a stopping—to welcome the Sabbath in.  The Jewish understanding is that the Sabbath is welcomed in like a queen.  It is more than rest; it is promise.  It is a release from whatever enslaves us.  For the early Jews, that was actually embodied slavery; for us, it is choosing to be released from clocks and commitments and phones and schedules and all those burdens that we bear.  Marcia Falk writes that “three generations back my family had only to light a candle and the world parted.  Today, Friday afternoon, I disconnect clocks and phones.  When night fills my house with passages, I begin saving my life.” This is the beginning of sacred time.  This is the beginning of eternity.  This is where we find life.

Sabbath is not rest the way we think.  Sabbath is connection.  Sabbath is responding to God’s invitation to enter the holiest of holies, to leave ourselves behind, if only for a day, and find ourselves. Sabbath is not a nap, not a withdrawal. Sabbath is rest in the God we know, the God who is wanting us to connect, wanting us to find ourselves.

Every person needs to take one day away.  A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future…A day in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for. (Maya Angelou)

Grace and Peace,

Shelli

The Light of the World

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Peter Adams, Cristo-Redentor, Corcovado Mountain, Rio

Scripture Text: John 8:12

12Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” 

Jesus is the light of the world.  We’ve heard that many times.  We like that.  It comforts us, give us hope for this sometimes-messed up world in which we live.  So, we wait.  We wait for the Light to come flooding in, for the darkness to subside, for the world to be what it is and always was meant to be.  And in the meantime, we rely on faith.  We look toward Jesus to lead us home.

Does that sound about right?  But what if it’s different from what we imagine?  What if the waiting is not for the time that the Light will come and fill our world but for the time that we will finally let the Light into where we are standing now?  See, contrary to what we’d like to visualize, I’m beginning to believe that Jesus has no intention of lighting up the world like some sort of massive fluorescent light fixture.  God is not dangling full lighting at us as a reward for our faith or for changing our ways or anything else.

The Light is already here.  Jesus did not say “I am going to be the Light of the world” or “Someday I’ll light up the world”.  Jesus said “I AM the light of the world.  The Light is shining into the world.  Sometimes it is hidden.  Sometimes we hide from it.  Sometimes we shrink away from it.  Sometimes we miss it because we’re looking in another direction.  But the Light is here, shining its way into the world.  The world is made of Light.

This Season of Advent is not preparing us for the Light to come; it is preparing us to learn to see what is already here.  It wakes us up, clears our eyes, and shows us how to focus on the Light that is shining into our lives.  And if we look toward that Light, if we learn to see it even through the shadows, the darkness in which we sometimes reside will not disappear but will become a hollow space prepared for Light.  Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.” 

Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness. (Desmond Tutu) 

Grace and Peace,

 Shelli