Good News?

     I receive daily a good news journal in my email.  I started doing it for the congregation so that Sunday mornings I could offer a moment for hope.  This has become, for me at least, a very important part of our Sunday morning service: taking a minute to lift up a reason to be hopeful.  It is frankly difficult to hold on to hope when we look at the increasing violence in our world; the senseless wars; the racism, sexism, heterosexism and more that are on the rise, world-wide; the unconditional support for people who do horrible, inhumane things while villainizing those who are already living on the edge because of unjust and broken systems; the anger and rage we encounter in greater and greater amounts; and the HEAT that is just a glimpse of what is to come in the next few years along with the fear that we will not have a planet we can live on for much longer because of human refusal to, very simply, care.  I can no longer listen to the "regular" news because I find it so distressing and so lacking in hope.

    So I signed up to receive this good news every day.  The e-zine I subscribe to usually lists 4-5 stories each day of good news, of humans being kind, of communities doing good work, of reasons to be hopeful.

    But I have to be honest, most of them are hopeful because they are countering a situation that is dire and lacking in kindness.  

    For example, today I read a story about how Jon Bon Jovi saved a woman from committing suicide who was about to jump off a bridge.  While the story did not detail why she wanted to commit suicide, the very fact that there are so many people in that state of wanting to take their own lives is deeply distressing.  But more to the point: the episode was caught on video.  And what surprised me was not the fact that Jon Bon Jovi stopped to talk to her, but that many people walked by her as she is hanging on the far side of the fence on the bridge with very clear intentions to jump, WITHOUT stopping!  Yay for Jon Bon Jovi, but really!  Shouldn't it be the exception that people don't stop for each other, don't step up, don't get involved to help?  Why is it the exception when someone does?

    The second story was about a woman who is taking old tennis balls and making furniture out of them.  She's doing this because most tennis balls end up in landfills where it takes at least 400 years to decompose!  Well, again, I'm thrilled she is doing something.  But why do we continue to use up the land (dare I say rape the land??!) of its resources to create huge, unusable garbage dumps with materials that cannot be reused or recycled?!  Why are humans so greedy that we feel the land is ours to use and abuse without care for future generations?  Why aren't more people demanding that we use renewable and recyclable resources instead of non-renewable resources that will run out and which, in the meantime, harm our planet, and often do damage to the people tasked with the jobs of extracting those materials from the earth?

    Today's third story was about a native tribe, the Chumash, who for the last 40 years have been trying to get legal protection of some important tribal land here in CA.  The good news was that now they are being heard, though it will still take more time to implement what they are requesting, which is protection of land.  But again, 40 years?!  And shouldn't we all want protection of our lands?

    The last story today was about another billionaire choosing to give $1million to a school.  He is donating less than 1% of his annual income, but it makes the news because it is so much in terms of the mighty dollar.  What if all these billionaires actually tithed, giving the ten percent that many give to help others?  What could be done then?  But no, those with more become greedier so that the small percentages they do give are seen as extraordinary and make the news.

    These stories, all of them, were just what came to my inbox today.  And as I'm writing this, I'm aware, again, that all of these are supposed to be good news, and yet each one of them said something very negative about humanity as a whole that I find very discouraging.  

    As always, my job is to pass on hope.  So what can I say about this that does offer hope?  It is hopeful that some of us can see how wrong the situations are in the first place.  Until we see what is wrong, until we can name it, there is no chance for change.  There is hope that there are a few people stepping out to make a difference.  Just as greed, anger and evil seem to be contagious, goodness and kindness is absolutely contagious.  So, as more people choose to do what is right, we can trust that their kindness will inspire others to also see the bigger picture and respond with care and kindness.

    From a faith perspective, we also put our hope in a God who can take our small efforts for good and grow them into bigger changes for the world.  We are called to trust that even when we cannot see the good we have done, that God can use it and grow it over time.  

    Perhaps these small pieces of hope don't feel like enough.  If that is the case I challenge each of you who are reading this to be the hope.  To be the kindness and to step into places of making a difference that we are each called to do.  Give more, even while knowing that it won't be reported to some good news magazine.  Care more, even while recognizing that your acts of reaching out to those who are struggling may not be caught on video.  Love more and serve more, even while seeing that you may start as the exception, but that as we continue to do the work of loving and serving, others will be inspired by our examples to do the same.

    We are the hope.  And we can trust that this is, indeed, good news!

Haggai

            Unlike the other prophets whom we’ve studied so far, Haggai is speaking to a people who have already been destroyed.  He is talking to the exiles of the destroyed Judah who have been in Babylon.  Now, under Cyrus’ edict (after Persia conquered the Babylonians), the remaining Israelites have been allowed to return to Jerusalem.  Haggai is therefore giving instructions for a new Jerusalem, and he is encouraging the rebuilding of the temple, the rebuilding of the tradition, the rebuilding of the Israelite commitment to their faith as they return home.  This is a very different message from what we’ve heard from the other prophets.  And the response of Zerubbabel, the high priest, is to lead the people to do exactly what Haggai says God has commanded.  They do set to work on building the temple.  And Haggai announces that as a result, God will grant peace, God will be with them, God is pleased.  The book of Haggai approaches the conclusion with this phrase, “From this day on I will bless you.”

            So, unlike the other prophets, and perhaps especially Amos who we heard from last week, the book of Haggai is hopeful, it is living in the resurrection of Israel, it is the promise of new life that comes after death.  Since we are in the season of lent, walking towards the cross, this resurrection and focus on the resurrection may seem to be premature.  But I think that, first of all, going through those times of hardship, those times of death, we can be boosted and supported by knowing that even out of death resurrection comes.  And secondly, I am aware that even in our most difficult times there are small moments, at least, of new life, or hope, of good things.  Those understandings, and that promise of new life, that hope, that belief, allows us to carry through, to make it through, to push forward even through the darkest times. 

            You all know the story of Pandora’s box (or jar, is, I understand, a more accurate translation).  The idea behind this Greek myth is that Pandora accidentally let loose on the human race all the evils of our world except one – that one being despair.  In another version, she let out (and away) from humanity all the good things in the world except for Hope.  In another version, everything in the box was evil except the very last “spirit” to slip from the box, and that spirit was hope….Whichever version you know of the story, the message is the same: with all the evils that are in the world, the one thing that humanity could not tolerate, could not live with: the one thing that would make life unbearable is despair, or lack of hope.  When people do hit that place of ultimate despair, that is when they give up, and we know the results of that…suicides, murders, harm to other people.  All of it ends the same: death. 

But the message of the gospel is a message of hope.  The scriptures do talk about endings, they do talk about sorrows, they do talk about walking through fire, as the Israelites did when they were sent into exile, as Jesus did when he was sent to the cross.  But the scriptures don’t leave us there.  There is always something beyond death, beyond the dark night, beyond the fiery trials and tribulations.  And that is the Good News of our faith.  On the other side of any loss, of any death, of any pain, God promises resurrection.  Haggai is the voice for that resurrection that is offered even in the Old Testament.

            I want to share with you a story written by Arnold Lobel in his book Grasshopper on the Road.  The story in entitled “A New House.”

The Road went up a steep hill.  Grasshopper climbed to the top.  He found a large apple lying on the ground.  “I will have my lunch,” said Grasshopper.  He ate a big bite of the apple.  “Look what you did!” said a worm, who lived in the apple.  “You have made a hole in my roof!  It is not polite to eat a person’s house,” said the worm. 

“I am sorry,” said Grasshopper.  Just then the apple began to roll down the road on the other side of the hill.

“Stop me!  Catch me!” cried the worm.  The apple was rolling faster and faster.  “Help, my head is bumping on the walls!  My dishes are falling off the shelf!” cried the worm.  Grasshopper ran after the apple.  “Everything is a mess in here!” cried the worm.  “My bathtub is in the living room.  My bed is in the kitchen!”

Grasshopper kept running down the hill.  But he could not catch the apple.  “I am getting dizzy,” cried the worm.  “My floor is on the ceiling!  My attic is in the cellar!”The apple rolled and rolled.  It rolled all the way down to the bottom of the hill.  The apple hit a tree.  It smashed into a hundred pieces. 

“Too bad, worm,” said Grasshopper.  “Your house is gone.”

The worm climbed up the side of the tree.  “Oh, never mind,” said the worm.  “It was old, and it had a big bite in it anyway.  This is a fine time for me to find a new house.” Grasshopper looked up into the tree.  He saw that it was filled with apples.  Grasshopper smiled, and he went on down the road.

The worm in this story was upset.  The worm experienced great loss – of everything that he owned.  But the worm also had the vision to see possibilities beyond his losses; to look forward, to go into new life, to experience resurrection.

Does that mean that we can avoid the pain and the grief?  No, we can’t.  We have to feel those things too.  But it does mean that we can avoid deep despair.  And I think that is the deepest gift, the deepest promise of our faith. 

As I wrote this sermon, I found myself reflecting on the hardest times in my own life.  I know that each of us has gone through difficult, painful, deeply disturbing times.  I have no doubt that for you, as there was for me, there were moments when the questions loomed large, “will we make it through this?”  “HOW will we make it through this?”  “Will we be okay on the other end of this?”  “What will that other side look like?”  For myself, the other side of those times did not look the way I had hoped or expected.  Nothing stayed the same, and nothing returned to what it was.

No, instead things are better than they were before.  I mean this genuinely.  I am happy here at this church, I am happy here in CA again with the sun and the land and the mountain, I am happy with David, I am happy with my family.  More than this, I walked through the fires of our life and came out with two very different and very real understandings than before I went through.  The first, I came through knowing my own strength, a strength based in large part on my faith.  God walked in a tangible way alongside our family through the toughest times.  I go forward trusting God’s presence to a much deeper level than ever before.  And secondly, I understand much more fully that “this too shall pass.”  Nothing lasts.  Nothing stays the same.  Everything changes. And that means that whatever is good in your life should be appreciated and celebrated now because it will not stay the same.  And whatever is bad in your life will not be a burden forever because it, too, will not stay the same.  These are deep gifts of learning: that everything changes, and that with god on our side there is hope, and there is faith that we will make it through whatever life hands us. 

A quote that has been helpful to me over the years, written by Paramahansa Yogandanda is, “Do not take life’s experiences too seriously.  Above all, do not let them hurt you for in reality they are nothing but dream experiences.  If circumstances are bad and you have to bear them, do not make them a part of yourself.  Play your part in life but never forget that it is only a role.”  I play my part, but I never forget that my deeper identity is as a child of God.  Your identity is as a child of God.  That is what is real.  That is what is ultimately important. 

I found as I wrote this that this poem came to mind:

I asked God for strength that I might achieve.
I was made weak that I might learn humbly to obey.
I asked for health that I might do greater things.
I was given infirmity that I might do better things.
I asked for riches that I might be happy.
I was given poverty that I might be wise.
I asked for power that I might have the praise of men.
I was given weakness that I might feel the need of God.
I asked for all things that I might enjoy life.
I was given life that I might enjoy all things.
I got nothing that I asked for, but everything I hoped for.
Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.
I am, among all men, most richly blessed.

– Prayer by an unknown confederate soldier

            There is another message in Haggai, though.  In the book of Haggai we are told that resurrection does not look like just sitting around and taking life easy. Resurrection is not a passive experience for us of sitting and waiting for God to act.  The Israelites were required to rebuild the temple – not an easy, simple, or small task to take on.  This was a primary message of Haggai: you must rebuild the temple: all of you must rebuild the temple together.  But the results of this, for the Israelites, for this people of God, were amazing.  First of all, when they had a hand in their own renewal, in their own resurrection, it became not only a source of pride, but they had a much deeper ownership in who they now were as a people.  Before the exile, the temple had really only been used by the elite.  It was a place built by, and for, the elite.  But it was only after the rebuilding of the temple that it became the center of life for the Israelites. That joint effort, that working together (not hired by the wealthy, not forced to build something for others, but choosing to be part of creating something for themselves) to rebuild this central building brought a deeper sense of faith, of commitment, of community to the people.  

Again, it came with a lot of work.  The message here is that for those who hope that new life, that resurrection, that “heaven”, that new beginnings of any kind are given to us on a silver platter, are a place where we are served and do not need to lift a hand on our own behalves but  can just nap and wait for the wonderful to come, the reality will be something far different.  The resurrection is a place where there will be good things, wonderful things: God’s presence, new life.  But those things also come with a much deeper gift: meaningful work and purpose.   

This week I read an article in the Washington Post about a school where the girls were being sexually harassed.  They tried to talk to the principal, who brought in only the “Leader” from the boys and told him to stop it.  But the girls knew this was not enough.  They fought for an education program at their school that would teach everyone more about how to be respectful of all people, no matter their age, gender, situation, race, or any other factor.  They changed the whole culture of the school by pushing this through.  And they came out with strength, with a sense of their own power and ability to change their world.  It not only improved things for them in the short run, it also empowered them and their fellow students as they were able to witness the power of their efforts change the world in which they lived.

Walking into new life will involve the work of all of us talking, sharing, healing, and growing together.  If we accept the invitation to follow God’s call to action, to working together, to building the new together: if we accept the invitations for meaning, to purpose, then, as Haggai tells us in his book, “From this day on, God will bless you”.  And that is very good news.  Amen.

Good and Bad Soil

Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

               When I have time to garden, I enjoy it very much.  I enjoy digging around in the dirt, working with the life of plants, helping them to grow and show their beauty.  Each time I dig around in the dirt and encounter tree roots, rocks, hard ground, or other barriers to growth, I find myself reflecting on this parable.  This parable is so rich with meanings.  And where we stand, where we live, what we experience daily has a great deal to do with how we hear and understand and relate to every parable, this story being no exception.  Even with Jesus’ explanation of the parable, we still hear it from our own contexts and understand it in that light. 

               What, for example, does rocky ground look like today?  When you hear this parable, what comes to mind when you think about those who, in the words of the parable, receive the seeds of Good News, of hope, of promise, with joy but then quickly fall away?  And what are we talking about when we talk about seeds?  These seeds that are planted but do not always grow or do not grow strong?  Are we talking about faith?  A belief in the Good News?  Are we talking about a commitment to following in the Way, to living out our lives with justice and compassion and commitment to our God of love?  Are we talking about lives dedicated to loving our neighbors, and yes, our enemies, as ourselves? I believe this parable, and these words can even be applied to easy, simpler situations, not just to the big picture of what it means to be people of Faith.  Sometimes we feel God’s call in our lives, for example, to do something specific and it just doesn’t take: God plants the seed in us of a dream, a hope, a calling.  But sometimes when we feel called to do a particular thing and it doesn’t work out for us, we can wonder if we’ve heard the call wrong, or if the seed we planted just wasn’t very good.  But this parable gives us another way to understand it.  Sometimes the call we have or the message we’ve been called to follow just hasn’t found the right soil yet.  Or perhaps the soil needed more tending, more tilling, more fertilizer.  And sometimes it simply isn’t the right time for the planting.  That’s why common church phrases such as “we tried that once and it didn’t work” are simply not helpful.  When God plants a seed in us, a call, an idea, sometimes it won’t work not because its bad seed but simply because the soil isn’t right for it at that moment or in that place or, most likely, with that particular combination of time and place. 

               But whether we are talking the little seeds of a particular task God gives us to plant or the big seed of living out lives of faith and following in the way, the ultimate point of this parable is that planting the seeds, being the sower, being the one to bring and attempt to grow things, ideas, visions, missions is hard.  Trusting in our calls to carry the Good News, in our words, in our actions, in our lives; trusting in the seeds that we are given, especially when they don’t seem to grow, can be so very hard.

For the disciples, these words that we hear Jesus speak today, this parable – these are words of encouragement.  After Jesus has gone, the disciples will share their stories, their experiences of Jesus, the imperative to live lives of love with others, but they must be aware that their words, the Word of God that they speak and that they ask others to live out, may not easily be received or followed.  They will encounter all kinds of people and they will not be able to succeed with everyone they meet.  Each person will come from their own place and their own perspective.  Some will not understand at all and will never be able to hear.  Others will hear and accept with joy the Good News they are given, but will have no depth in their faith, in their understanding, in their commitments to living the life that this demands of us, that will allow them to persevere when things become hard or challenging.  And some will find they are lured away from acting or living out, growing their seeds to fullness by the values of the world.  Jesus tells them this parable to reassure the disciples.  Their job, their only job, is to plant the seeds, to speak Good News, to live God’s truth, to be the people God calls them to be and by so doing to plant and plant and plant the seeds God gives them each and every day.  They are not responsible for how it is received or what people do with what they hear.  They are not responsible for the growing of those seeds, only the planting of them.  There are many reasons why those seeds might not grow, why the visions God gives them to plant might not grow, and ultimately the disciples may not know the good they are able to accomplish in some.  But that is not theirs to worry about.   

               We are given the same words of encouragement.  But still they are hard.  What do you do when things don’t work out?  When you think the seeds you’ve planted, by actions, by deed, by the way you live your life, or by your words were good and you think the soil or groundwork foundation upon which those seeds were planted was well fertilized and abundant, but it still just doesn’t work out?  What do you do when the seeds don’t grow, for one reason or another? 

               Current emphasis on church growth looks at doing studies ahead of time, or, to put it in this parable’s terms, to actually dig into the soil to understand it a bit before seeds are planted.  But this has been found in many ways to be ineffective.  Will we ever really know what is in or under the soil?  We can be educated about our communities’ needs, we can care about what is going on in the lives of those around us, but ultimately, knowing the heart of one another takes time, it takes work, and it takes a willingness to plant seeds without knowing whether they will flourish long term or not.

Sojourner’s magazine published an article entitled, “Have churches become too shallow?”  Stephen Mattson wrote, “Christians ultimately attend church to meet with God. But sometimes we turn our churches into distractions, and spiritual leaders mistakenly prioritize things beyond God, becoming obsessed with marketing, consumerism, and entertainment — creating false idols…..Truth is gauged by the amount of attention received, morality judged by popularity, holiness measured by fame, authority determined by power, security based upon control, and happiness evaluated according to wealth.  This is what happens when we ignore God — or simply try to make God more marketable: Jesus becomes a product. The Gospel becomes a promotional tool. Parishioners become customers. Pastors become celebrities. Sermons become propaganda. Churches become businesses. Denominations become institutions. Faith becomes a religion, which eventually becomes an empire.  Instead of striving to be a place for divine communion where disciples praise and worship …, churches become infatuated with accommodation — making people comfortable, happy, entertained, safe, and content. Contrarily, churches can go to the opposite extreme and remove any hint of joy, encouragement, comfort, and inspiration. Instead, they choose to implement fear, guilt, shame, and other abusive tactics to legalistically manipulate people into “loving” God.  Both types of Christianity are illusions built upon lies and a facade of clichés, where cheap sales techniques and overused stereotypes are reinforced using the powerful motivations of insecurity, convenience, ignorance, and a deep fear and hesitation of being brutally honest, uncomfortable, humble, and vulnerable — scared of risking it all.  This is why people often abandon Christianity and stop attending church — because God has been replaced by shallow gimmicks.  Instead of helping the poor, feeding the hungry, tending to the sick, sheltering the homeless, fighting injustice, speaking for the voiceless, sacrificially giving, and wholeheartedly loving our neighbors (and enemies), churches have become co-opted by secular values and empty content.  Emulating Christ is not for the faint of heart, and following his commands will probably mean becoming a church that embraces conflict, discomfort, work, pain, suffering, and truth. This is the messiness of Christianity — following God through the Pilgrim’s Progress of life, forsaking the riches of this world for the treasure of a Divine relationship. Are we brave enough to embrace this?”

The call to plant seeds, to do the work, to have the conversations, to risk truth-telling and to risk truly loving others, and acting in a way that really empowers, liberates and feeds others – that call requires being brave.  I found myself thinking about the Dr. Seuss story, Horton Hears a Who.  Horton did not want the job of protecting the teeny tiny Who community that was on the little clover flower.  But he took it because the job needed to be done and it was in front of him.  He was given the seed, the opportunity to serve and he planted it by taking the job.  In contrast, a little later when the Whos were trying to get the attention of Horton’s disbelieving community by shouting with all of their might, one of the little Whos was not participating.  This little Who didn’t want to do it, he didn’t think it would matter whether he did what he was called to do or not.  In the end, when he was finally convinced to try, it was his voice, the littlest voice of all, that added enough volume to the collective shouting that Horton’s community could hear him and change their minds about the Whos existence.  That one voice, that one decision to say “yes” to the call to answer the needs at hand, to stand up, to be a voice for truth and justice, that one voice made the difference.

Will it always?  No.  But again, we are not in charge of the outcome.  We are not in charge of whether or not our voice, our work, our efforts make a difference.  We are not in charge of whether or not the seeds we plant will grow.  I realize that is a hard lesson to bear.  When we work hard at something and get nowhere, it is easy to give up.  It is easy to say, “it’s not going to make any difference, so why bother?”  (starfish?)

We also can’t always anticipate which seeds will grow what, or what good they will do.  Sometimes the things we consider to be weeds give the most life.  As a world, for example, we are having a crisis about bees dying.  In the process of studying bees, one of the things that has been found is that one small reason for this is that we get rid of “weeds”.  One of the weeds we get rid of, dandelions, happens to be one of the bees’ favorite flowers.  Similarly, gold finches are most attracted to thistle.  Sometimes when we think the seeds we’ve planted are turning into weeds, we have to take a more studied look at what is, in fact, growing after all.  We may find ourselves unhappy about the thistle and the dandelions until we see the life that surrounds them.  I have a friend who planted what he called a “butterfly plant” in his yard.  He found that the caterpillars of the butterflies kept eating most of the leaves on this butterfly plant.  He became very upset and determined to poison the caterpillars until his son pointed out that the caterpillars were what was becoming the butterflies he was hoping to attract.  He had a choice.  To let the caterpillars eat much of the plant but be rewarded with the butterflies, or to kill off the caterpillars and lose the butterflies as well.

               I began today’s sermon by saying that where we stand has a great deal to do with how we hear this story.  Wherever we stand, we tend to assume that our hearts represent the good soil, that we are the ones who have heard, in whom the seeds have taken hold and grown, the ones with depth of soil in whom the roots can also find room to move and deepen.  But my experience says that all of us hold all those different types of soil in one area of our lives or another.  Maybe the good soil within us, for example, takes strong hold of God’s words of grace offered, given and accepted into our hearts through our trust and faith in it.  But maybe at the same time, the call to love our enemies as ourselves has not found good soil in terms of loving a certain kind of person, a certain type of person, whatever or whomever that may be.  Or maybe it is the opposite.  We have good soil within us that encourages us to live lives of action and love towards our neighbors, but when it comes to the soil that allows the seeds of God’s grace and forgiveness, the new life that God offers to US to grow, our soil is not so rich. 

               In all of these cases, the soil is not up to us.  What happens with the seeds that we plant is not up to us.  We can pray for good soil, pray that God will enrich the soil, fertilize the soil.  But what we are called to do is our job - keep planting the seeds, within our world, within our communities, within our churches, and mostly, within ourselves – to keep doing the work of God, being open to receiving the seeds God asks us to plant, keep listening in every way that God speaks, and to pray for the good soil that only God, ultimately, can provide.

               I want to leave you with one more thought about planting seeds.  There is a story about a group of people who were taking a pottery class.  The teacher divided the students into two groups – a quality group and a quantity group.  The quality group was told all each of them had to do was make one beautiful pot.  The quantity group was told they needed to just make as many pots as possible.  Which group do you think did the better job?  The quality group did not do well because they spent all their time on one pot and when it was not going well, they just kept trying to redo it.  The quantity group produced beautiful pots because with each one they made, they learned something and could improve on it with the next pot. 

               When we do the work of God, we will be given more seeds to plant.  Each time we will learn and get better at the planting.  Do justice.  Speak the truth.  Share the Good News of God’s love for ALL people.  Stand up for the voiceless.: the call under all of it is simply to love one another.  These are the seeds we are called to plant.  Plant lots of seeds of love.  Each time you do, you will get better at it.  But even so, let go of the results.  We are not in charge of the soil, that is up to the hearers.  And we are not in charge of the end results: that is up to God.  And in that, there is great hope.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.