A Lack of Laughter

         In a training I took on trauma, mediation, and conflict resolution, I remember learning that one of the ways to evaluate how well a congregation or any group is doing is by seeing how easily they laugh.  If they can move easily to genuine, non-sarcastic and non-cynical laughter, then, despite what else might be going on, they are actually doing okay.  In contrast, if you cannot move a group into laughter, that is a sign that the tensions and conflict are high, and that the group is in a crisis situation that will not be easily resolved.

    Our country has stopped laughing.  

    I see it in smaller groups of people: the small groups in my church no longer laugh and play.  When I intentionally attempt to say something funny on a Sunday, the congregation has stopped responding with laughter.  At home, we usually laugh a great deal but we don't anymore.  At the Presbytery meeting, there was little laughter and play. The friends I usually laugh and play with are very sullen and serious now.  Even in the office, where we often share funny videos and playful images, those have changed.  Now we only share the ones that, again, are sarcastic, cynical and if there is laughter, it is bitter.  

    There's no more grace in our roads or even in relationships.  People are quick to anger and forgiveness is a stretch if it exists at all.    

    An article came out this week talking about the great importance of play.  One of the kids at church told the congregation that they need to stop working as much and need to play more.  We know that play and laughter are extremely important parts of mental health.  

    But our stress is too high.  Our fear too great.  The damage we are witnessing to our siblings and to our own family members can't be laughed off.  

    I can name all the reasons.  You can name all the reasons.  We've lost our country.  We are no longer a democracy.  And the changes that are happening now won't be reversible. Add to that that we don't know what will come next, but since everything so far has aimed at the financial and in many cases physical destruction of everyone who is not white, male, heterosexual, and in the richest .02% of the country, there's no reason to expect that whatever comes next won't hurt us further. But saying all this doesn't help, since, as I said, you know all this. 

    So what can help?  What might help? I write to encourage you to do what it takes to start laughing again.  I write to encourage you to look for what is beautiful and good in this moment, for this moment is all we have.  Try to be kind and gentle with one another.  Try to be graceful and forgiving of one another.  Do what you need to do to stay sane in the midst of the chaos: write, draw, sing, laugh, cry, pray, rage, run, exercise, do yoga, meditate, reach out for your friends and for those who can hear and support you.  Watch funny videos, listen to happy music, get out in nature, learn something new, take a class, take a nap.  Give thanks for this moment because right now you are still alive.  Be grateful for your family and friends who are still living because they are there to be support and to offer love.  Remember that you are not alone: we are in this together, and God is with us, too.  Breathe. 

    Don't be afraid to do what must be done and to speak truth. Take care of the least of these because that is our call. But also, take care of yourselves. Try to find a way to truly laugh.     

Hurry! Hurry! Offer ends soon!

     We are bombarded with ads that come to our houses, to our emails, through our televisions, on the websites we visit, and even through our phones via texts, apps and phone calls.  There is always an urgency in these ads: "Hurry, hurry!  Offer ends soon!" 

    We know why they do it this way: if they can create a sense of urgency, people are more likely to purchase whatever it is before their rational brain can kick in and point out that we don't actually need whatever it is they are selling, and often we don't even want it.  There is danger from companies that want to sell more! more! more! in giving people time for them to think about what they are doing.  There is also the fallacy that if you buy something on sale that you are saving money.  You are still buying whatever it is.  You are still paying money for that item.  Unless it is something you were looking to buy and planning to buy that you then found on sale, you have not saved money.  You have spent money on something you probably didn't need.  Most of the items people buy in this way might be used once, maybe, but then end up in the drawer or garage and are not used again.    

    While some of us can see through these sales tactics, other people also use this same method to trick us into believing certain things or reacting quickly in other ways.  If they use the scare tactic of, "If you don't do this NOW, then these bad things will happen!" it effectively turns off people's ability to think and make rational, logical decisions.  Propaganda ads use this urgency to convince you that dire situations will follow if you don't vote such a way, for example.  

    Scammers also use this urgency effectively.  Those phone calls from "the IRS" that insist you better head down to your local target and buy copious amounts of gift cards or else you will be arrested within an hour affectively scare people into failing to consider how likely the whole scenario really is.  I was reading an article about the latest scams, one of which is to use AI to impersonate loved ones' voices who urgently ask for money to be wired in order to keep them out of jail or to save them in some other way.  Scams using Zelle or Venmo have also become common, and again, one thing they all have in common is the urgency with which they push you to respond.  

    I've seen this happen so often that at this point, anything that is presented to me with urgency I receive with great suspicion.  

    But today I found myself wondering if this manufactured urgency is part of the mental health crisis in this country.  That urgency creates anxiety, and if that anxiety cannot be addressed or attended to, it can lead to serious depression. We run around feeling that we have to move fast, fast, fast to get things done.  We make decisions based on urgency and how quickly we can move so that we have time for other things that we will also zoom through as fast as we possibly can.  We aren't living in the moment anymore.  We aren't taking time to enjoy the day.  Everything feels urgent.  

    My challenges for all of us today:

    First, be very wary of the urgencies others bring to you.  The faster others are pushing for something to be done, perhaps the slower we should move to respond so that we genuinely have time to think things through with our non-anxious, rational brain.  

    Second, and again, this is for all of us: I want to encourage us all to breathe!  This life is for living, for enjoying, and that means we need to take time to be in each moment and savor what is good, what is beautiful, to see where God is, where the good is, where love is, without letting our brains run to what must be done next.  

     Finally, try not to let the urgency of others become a contagious way to functioning in the world.  We change the culture by acting differently in the world.  For today, I encourage you to find the moments of quiet, of peace, to rest in those moments and to slow down.  What must be done will be done.  What does not need to be done in this moment or today can wait.  Maybe we will find it didn't really need to be done at all!      

Those Challenging Moments - sermon

 

Luke 6:18-19, 22-23

Acts 16:16-40

5/8/22 

               In Sunday sermons we mostly focus on the gospels, but last week, this week and next week, we instead are focusing on the book of Acts.  The truth is that well over half of our New Testament is written by or in the name of Paul.  His story, and the messages he brings to us have had a huge impact on the Church, and on Christianity as a whole.  The book of Acts, in many ways, is a book about the beginnings of the church, of Christianity, but it, too, in large part focuses on the story of Paul.  So spending some time on his story and his messages has value for us, if only to understand better the history of the church, where we have been, where we have moved to, and where we are heading forward.            

               In today’s passage from Acts, then, we hear of the imprisonment of Paul and Silas.  What struck you as odd about this story?  We tend to read these stories with great seriousness, but the truth is I find this to be a particularly amusing story at many points.

1.        Paul became really annoyed with this woman who was, frankly, helping him spread the word.  We don’t know why he became annoyed, but he was irritated with her presence.  He was so annoyed that he “took her gift” away: calling the spirit of divination out of her so she could no longer be a fortune teller.  Is that a gracious way to behave?  Here is a disciple who is extremely human acting in an extremely human way: responding to his own emotions in a way that could not possibly be helpful.

2.       The “owners” of this slave girl had been cashing in on her gift.  So when Paul called it out of her, they were notably upset.  They then responded by throwing Paul into prison on trumped up charges.  Okay, we know this happens.  Still, what a funny, or odd, part of this story.  Paul’s behavior in reacting out of annoyance led him into prison.  Wasn’t very thought out action on his part, was it? 

3.       Those in the prison are set free and yet they don’t leave.  Now what on earth is that about? 

4.       The guard asks to be “rescued” – and I assume he is talking about escaping the wrath of the Romans who would have had his head for letting the prisoners go free.  But Paul doesn’t tell him how to be rescued.  He tells him, instead, how he can be “saved”. 

5.       The legal people learn that Paul is a Roman citizen, so now they are embarrassed by the way they treated him and have to apologize for it all.

6.       In their embarrassment, then, they beg Paul to leave the area.

All in all, it’s a very weird story.  Don’t you agree? 

As with all biblical passages, then, we are called to go deeper.  What is this story trying to tell us?  Is there a message here for us, something for us to learn and deepen from?  And if so, what is the message here for us? 

There are several things I want to point out about this story.

First, the “crime” that actually sends Paul to prison here is an economic one.  Yes, the owners of the slave girl turn it around and accuse Paul of an uproar in the city center.  But his actual “crime” was cheating these owners of their ability to use the slave girl for economic gain in this way.  Paul and Silas are attacked, beaten and imprisoned because of the greed of these “owners” of the slave girl.  This is true of today, too.  In many ways what looks like politics really comes down to economics.  Those who have don’t like it when they are faced with the possibility of less financial gain and they will still, to this day, come up with other excuses, even make up stuff, in order to act out their fear, their anger of losing what they have.  They too tend not to be gracious or compassionate but go for the jugular, attacking, killing, imprisoning and harming others. This is true at an individual level and it is true in a communal or corporate level.  Greed and the fear of loss do huge amounts of damage in our world.  In this way the story is cautionary for all of us.  Do we, too, out of our economic fears, harm others?  Do we, too, out of our economic fears, weave stories that appear to be about other things than what is really at the heart of the situation so that we can seek revenge or enact “justice” on those who would take from us moneys that we may not have earned in moral ways in the first place?  What causes us the most fear and anger?  And how do we deal with that when it does come?  Do we attack and harm out of our fear and anger?  Or are we able to step back?  To self-reflect and to act with love and grace towards the world around us? 

Another point that I gain from this story: Paul acts in a way that, at some level, frees the girl.  She can no longer be used and taken advantage of anymore because of this gift that she has.  Her “gift” has been cast out.  But he doesn’t do it out of compassion.  He does it because he is annoyed.  And for me this story then calls me to look and consider the times when God is able to use even our flaws, our impatience, our annoyance, to accomplish good things in the world, to bring life out of death, to bring freedom out of captivity, to bring release out of imprisonment. 

The girl relates to Paul.  She is a slave to an owner.  She accuses Paul of being a slave of God.  But she does see the difference: Paul’s “slavery” frees him, while her slavery imprisons her.  It is interesting to me that Paul does get annoyed with this.  After all, she is giving him free advertising.  The passage says this goes on for “many days”.  Maybe he just became tired of hearing her voice.  Whatever, the reason, he “frees” her from what her owners see as a gift, and what to her must have felt like a burden.  But the truth is that we never learn what happens to the girl after this event.  We don’t know if the owners then acted out in anger towards her for no longer being a source of income for them.  We simply don’t know.  Even the author of the book of Acts does not really see some people except as characters in his story.  He, too, overlooks the life of this small one, this “slave girl” in order to focus on his hero.  Jesus would have done differently, I am sure.  But this is a story about the early church and not about Jesus.  And as such, it behooves us, while we can marvel at the good that can come out of bad at times, to still do our best by other people: to have long-sight, long-vision into what our reactive behaviors can do to others.

Finally, the jailer asks to be rescued.  He knows he needs to be rescued.  He understands that because the prisoners have gotten out, that he is in danger and he needs help.  It will be assumed that he has let the prisoners go and he will lose everything as a result.  So, he is asking to be rescued.  But I would say the difference between him and us is that he recognizes his need for rescue.  Do we know we, too, need to be rescued?  And if so, what is it that you need to be rescued from?  What enslaves you?  What holds you captive?  What keeps you from true freedom?  What things imprison us?  Is it a list of “shoulds?”  I SHOULD do this, I SHOULD do that.  Is it a list of societal expectations?  We are expected to do this, expected to do that.  Is it work that is difficult?  Is it our bodies’ limitations?  Is it a worldview of scarcity?  Of fear? 

I think that if this story has anything at all to teach us, it is to, once again, look at things differently.  Would you be able to sing God’s praises and pray with joy if you were unfairly beaten with rods and thrown into prison?  Probably not.  But why not?  Why do we not see our challenges as opportunities for growth and deepening?  And how do we learn to reframe our lives, our challenges? 

There are studies that show that laughter changes us.  I think the saying, “well, I could laugh or I could cry” is an accurate representation of some of the choices that we have about how we see, interpret and understand what happens in our lives.  Can we learn to laugh at things when we feel like crying?  There have also been studies that show that when we smile, it actually improves our mood.  That while we usually think we smile when we are first happy, it can work just as well in the other direction: smile first and then feel happy.  Singing is also shown to create the endorphins in our bodies that lead to feeling well. 

But I think it goes deeper than that.  I think that our culture teaches us to connect through complaining, through our hardships rather than through our joys, and that trains us to see the bad, even in situations that are mostly good.  I will use myself as an example here.  As I’m writing this it is a glorious day outside.  The sun is shining, I can hear birds singing, trees are blooming with flowers.  I worked on this in March, so this week is my birthday, my daughter’s birthday, my mom’s birthday is next week.  I’m siting here thinking about my kids: all of whom are doing really well.  Middle is starting his very exciting internship this week, Eldest is about to graduate and has been accepted into their first choice of grad school, Youngest is looking at colleges, got to go to San Diego with a choir tour, is finishing her junior year.  I have a wonderful husband who is kind, loving and generous.  I have work that is fulfilling and has so much variety in it.  Things are good.  But what did I talk about today with Kristi and Sandy in the office?  I complained about something my son said rather than focusing on the fact that he reached out to me.  I complained about the pollen from the trees making me sneezy rather than delighting in the flowers.  I complained about the scam email I received from someone claiming to be in need of help (though giving me an address that wasn’t real, a “lease” form that had clearly electronically created signatures, a phone number that was marked by google as “scammers”, and asking me to MAIL the check because she wasn’t able to come in), instead of focusing on the reality that I always have more than I need which is why they ask me for help.

Youngest told me the week that on one of the fields at her school, they put out fake coyotes on the lawn.  The intention behind the fake coyotes is to scare off the geese who are so prolific in their droppings that they create a huge mess of the field when they land there.  She then told me that even though the coyotes are extremely realistic looking, the geese eventually figured out that they weren’t real, so the school has had to start moving them around on the field in order for the geese to continue to be scared off. 

Sometimes I think that we get confused by all the fake coyotes in our own lives.  Is this thing over here really a coyote?  Dangerous?  Threatening?  Damaging?  Or does it just appear that way when we are looking for the bad in our lives?

I want to be clear.  I am not saying that we shouldn’t ever get upset.  Really bad things do happen, to us as individuals and to us as communities and to the world.  The war in the Ukraine is one of those really bad things and it should upset us and call us into action.  Terrible things happen in our lives that need addressing.  And depression is a real and formidable force that cannot just be dismissed by “smile”, “Laugh” or “sing”.  What I am saying though, is what I pray almost every week: we can be empowered to do the work of the world, to confront the issues, to face the demons, as it were, by also recognizing the good, by remembering with joy the many, many blessings that come our way each and every day. 

If Paul can sing from prison, we can find delight in things every single day.  We are still in the Easter season and the Easter season calls us, in contrast to lent, to look for the resurrections all around us, every single day.

Don’t let the Coyotes, those beacons of death and danger, fool you: they are fake coyotes after all.  The birds, on the other hand, with their beauty and with their scat: they are very real.  So delight in the green grass, celebrate the life of the geese, and be empowered to remove the “stuff” left behind.  Amen.

Discrediting What We Fear

 

Psalm 147:1-11

John 7:37-52

 

               Last week we talked about Jesus as the Bread of Life.  And this week we come to another metaphor for Jesus: Jesus as living water.  But this time, rather than seeing a ritual created out of it by the followers of Jesus, we see how those who don’t understand, don’t agree, don’t want the changes and vision that he brings, we see how they react.  And it’s the same as any people react to things that are new and that they don’t understand: they react with fear.  They wanted him seized, they wanted him cast out, they wanted him arrested.  And this was especially true when people around Jesus began to see him as prophet, as messiah.  This was an incredible threat to those in charge.  Remember that the vision and hope for a Messiah was one who would, in a military way, overthrow the oppressors, lift up the poor, bring down the rich and mighty.  So those in charge, who would have recognized themselves as the rich, powerful and mighty had every reason to feel threatened by someone others were calling Messiah.  They were afraid for the wrong reasons, since Jesus was not a military leader, was not going to create change through violence, but through love.  Jesus was about freeing both sides of the coin: and that meant healing and redemption for the rich as well as the poor.  But they did not understand.  And so they were afraid.

               Their response?  Well, their response was to discount what they heard.  They grabbed onto something that they could use to discredit the thing they feared and they wielded it with all the strength they could muster. “A prophet does not come from Galilee” they declared.  “The messiah does not come from Galilee”.  They declared this and held fast to it.  They held on to it because it helped them to feel safe: they could discount what they were hearing, what they were even experiencing, by hanging on to a thin, flimsy and inaccurate statement and making it the center of their belief system.  “a prophet does not come from Galilee” they declared as if this was the most important statement in scripture.  They stood on it as the proof they needed to hang onto their beliefs that Jesus was not a threat and could not change their world. 

               Those in charge, those in politics, have used fear and the discrediting that which they don’t want to accept, that which scares them, forever.  Bryan Stevenson who wrote, “Just Mercy” gave a wonderful speech in which he said that our NARRATIVES have to change.  As he said, the people in power preach “fear and anger” and use those to justify policies.  He went on to say that almost every policy decision at this point in time is based on fear and anger.  None are based on hope, or love, or joy.  It is all fear and anger.  And the thing is, fear and anger are the essential components of injustice.  I want to say that again, fear and anger are the essential components of injustice.  We use it, and always have used it, to justify extreme cruelty, to “forget” that all those people whom we label and discredit, those are our brothers, sisters and siblings.  All of them belong to us.  And rather than fear them, harm them, hurt them, we need to work with them, love them, and care for them.  But until we change the fear and anger narratives, we will never succeed in becoming the world united, the world as one, the world God calls us to create.  Bryan Stevenson talked about the ways we discredit that which we fear.  We discredit people struggling with addictions who need our help: we relabel drug addicts as “criminals”.  We relabel people who are struggling to find work and call them “lazy”.  We relabel people of color as “stupid” or “inferior”.  And we do this because we are afraid.  We are afraid of that which we don’t know so we discredit it.  We are afraid of losing our wealth, so we discredit and label the other.  We are afraid of losing our power, so we discredit and label. 

               When the news started coming out about the sexual abuse that had taken place at Cameron house in San Francisco, our Presbytery reacted with fear.  They tried to muzzle the information, they tried to discredit what people were saying.  They were afraid that the truth and that information would destroy the church in this area, would discredit the church.  So out of our great fear, we tried hard to discredit the voices sharing their vulnerable and horrible experiences.  As we know this doesn’t work.  It didn’t work then and it doesn’t work now.  In the process, they revictimized the victims by proclaiming their words as “lies”.  They revictimized the victims by shutting them down and shutting them out.  The church did not behave as a church, it did not act with love.  And as a result of THAT choice, we lost so many of our members.   

               I want to say this, fear is a feeling.  And as a feeling, it is a natural part of the human experience.  It can help us to see where there is danger, and it can help us to make good choices.  But it can also cause us to move into anger, hatred, violence towards others.  And while the feeling of fear is just that, a feeling, the reactions to fear are things we choose and have to choose with great care.  Do we run away, try to discount and discredit what scares us?  Or do we look at it full-on, try to understand and move through the fear into something better?  I remember a quote from the movie, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel: “We came here and we tried, all of us, in our different ways. Can we be blamed for feeling we are too old to change? Too scared of disappointment to start it all again? We get up in the morning, we do our best. Nothing else matters…But it’s also true that the person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing. All we know about the future is that it will be different. But perhaps what we fear is that it will be the same. So we must celebrate the changes. Because, as someone once said, everything will be all right in the end. And if it’s not all right, then trust me, it’s not yet the end."

               While it is deeply true that fear is a normal feeling, a part of being human, we have to choose what we will do with it.  Will we remain stuck in it?  Will we live it out by separating ourselves into “us” and “them?” Because when we do, we do great damage.  That’s when it can cause injustice, when we are reactionary to the fear and act it out.  And the deep truth is that Fear doesn’t leave room for anything else like purpose or beauty.  Or LIVING. 

I look at our playgrounds that no longer have the merry-go-rounds because they were too dangerous and are now beginning to remove even the swing sets as “too dangerous.”  And I feel sad for our children who cannot experience these things.  I remember reading an article when I was living in Ohio about an experiment some reporters had done.  They had gotten together and to see if someone could use the ice cream trucks to poison children.  So they got a truck, they never got a business license and they just went around seeing how long it would take for someone to report them as suspicious after they started selling ice cream to kids.  No one did.  No one even checked to make sure they were legitimate.  No one asked to see their business license, but if they had, the reporters had printed up a false one to show folk.  And they published this article, “Ice cream trucks could be poisoning your kids!”  The thing is, it hadn’t happened.  It had never happened.  They just made this up as a story they thought would sell.  Fear sells.  But it also prevents us from living.

               So, what is the opposite of fear?  The opposite of fear is, of course, love.  And love invites us to understand, to listen, to hear, to stay with the other in relationship, in connection.  It is what Nicodemus said today in this passage: “Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who was one of their own number, asked, “Does our law condemn a man without first hearing him to find out what he has been doing?”  It invites us to look, to have curiosity, to explore.  It does not cut off or make fear-based assessments formed off of one side of the truth, one side of any story.  And it never makes decisions based on fear that limit, condemn, judge or harm others. 

               In today’s gospel story, fear was still ruling the day.  And so, the pharisees not only tried to discredit Jesus, but when Nicodemus was being rational about the situation, they responded by then accusing him, too, of being from Galilee and therefore to be discredited, discounted, ignored, unheard. 

               Fear invites us, in our wiser moments, not to run, but to listen more deeply.  Fear invites us to explore what it is we value that is feeling threatened.  And then fear invites us to look deeper, to open to other possibilities, and to act in love instead.  James Baldwin, “Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.”

               What do you most fear?  And who does your fear have the potential to harm?  What are you discrediting and discounting out of that fear?  And what limitations does that, then, put on YOU? 

               More importantly, what would it look like for you to let go of those fears and instead put yourself in the position of considering the possibility of ideas that you have discredited and rejected out of that fear?  What would it look like for you to put aside that which you fear most to put yourself in someone else’s shoes, with someone else’s view points and beliefs?  What would it look like to stop discrediting those we don’t understand?  Maybe that fast driver on the freeway is not a maniac but is someone with a loved one in the hospital.  Maybe that person who was mean and angry with you in the grocery story was just fired from their job or had a loved one die.  What would it mean to reframe our fears and choose to listen instead, without judgment or condemnation?  What would it mean to recognize that there is always more to be learned, always others to understand, always new ways of living and being in the world?

               I want to end by sharing with you a story.  Once there were two brothers who shared a farm. The older brother had several children and the younger brother had none, but each year they would gather the grain and divide it evenly, each taking half to his own granary.

After a while, though, the younger brother got to thinking that it wasn’t exactly fair that they divided the grain evenly. After all, his brother had all of those children to feed while he had no one but himself. So each night he took to going to his own granary with a sack, filling it full of grain, and carrying it to the granary of his brother.

At about the same time, the older brother also got to thinking that it wasn’t exactly fair that they divided the grain evenly. After all, he had all of those children – to look after him in his old age – while his brother had no one but himself. So each night he took to going to his own granary with a sack, filling it full of grain, and carrying it to the granary of his brother.

Eventually, of course, what had to happen happened. The two of them met there in the middle of the night – and what could they do but fall upon each other, and embrace, and count their blessings for the love in the family?

 

This story shows the opposite of fear: this is a choosing not to live in the fear of not having enough for one self, but the love of seeing the other’s point of view, embracing it, and seeking to care for the other, despite cost to oneself, despite fear. 

It is not easy to let go of fear, especially when the powers that be are constantly using it to their own advantage.  But I invite you to move deeper, to embrace love.  I invite you to remember that fear caused the pharisees to try to discredit even Jesus, even God.  And that fear as a weapon is powerful, but dishonest.  I invite you to remember that LOVE is the opposite of fear, and it is love we are called to embrace and to live out.  I invite you to remember that Jesus overcame fear not with more fear, but with love.  For that we have been created.  And for that we are called.  Amen.

Dangerous, angry times

     Youngest and I went up to Old Sacramento on Saturday afternoon to have some mother-daughter time.  We went to the Crocker Art Museum and then walked down to the train museum and wharf to get some ice cream (because in my mind Old Sacramento means trains and ice cream).  As we walked into the ice cream store, we saw a sign in the middle of the entrance that read "Masks must be worn, as per state mandate.  Anyone failing to comply with this mandate will not be served."  We were wearing our masks, so not a big deal.  We walked up to the counter, ordered our ice cream and stepped aside for the next person to order.  Apparently the people who walked in behind us were not, however, wearing masks.  One of the workers (my guess is the manager) said to the woman behind me, "Ma'am, I'm sorry, but masks are required by state mandate within this facility.  Please put on a mask.  I believe I have one I can give you."  After a minute, though, he said, "Oh, I'm sorry.  It appears we have just run out.  If you do not have your own mask, I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you to leave."  

    I don't know about you, but if I were asked to leave a facility, I would.  I would do it out of embarrassment if nothing else.  But also, I am lacking that sense of entitlement that some people apparently have.  This woman was one of those people.  "Well @#$% that!"  She said, "I'm not going anywhere!"

    She stepped up closer to the counter to order.  The worker said, "I'm sorry, ma'am, but if you do not leave, I'm going to have to call the police."

    "You do that!" she said, and then proceeded to call him a list of nasty discriminatory slurs that I will not print here.  She then turned to two of the other workers insisting that they take her order.  The other workers both shook their heads and backed up, frankly looking a little scared.

    The first worker responded by saying that yep, the slur she had used absolutely applied to him, and that as a result he was better at certain graphicly described behaviors than she was.  He then repeated that if the woman did not leave, he was going to call the police.

    The woman responded by approaching the counter and knocking everything on it to the floor, spilling the tip jar, scattering coins, making a huge and violent ruckus.  The worker then bounded over the counter, the same counter that Youngest and I were standing in front of (which we both quickly stepped back from), to move towards her, threatening to kill her at the same time and saying, "Don't think for a second that I won't do it!"  She laughed and ran out.

    Whew.  Situation over.  But frankly, Youngest and I were so shaken by the incident that we did not have the ability to taste our ice creams at all.  

    While it is a challenge for me to NOT express some of my thoughts on all of this, today I am working hard to face that challenge because I don't see that as productive in this moment.  What I want to focus on instead is this: I think the divisions in our country and in our society, the divisions that I saw escalate in that store, reveal a much larger issue.  

    We have forgotten that we belong to one another.  We have forgotten that the person in front of you with whom you disagree is still your sister, is still your brother, is still your sibling.  We have forgotten that we are to be kind and loving to others, even when they disagree with us, even when we don't like what they believe or what they do, even when we are embarrassed or uneasy, or hurt.

    To put this a bit more forcefully: while it takes effort on our part to respond to anger with compassion, this is the job of being an adult.  Having no self-control or ability to respond to anger with a calm and listening presence can only increase the divisions and the struggles in our world.  To be kind, to be caring: these are not easy, but no one ever said that life would be easy.  Just as you can spread violence by reacting with more violence, you can spread kindness by reacting with a calm and caring presence.  YOU have the power to diffuse violent and scary situations with your very demeanor, with your caring, with listening deeply and responding with compassion.

    So once again we have a choice to make: do we add to the pain, anger, and panic of the world by responding in kind when others lose it?  Or can we be part of the solution and movement to make the world better by staying calm, by hearing one another, and by acting with love?  

    We won't always be able to do the right thing.  I know this.  As always, I'm preaching to myself here and I know that it is not easy to respond to nastiness, to hurtful comments or actions with kindness.  It takes practice.  But, for better or worse, we are getting a whole lot of practice of late!  So take it for the gift it is: to practice taking the high road in the face of anger.  People are stressed.  People are scared.  And ultimately, people are just people: flawed and trying to do the best they can in difficult circumstances.  Try to picture each person as your mother, or your sister, or your best friend: someone having a hard day.  You may disagree with them, but you can still love them.  

    If we can do anything to help the current situation in our culture, it's worth the effort.

    That interaction that Youngest and I witnessed did not just upset the manager and the customer.  An ice cream store full of customers and employees were affected by what we experienced.  And while, fortunately, no one was hurt, things could have gotten worse, they could have escalated even more.  I am thankful that they didn't.  But also saddened that it happened at all.  It would have been so easy for either of the two main characters in this incident to take a different path.  The woman could have just left when asked to do so.  The manager could have stayed calm and just said, "I hear you are upset, but we are required to follow the law."  So much could have been done differently.  But it wasn't.  So I'm just taking the lesson for what it was: a chance to think through my own reaction for the next time someone acts out.  How will I respond?  How will you respond?  How will we make this world better together?  

A New Covenant

 Jeremiah 33:14-18; 31:31-34, Mark 6:1-13

               Today we finish our study of the book of Jeremiah.  And we finish it with two passages from Jeremiah that are, at their base, all about hope.  This is especially true of Jeremiah 31 with those very familiar words, “this is the covenant that I will make with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my instructions within them and engrave them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.  They will no longer need to teach each other to say, “Know the Lord!” because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord; for I will forgive their wrongdoing and never again remember their sins.” This is hope, at its core.  It is a promise that the new relationship the Israelites will have with God will be so close, so intentional that it will no longer have to be heard through words such as the prophets bring, or words such as are written in scripture.  It will be okay that the temple is destroyed because God will live within them and not just at the temple.  The new covenant will be written in our very hearts. Intermediaries will be unnecessary at all. And location will be unimportant.  We will know God because God is right there within us, speaking to us, part of our very beings.  God will be within, not holding grudges, no longer angry, but forgiving and living connected to us. 

               And then we read the passage from Mark.  And there are two parts to this.  In the first we hear that Jesus is not being recognized or honored in his hometown.  And in the second, we hear him give the disciples directions for their future.  He tells them to go into the community with nothing at all on them.  And what are they to do?  We hear it here, “So they went out and proclaimed that people should change their hearts and lives.  They cast out many demons and they anointed many sick people with olive oil and healed them.”  Why do you think these two stories are in Mark together? 

The first part of today’s message in Mark is the experience of Jesus that he then, in the second part, asks the disciples to carry through.  Jesus was proclaiming the Good News, liberty for the captives, sight for the blind, freedom for the oppressed.  And he was healing, bringing these things into a concrete form, making physical what he was proclaiming to be the Good News.  But in his hometown, he was not able to do the work that he felt he was called to do.  So he shook the dust off his feet, did what he could  and then moved along.  In the second part of today’s reading, then, he then tells the disciples to do the same: to go into the world, proclaim the good news, cast out demons, heal and anoint sick people.  If they too are not welcomed or heard, then they, too, are to shake the dust from their feet and move along. 

How does this tie in to the Jeremiah passage?  Jeremiah talks about a New Covenant written in our hearts.  But a Covenant is not a one-way street.  A covenant is something that is created in relationship and it goes both ways.  I commit to doing x and you commit to doing y and we both commit to this out of the depths of love and integrity that form a relationship.  Jeremiah describes what God puts in our heart, God’s commitment to forgiveness and connection.  And the Mark passage describes our part.

And what, again does that look like?  This passage from Mark in which Jesus tells the disciples what they are to do says so very much to us, some of which we recognize in what is NOT said as much as in what is said. 

For example, this passage tells us that the disciples, the followers of Jesus, are not called to fight.  They are not to beat people up with the Bible, with scripture, with the “good News”.  They are not to argue or cause problems.  They are to deliver their message, and if what they share is not received or heard, they are to move on.

               Second, what is the message that the disciples are to deliver?  “to proclaim that people should change their hearts and lives.  To cast out demons and anoint the sick and heal them.”  What is absent here from what we usually think the disciples are being asked to do?  Jesus is NOT telling the disciples to convert people to belief in Jesus.  He is NOT telling the disciples to make sure people have right beliefs.  He is not even telling the disciples to share about Jesus, what he has done and what he will do.  Instead, they are to invite people to change their hearts and their lives.  This is profound.  Once again this is about action, not belief.  And about relationship rather than just a barter exchange of faith for salvation.

               Mark Davis said it this way:  “In my own reading of Mark, I think it is an incredibly important moment when Jesus sends the twelve out preaching repentance. It relates to my somewhat-developed opinion of the so-called ‘messianic secret’ in Mark. The phrase “messianic secret” attempts to name a motif that certainly is central to Mark’s gospel – the repetitive ‘don’t say anything’ moments right where we don’t expect them. For me, however, it is not so much a secret as a re-direction. By attempting over and over to make Jesus ‘the Messiah,’ people were missing the point of his message, which was that the Reign of God was present and that they all were invited to participate in it. As long as they had the Messiah to embody the reign, they were missing the participation part. To ‘follow’ is not to point to, observe, marvel, coronate, or even profess. It is more about joining along, taking up the message, indeed taking up the cross that is central to the message, and “believing” by living in the present reign of God. It is healing the sick, delivering those who are oppressed, etc. In other words, I don’t think the “messianic secret” is a literary device by Mark, but a theological point that Mark saw Jesus trying to re-direct his message away from himself and toward following-as-participating.”

               So then we come to the question of what we are repenting from.  What are the demons that they are casting out?  And this, too, we come to understand by seeing how Jesus lived his life, what his values were, what his call was to the people and what he did.  And we see that lies, greed, addictions, oppression of any kind: these were what he fought against, these were the demons that he was casting out time and again.  They manifested in terrible ways in that time, and indeed they do in our time as well.  And what is at the heart of all of these?  Fear. Fear of not having enough, fear of being the underdogs, fear of losing power or control, or understanding of the world.   Jesus represented change and people were afraid of it.  And their demons were manifestations of that.  Our call, then, as we follow Jesus, is to challenge fear.  To reassure people that in Christ, in God, there is nothing left to fear.   When they accept that truth, accept it in their hearts: take it in as the Covenant in our hearts that God has placed there, then their demons are gone and they can truly live as people forgiven, renewed, and invited into the future.   

               I came across a wonderful song that I will be playing for you later called “Fear is a Liar” by Zach Williams.

               The words are:

When he told you you're not good enough
When he told you you're not right
When he told you you're not strong enough
To put up a good fight
When he told you you're not worthy
When he told you you're not loved
When he told you you're not beautiful
You'll never be enough

When he told you were troubled
You'll forever be alone
When he told you you should run away
You'll never find a home
When he told you you were dirty
And you should be ashamed
When he told you you could be the one
That grace could never change

Fear, he is a liar
He will take your breath
Stop you in your steps
Fear, he is a liar
He will rob your rest
Steal your happiness
Cast your fear in the fire
'Cause fear, he is a liar

Let your fire fall and cast out all my fears

Let your fire fall, your love is all I feel

Let your fire fall and cast out all my fears

Let your fire fall, your love is all I feel

Let your fire fall and cast out all my fears

Let your fire fall, your love is all I feel

Oh, let your fire fall and cast out all my fears

Let your fire fall, your love is all I feel

                And that leads us back to the Jeremiah passage.  Because the other side of fear is hope.  It is hope that there is something bigger than ourselves and something bigger than our fears. It is the hope that even when things are hard, that God’s love is greater than we can imagine, greater than any problems or struggles or pain that we may have.  It is the hope in a resurrection that overcomes every death and is bigger and stronger than even death.  It is a hope that says we CAN change and that things CAN be better.  God sends us this message of hope in so very many ways.  It is truly, all around us for us to hear. 

As you know, Eldest lost almost everything that she owns when she moved back to school at the beginning of the summer.  Her large suitcase, MY suitcase actually, went missing in transit with all of Eldest’s clothing, and several of her personal treasures.  Included in those personal treasures were three of her four favorite stuffed animals.  Maybe that feels like a small thing, but these were her comfort toys, her comfort animals, and it really was a blow to Eldest to face their loss on top of not having any clothing that is familiar to her, nothing that she picked out, and nothing at all to wear for the first week of her return to school.  And yet the other day, Eldest sent me this text:  “There was one stuffed animal that I couldn’t easily fit into my suitcase that I carried with me on the plane.  It was my red panda.  My red panda’s name is Hope.  I lost almost all my stuff, but Hope stayed with me.”

That hope is also there in the words from Mark which call on all of us to be better than we are, to turn, to repent, to be willing to go out into the world with NOTHING but a staff: no money, no food, nothing. 

One of the pastors in my lectionary group is Indian.  He was born and raised in India.  He told us this week that when he came to the United States, he had a small bag of personal items and $8.  That was it.  That was all he had with him, but he trusted that he would find here what he needed and he did.  That is the faith that cannot be separated from action.  That is the faith of repentance, or turning around, changing, going a new way.  And in that is great hope. 

There is also hope to be found in the words of Mark’s first story for today, “He  was unable to do any miracles there, except that he placed his hands on a few sick people and healed them.”  “Except that he placed his hands on a few sick people and healed them.”  While Jesus knows our experience of rejection, while Jesus has experienced it too, at the same time, he was still able to heal a few sick people.  And that may be our experience too.  We speak, we live lives that follow Christ’s call to us to be changers in this works.  And then the hope tells us that we can let go of the results.  All we can do is the work that is before us to do and trust God to do the change where God will.  The wind, the Spirit, the breath blows where it will and we are not in charge of the results.  Fear of failure is itself another demon of fear, one we are called to release, to “exorcise” or to cast out.  Even where Jesus was rejected, healing happened.  And even when we cannot see it, the lives we live for good make a difference in the world. 

If we look for God, we will see God.  And if we look for hope, we will find hope.  Hope is there all around us, all the time.  It is in Jeremiah’s message of God writing the new covenant directly onto our hearts, no more go-between, no more middle-man, no more needing to be told that God is with us because that new covenant is there for us, now, written directly onto our hearts.  It is in the fact that what we do makes a difference, even when and if we can’t see it.  It is in the risks people take to start their lives anew, to make the changes God calls us to make, to step forward with little to nothing in their hands.  And it is in the very covenant that God has written on our hearts: a covenant for good, for love, for connection, for Relationship!  That is powerful and amazing and wondrous and God gives it to us.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.  

 

 

Allowing the unpleasant to have free rent in our heads.

        My spiritual director advised me to work against allowing unkind people to have free rent in my head.  I think we probably all struggle with this.  People who upset us, people who are cruel, people who do terrible things that affect us, those we love, or the world itself - these people are the ones we allow to wake us up in the night and prevent sleep from returning, these are the people we allow to cause us the stomach cramps that lead to ulcers, these are the ones we allow to cause us to move, or to quit jobs, to change careers, or to do something even worse.  

       But yes, I use the phrase "whom we allow..." with intention.  

        It doesn't feel that way, I know.  It feels like they have control in our brains, that their voices, their faces, their incomprehensible behaviors and their cruel choices prevent us from choosing anything other than being obsessed with what has been said, done, or is going to happen in the future.  How can we possibly do anything other than give them the free rent in our brains that their effects on our lives demand?  

       But I keep thinking about what I posted in September, 2015, and the reality that we are in so many ways closer to those we don't like or are struggling with or against than we are to our acquaintances and sometimes even those people we like or love.  If we are not working against this actively, if we are not choosing something different, our brains will focus, give time to, spend energy on the people with whom we are struggling much more than they will on the beautiful people in our lives, the gifts of the people in our lives, the kind and good things that have come and are coming our way daily.   And the question then is, how do we want to spend our time and energy?  On whom and on what do we want to dedicate our lives?  Do we want to spend the limited time we have here staying awake at night going over and over in our heads things we can do nothing about?  Do we want to allow our stomachs and bodies to be destroyed by the remembrances of cruelties and unkindnesses?  Or do we want to pass our time in gratitude and remembrances of the many wonderful good things that come our way each and every day?  Do we want to be awakened with thoughts of celebrations and warmth and good memories?

     I just downloaded through my Kindle Free Books a children's story called Some Days by Maria Wernicke.  It's a short picture book about a child who has lost her father and is grieving that.  She has moments when she feels the warmth of connection, of beauty with the world.  But other times she can't access those feelings and she is upset by that.  It's a story for children, but it, too, speaks to the truth for all of us that sometimes finding those peaceful places of remembrance are hard to do.  Perhaps it is harder for adults even than for kids.  Remembering that "this too shall pass" and that even in the dark times there are always sparks of light, gifts of caring, warm signs of a God who loves us more than we can imagine - remembering these things comes and goes, and when we are really struggling with something, these truths can be elusive.  Holding tight to the memories of the good and right in the world is hard.

    So, how do we do this?  How do we choose not to let the negative stay in our heads free of rent?  Having on hand a list of things for which we are grateful that we may choose to focus our attention on when the bad things come to mind is a start.  What blessings did I experience today?  For what am I grateful?  When the negative comes in at 2:00am, taking time to meditate or focus on the good can be very helpful.  If we still can't sleep, making a deliberate choice to get up, write a card of thanks, send an email, bake bread, sing a song: to create the good and focus on that creation of beauty instead.  These things take practice and intentionality, but I think they are important survival skills for all of us.

   I want to be clear that I am not advocating that we just let the world spin the way it will without taking action against injustices.  But I know for myself that if I am not centered, if I cannot find those gifts of peace and grace and gratitude daily, the actions I would normally take to fight injustice lack power, strength, grounding, conviction, and faith.  If I cannot remember the good, the efforts to work for justice for others also lack conviction - after all, if there is no good, what is the point in fighting for something better or different?  If I am unhealthy because of lack of sleep or a stomach tied in cramps, I become physically unable to do the work that must be done.  Remembering that we must put on our own oxygen masks in order to help those around us means doing the things necessary to sit in love, grace, and peace.  Remembering the joy, delighting in the good, even when things are hard, allows us the space to walk with truth and compassion.

    The goal then is to get to a place where we choose what takes up space in our minds and bodies, to intentionally decide what we will focus on at what time, to start with the good, and then move from a place of strength and love into facing the bad.  That's my work for today.  I offer it to you in the hopes that you also are working towards making good choices for yourselves as well.  Be at peace, friends.

Psalms of Lament

Psalm 51
            Today is our third Sunday of looking at the psalms and today we were supposed to be looking at the psalms of lament.  That being said, I woke up this morning feeling the need to talk more about what is happening in our world today.  The Hebrew word that we translate “lament” literally means “Howl” or “wail”.  A lament, then, is a crying out, and it formed a ritualized way of dealing with grief, with loss, with pain.  Somehow that feels appropriate given what is happening in our world.  Lament psalms could be very personal, such as today’s psalm.  But other laments were corporate.  And I think that today, as we face this pandemic and the crisis that has turned all of our lives over, at least for a time, we are in need of a way of expressing our corporate lament. 
            These laments, these spoken rituals of mourning were so important and so central in practice for the Israelites that there are more laments than any other type of psalm.  Again, there are more laments than ANY other type of psalm.  While there are approximately ten different categories of psalms, laments comprise more than a third of the psalms that we have in our Bible.  Last week I mentioned that trust was the single most dominant theme within the psalms and trust is expressed in all of our psalms, including the lament psalms.  When we think about it, we can recognize that it takes a great deal of trust in God’s grace, God’s mercy, and especially, God’s deep and abiding love for us to be able to complain to God.  We would not dare to complain to a tyrant.  But because we trust that God hears us, that God loves us and that God will respond to our laments, that trust gives us permission to express our pain and petitions for God’s care in the midst of that pain.  Laments are expressed many other places in scripture as well – the book of lamentations consists of five poems mourning the loss of the temple and Jerusalem.  Jesus offers laments, and not only the one from the cross when he quotes psalm 22 with “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me”.  For example, in Luke 13: 34-35 when Jesus says, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. ³⁵ Look, your house is left to you desolate. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’” he is expressing lament.
            Psalms of lament follow a prescribed format.  That format is:
Incantation – or calling on God
Expressions of Complaint
Expression of trust
Petitions asking God for specific things
            and
Praise of God.
           The corporate psalms of lament also add an aspect of remembering God’s past actions.  Each lament may have each of these components in different quantities, however.  For example, psalm 22, the psalm of lament that is perhaps the most well known because Jesus begins to quote it when he says on the cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” – this psalm is mostly complaints and praise, while psalm 51,which we heard today, is mostly petition.
             Psalms of lament truly let all feelings be expressed before God.  And while I think at a cognitive level, all of us understand that we can express anything to God, and that, in fact, nothing should be withheld from God, still, there are aspects of psalms of lament that are challenging, I believe, for all of us.  The first is doubt or accusation against God.  It can feel disrespectful to us to hear phrases such as “How long, O Lord?  Will you be angry forever?”  “How long will your wrath burn like fire?”  “How long shall the wicked exult?”  “Rouse yourself!  Why do you sleep O God?”  And even the well known, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  Does that feel disrespectful to you?  It would be understandable if it did.  But again, I cannot emphasize enough that our ability to express our deepest pain, anger and other feelings are in fact deep expressions of our trust in God.  We trust that God will hear us, will respond, that is the context of these expressions of complaint. 
          The second aspect of our psalms that are difficult for us to hear are the many expressions in the psalms of vengeance, anger, and violence.  Phrases such as “God will punish you with a warrior’s sharp arrows, with burning coals of the broom bush.” (120), “They cried for help, but there was no one to save them—to the Lord, but he did not answer.  I beat them as fine as windblown dust; I trampled them like mud in the streets.” (18), “The Lord will swallow them up in his wrath, and fire will consume them. You will destroy their offspring from the earth, and their children from among humankind.” (21), “O God, break the teeth in their mouths; tear out the fangs of the young lions, O Lord! ⁷ Let them vanish like water that runs away; like grass let them be trodden down and wither.  Let them be like the snail that dissolves into slime; like the untimely birth that never sees the sun.”(58), and perhaps the hardest to hear - “Happy is the one who seizes your infants, and dashes them against the rocks.” (137) 
          We are uneasy with these phrases for very good reasons.  Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:44, “But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”  And he says in Luke 6:27, “But I say to you that listen, love your enemies and do good to those who hate you.”  In the context of Jesus’ words of love and compassion, and his call to us to enact only love and compassion, we find the judgments, violence, anger and deep desire for vengeance to be unChristian at least!  W.H. Bellinger writes this, “The laments amazing candor is sometimes shocking to the reader, but it is crucial to the honest dialogue of faith.  The psalms do not bear witness to prayer ‘as it ought to be’ but to brutally honest prayer from the depths of life.  An honest faith acknowledges life’s realities.  In the Psalms, no part of life is ever beyond dialogue with God….the psalms that seek vengeance call God to the divine task of justice and take the desire for vengeance to the Lord who can act upon it.”  Additionally, it is not necessary that we read these words as our own prayers, though there are no doubt times when we might feel that angry, or that hurt.  And these words give us permission, encouragement even, to be honest with God about our feelings.  Does that mean we are given permission to harbor resentments?  To plan vengeance?  To dwell in anger?  To act out violence?  No.  We are still called to love, even our enemies.  But sometimes the expression of these feelings to God allows us to release them from our own souls.  God knows what we feel and God is a safe being, a loving being to whom we can express even the “unacceptable” feelings.  There is relief in knowing that we have a God with whom we can be completely open and honest.
           Bob sent me an article from the New York Times this week that was talking about the terrible way humans have behaved when pandemics have happened before.  It went into great detail about the horrible ways we have behaved when we were scared or in fear of diseases killing us.  In the past when there have been pandemics, people have even forsaken their children, all children, in their terror and fear and desire to stay safe themselves.  Children were left to die, often to starve, by parents trying to get away. I would hope that we have progressed enough as people that we would never, ever, do this to our children.  But then I see that we cage children at the border, and I realize that this is not so.  Those who live in a state of fear tend to behave badly.  They tend to focus on themselves and their needs above everyone else’s.  You know that this is NOT what we are called to do.  You know this.  So to me, while this article talks about a moral disease accompanying a physical one, I would say this is a spiritual disease that is accompanying a physical one.  We are called to love, no matter what the threat is to our own lives.  We are called to be willing to walk the path towards the cross, towards death even, in the service of that love. 
            Psalms of Lament invite us to express our fear, our pain, our anger, to God so that we may release it and not allow it to control us.  This would be a good time for you to write one of your own.  And I would strongly encourage you to do that.  Don’t let your fear control you.  Don’t let it turn you away from God, from light, and most especially from Love.  THAT is the bottom line.  The expressions to God of all of our feelings allow us to release them.  We hand over our anger and our fear to God, literally through our words and our expressions, through our laments – and that allows us to behave better.  To not act on those feelings, but instead to live into our calls to love, no matter what else is going on.
           In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter was expressing extreme pain over the death of someone he had deeply loved.  The wise Dumbledore recognized the great value in simply allowing Harry to express those feelings.  I want to read you a part of the book: (p. 823):
            “I know how you are feeling, Harry,” said Dumbledore very quietly.
             “No, you don’t,” said Harry, and his voice was suddenly loud and strong.  White-hot anger leapt inside him.  Dumbledore knew nothing about his feelings….
              …
            “There is no shame in what you are feeling, Harry,” said Dumbledore’s voice.  “On the contrary…the fact that you can feel pain like this is your greatest strength.”
            Harry felt the white-hot anger lick his insides, blazing in the terrible emptiness, filling him with the desire to hurt Dumbledore for his calmness and his empty words.
           “My greatest strength, is it?” said Harry, his voice shaking as he stared out at the Quidditch stadium, no longer seeing it. “You haven’t got a clue…You don’t know…”
            “What don’t I know?” asked Dumbledore calmly.
            It was too much.  Harry turned around, shaking with rage.
           “I don’t want to talk about how I feel, all right?”
            “Harry, suffering like this proves you are still a man!  This pain is part of being human –”
           “THEN – I – DON’T – WANT – TO – BE- HUMAN!” Harry roared, and he seized one of the delicate silver instruments form the spindle-legged table beside him and flung it across the room.  It shattered into a hundred tiny pieces against the wall.
              …
              “I DON’T CARE!” Harry yelled … snatching up a lunascope and throwing it into the fireplace.  “I’VE HAD ENOUGH, I’VE SEEN ENOUGH, I WANT OUT, I WANT IT TO END, I DON’T CARE ANYMORE - ”
            He seized the table on which the silver instrument had stood and threw that too.  It broke apart on the floor and the legs rolled in different directions.
           “You do care,” said Dumbledore.  He had not flinched or made a single move to stop Harry demolishing his office.  His expression was calm, almost detached.  “You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.”
           That pain, that deep, bleeding anger, rage, sense of wanting justice and revenge – these are the feelings that psalms of lament express and allow us to express in our own words as well.            Harry did not want to talk through his feelings, so instead he was acting them out, throwing things around the room, destroying things.  When we keep our fears and our pain bottled up, it has a tendency to come out anyway in our actions.  Expressing those feelings to God allows us to choose to behave differently.
             In Mitch Albom’s book, “have a little faith” (p 81-82), the Rabbi, too, expressed the gift in this ability to express and share those feelings.  He said,
           “I had a doctor once who was an atheist.  Did I ever tell you about him?”
             No.
          “This doctor, he liked to jab at me and my beliefs.  He used to schedule my appointments deliberately on Saturdays, so I would have to call the receptionist and explain why, because of my religion, that wouldn’t work.”
            Nice guy, I said.
           “Anyhow, one day, I read in the paper that his brother had died.  So I made a condolence call.”
            After the way he treated you?
           “In this job,” the Reb said, “you don’t retaliate….So I go to his house and he sees me.  I can tell he is upset.  I tell him I am sorry for his loss.  And he says, with an angry face, ‘I envy you.’
         “ “Why do you envy me?’ I said.
          “ ‘Because when you lose someone you love, you can curse God.  You can yell.  You can blame him.  You can demand to know why.  But I don’t believe in God.  I’m a doctor and I couldn’t help my brother!”
        “He was near tears. ‘Who do I blame?’ he kept asking me.  ‘I don’t believe in God, so I can only blame myself.’
           The Reb’s face tightened, “That,” he said softly, “is a terrible self-indictment.”
        Worse than an unanswered prayer?
        “Oh yes.  It is far more comforting to think God listened and said no, than to think that nobody’s out there.”
            Because of our understanding of what it means to be respectful towards God, because of our recognition that we are called towards love and compassion, we can struggle at times with the expression of lament.  But when we don’t express those feelings, they can eat us alive.
             Sometimes we find it easier to express our pain to other people, and that is okay, too.  But again, I encourage us also to come to God with all of those feelings.  God already knows them anyway, and God wants us, calls us, to take the time, take the risk of sharing them consciously with God.  Towards that end, I am going to have us end today by offering up psalm 6, another prayer of lament, together.  And I encourage you again to feel the feelings that are expressed, to allow them to touch you personally in whatever way the words speak to you.  Let us pray together:

Psalm 6:1-10 (NRSV)
¹ O LORD, do not rebuke me in your anger, or discipline me in your wrath.
² Be gracious to me, O LORD, for I am languishing; O LORD, heal me, for my bones are shaking with terror.
³ My soul also is struck with terror, while you, O LORD—how long?
⁴ Turn, O LORD, save my life; deliver me for the sake of your steadfast love.
⁵ For in death there is no remembrance of you; in Sheol who can give you praise?
⁶ I am weary with my moaning; every night I flood my bed with tears; I drench my couch with my weeping.
⁷ My eyes waste away because of grief; they grow weak because of all my foes.
⁸ Depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the LORD has heard the sound of my weeping.
⁹ The LORD has heard my supplication; the LORD accepts my prayer.
¹⁰ All my enemies shall be ashamed and struck with terror; they shall turn back, and in a moment be put to shame. 

In expressing these feelings we can trust absolutely that God cares, that God hears, that God invites us forward into new life, healing from our griefs and stepping forward into tomorrow with God at our side.  Amen.